Sorry friends for posting so late today. I was pondering today about what to write about, I have so many thoughts and writings that I have started but I want my posts to be by God for God so after praying about what to write for his glory, he laid today's topic on my heart.
I have been following the news about the rapper Kayne West's mother who died from complications of her cosmetic surgery. My prayers are with him and his family. While I do not listen to his music, I am aware of who he is and the contributions that his mother made during her life here on this earth. She was a very highly esteemed, respected, successful and well educated single mom. I thought of her as a role model for how she never let her single mother status stop her from achieving her goals.
I hope that my thoughts surrounding this situation do not come across as uncaring, or disrespectful as I am not commenting on his mother but of what I feel is the trap behind cosmetic surgery and the need for women to feel pretty. With so many un-reported complications behind cosmetic surgery, eating disorders, depression, and other ugly things associated with the need for our girls to fit in a mold that is not always as pretty or beautiful as they think. What about the images that our boys are given. What they are taught to accept and embrace as beauty? This has been such a heavy weight on my heart and mind this week.
For instance, today I felt I was having a very un-pretty day. Translation, I just didn't feel that I looked my best. Something has created a break-out on my face, right around my eyes and so I felt as though I look horrid, as young as I am I seem to sprout grey hair by the hour, I feel as if I look so old. I can tell that I am gaining weight in the wrong place, but just don't have the time to committ to the strenuous excersise that is needed to manage it before it gets out of hand. All of my flaws and insercurites seem to be right in my face larger than life.
Well as soon as I accepted these thoughts, the enemy being the person that he is decided to try and get in a few punches- "Vanity, saved women aren't supposed to struggle with feeling pretty. It's vanity and pride." Well I cast that imagination down and decided to talk to my husband about how I was feeling. Why? Well first the way we think of ourselves is how we project ourselves, I believe and secondly and more imortantly I have two beautiful daughters, and they both have days when they tell me they just don't feel pretty.... I want and NEED to learn how do I deal with this? How do I teach them self acceptanace and how to embrace thier inner beauty, and most importantly how to accept how God sees them!
Is there Scripture supporting how we view ourselves? YES-And last but not least, how do I teach them that naturalness and modesty is beautiful ? Truly I know that the world is against the very thing that I stand for in regards to modesty, and I don't want this to be a battle for my daughters.
I also find it sad that the generation of women who taught us as young women to embrace our beauty, that it comes from the inside and not the outside are now turning to the knife to make them mainstream beautiful. What has happend when our grandmothers are now falling under the pressure of the sterotypes that the world had given us about beauty and self acceptance??
A few Scriptures came to mind as I meditated and prayed about this , the first being Psalm 149:4For the LORD taketh pleasure in his people: he will beautify the meek with salvation. I love this Scripture!! I remember the days when I wouldn't go to the corner store without a face full of make up! How sad was I to be bound in selfcentered vanity!!! I want my daughters to grow up knowing strongly that a meek and humble spirit given through salvation is the most beautiful gift ever recieved! I want my nephews to grow up knowing that true beauty comes from within, it is not what man teaches us, it is not what we see on the magazines, and televisions but it radiates from within. Beauty is a way of life, not a mask that can be brushed on and washed off, trimmed, or lengthend, or artificial in any way.
We must teach our little girls and boys from babies to adults how to love themselves, and to accept the person that God has made them. If there is anything that they don't like about themselves, we have to teach them to pray and ask God to help them love themselves as he created them, and to give them the measure of meekness that is needed to be beautiful and of great price in his eyes. 1 Peter 3:4 But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.
Now don't get me wrong, I am not at all saying that we shouldn't want to look nice, or pretty, I am saying that we have to be careful and see the bond of vanity that can easily creep in and take away our appreciation for how God created us. If we or (our children) find ourselves comparing ourselves to what the world thinks is beautiful, we need to stop and pray for God to refocus us and shift our thoughts to the things that are beautiful in his eyesight. I have so many thoughts on this that I believe this could constitute a Part II!
