Being Beautiful

                                                —by Chris Stinnett

 

A young woman in China broke up with her 28-year-old boyfriend because he was obsessed with actress Jessica Alba. But now she misses him, so she is going to great length to win him back. She is going to have plastic surgery to make her look like Jessica Alba. She will need multiple surgeries to reshape her nose and eyes in order to resemble the actress.

            The woman, who would only give the name Xiaoqing, was advised by her friends to undertake the surgeries. And the Shanghai Time Plastic Surgery Hospital doctors have offered to perform the procedures for free in order to “showcase their surgical skills.”

            There is nothing in the news reports to indicate what will happen to the woman when age takes its toll. And there was nothing said about why she would want to link herself to a man with such shallow values.

            She’s not alone, though. Apparently lots of people think their appearance is the most important thing about them. A different news story reported that over 11,000 teenagers in the U.S. had Botox® injections to reduce or eliminate wrinkles. Wrinkles? In a 16-year-old’s face? It seems there is a myth that early treatments will not only smooth the face now, but will prevent wrinkles in the future. One girl said, “I don’t want to look haggard and ugly by the time I’m 25.” Again, there was no comment about the appearance of her shriveled soul.

                        He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not (Isaiah 53:2-3 NIV).

            Hundreds of years before Jesus came among us, the prophet noted there would be nothing particularly inviting about His appearance. When the gospels were written about the life, ministry and sacrifice of Jesus, none of them described His features. We don’t know if He was tall or short, dark or light, big nose or small, coarse skin or smooth. None of that mattered then; none of it matters now.

            What matters is who He is. As the Scriptures tell us who He is, His actual beauty shines from the page. His love and compassion combine with an unyielding allegiance to the Father. The result is a living, walking, breathing example of what human beings were created to be. And He calls us to accept His forgiveness and imitate Him in His full human nature.

            Society places enormous pressure on us to look good; Christ calls for us actually to be good. If we submit our lives to Him and cooperate with the transformation that is to take place within us, we’ll possess a genuine beauty that will shine through any outward appearance we might have.