What is beauty?
Traveling often evokes an identity crisis within me. I’ve been a part of bits and pieces of many different cultures but never know which one is mine. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t white. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t American. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t blonde. Then I dye my hair and wish I wasn’t brunette. There are many different voices, opinions, and standards telling me what beautiful is and frankly… I have NO idea how to define it. I’ve changed my own mind about what makes something or someone beautiful time and time again, each time with a little more confusion and a little less certainty than the time before.
What is beauty?
The fact that I don’t even know which community I belong to/ want to belong to/ am accepted in, makes me feel much more lost in this area than the average bear who’s community defines beauty for him. I find myself chasing people’s ideals of beauty and imitating them, trying to find out what it is for myself. I just want be me. Easy for someone else to say. But what if I don’t know what me is supposed to look like, to say, or how me is supposed to act? Half the time, I don’t know what I’m “supposed” to do based on “where I’m from” because I don’t even know from where I hail.
What is beauty?
I don’t have a label. I don’t fit into any predetermined category. Who am I? Which identities do I embrace? And for when and what? When is it appropriate to change to be a part of your current culture and community? Beauty should be interchangeable in all settings, right? How do I stay the same person all the time? SHOULD I stay the same person all the time or be adapting to my location? And it goes beyond clothes and skin and gestures. How do I value ANYTHING without a working definition of beauty? What things are and SHOULD be valued as beautiful?
What is beauty?
God is my rock and foundation. I need to begin this search with Him and let His word transform my warped views of beauty and my identity. I am confused. I am fickle. I am broken. God is strong. God never changes. God restores the broken. I am inadequate. I am weak. I am dirty. God is perfect beauty. Jesus’ death is perfect beauty. What God created was good and beautiful. Then we messed that up with sin. With Jesus’ sacrifice, all my ugly shortcomings and weaknesses are covered and God only sees Jesus’ beautiful and perfect love. Jesus’ love has made my heart beautiful. Love has given this soul purpose. Love has turned something ugly into something beautiful.
What is beauty?
When I think of the people in my life who I find most beautiful, it is those who are Jesus’ hands and feet. Who are selfless servants. Those who love with all they have. Romans 10:15 says, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things!”
What is beauty?
I may never fully be a part of any one community. I many never completely share ideals of beauty with a given society. But I do know who I am in Christ. And I do know that His love has made me beautiful. I am still a broken vessel but I am also a child of the Redeemer. I hope He will use me- inadequate on my own- to serve and love Him and others.
“Love will make you beautiful.” The Afters
This was an awesome post. I started reading it and completely identifying with you and throughout it I could completely identify with you. It all comes down to God and who we are in Him because we truly have and are nothing without him. You said it best when you said "I am a broken vessel, but I am also a child of the Redeemer." We are broken, and without him we sink to the bottom of the sea, but with Him, our Redeemer we can be used for anything. We can weather any storm.
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