All Things Beauty? All in One Place?

I've walked past this store in the mall many times, and plenty of times I've felt that something not right is being 'shouted' from the advertisements in the windows. It makes me feel sad.

I'll tell you why.

Over and over I've seen messages in the ads in the windows that say beauty is found outside of a woman. 

For example:

It's like these ads are shouting to anyone who walks past that women need something outside of themselves to attain beauty. That bothers me. "All things beauty. All in one place." Beauty is found in a place. "21 days of beauty...it's our most loved semi-annual event!" Beauty is found through buying enough of the right things at an event. "Bring the beauty." "Makeup: Report for beauty!" Beauty is found in products.

I don't believe that beauty is found in a place, in an event, in a product. I don't believe that beauty is outside of a woman, and she needs to strive to make sure she has it. I don't believe beauty is outside of a woman.

I believe that beauty is found already inside of a woman. 

It's not her PLUS makeup, clothes, a perfect hairstyle, a skinnier body...any of that stuff our culture has shouted to us.

A woman already IS beautiful. 

She doesn't have to become beautiful.

A woman is beautiful because she has a Maker who, though it might sound a bit odd to our ears, is Himself the most beautiful One ever. And He wanted to give us a reflection of the way He is...so He made women to display His beauty.

She's not beautiful just because she herself is so amazing, but she's made to reflect back to the world a message about the One who made her. The way she is (but also women collectively) images God. 

Her beauty tells a story to the world about the way the Maker is.

So that's why I feel bothered by those ads in the windows. They're trying to sell me, and every woman walking by, the lie that we need something outside of ourselves to GET something we REALLY WANT: beauty. The heartbreaking lie is that beauty is found somewhere outside of a woman...that a woman can be beautiful if she does enough to become beautiful. But a woman already is beautiful, without doing anything, without adding anything, without needing anything. She isn't beautiful because the culture says she is, or because she measures up to some cultural standard of what we've defined beauty as, but because she has a Maker. Her Maker has decided that one thing all women would carry around in their physical body would be beauty. It's not a choice, it's not something they have to attain or earn or strive for. It's just a part of who each woman is. Yes, the beauty of her personality is part of it, but physical beauty, beauty you can see with your eyes, is just essential to what it is to be woman. 

And what makes it all even more sad for me is that those ads are pretty much shouting out that lie about it's me PLUS something else, but we don't even notice that they're shouting because we've all heard that lie, our whole lives, without questioning it. We've grown up on a diet of lies about what beauty even is, and who has it, and where it's found...so when there are images that say "Beauty is found in a product," we don't even think twice. Not many of us have had anyone in our lives to tell us the truth, or to point out the lies. 

So I guess I write this blog post, for myself, and for anyone who stumbles upon it out there in the huge world of the Internet. You can't find beauty inside of Ulta. It might feel like you can...that's because we've all grown up learning and believing that those are the places where beauty is found: a 'beauty parlor,' 'beauty salon,' 'Ulta Beauty.' But it's not found out there, in striving, in adding. It's already in who we are, in being crafted and formed by a God who wants to speak a message about Himself through seeing us. 

--Sarah Howard

Embracing My Limits: Lessons Learned While Slowing Down

There is nothing quite like being forced to slow down. And there is nothing that halts me in my steps and redirects my pace quite like pregnancy. This third time around you would think that I wouldn’t be surprised by the necessary change in rhythm to accommodate my limitations, but alas it has caught me off guard again.    

I feel as though I am living what might have been deemed the “time of my confinement” during medieval times (haha) as I am forced to rest for long periods of my day. Some might think, “How heavenly! Forced rest.” However, I have found it to be challenging. First of all, I’m not just talking about a nice pregnancy nap here and there, but something more along the lines of bed rest at times where I need to have someone come and make my girls lunch and play with them so that I can sit for a while (aka hours). It’s not easy for me to sit still with a toddler and preschooler running around needing attention and making messes that I can’t clean. However, what has felt more difficult is not just having to be still but having to let go of my ideals of being super mom and housewife and having to “trim the fat” off my schedule. Everything not 100% necessary has been placed to the back burner including extra involvement at church.

Having to cut back on things has been revealing to me again my tendency to believe that I have to perform in order to be valued or that part of my identity is in what I do. I have wondered about what people might think about my decreased participation in things at church right as my husband has started a new position there. The questions start to roll around in my mind. Should I push harder to be more involved? I feel like I am missing out on things God is doing. What do I tell people I have been up to when they ask? Sitting on my couch and being a wife and mom to my best ability?   

The great thing about wrestling with questions during this season has been having the extra space to process them before God. Here are three things that He has revealed to me as I bring my questions and feelings to Him:

1. It is RIGHT for me to embrace and make adjustments to live within my limits.   He has never asked nor expected of me to be HIM essentially. He doesn’t expect me to have super human strength. Although this season won’t be forever, learning to embrace my limitations will. They are God given, and they do not surprise Him. I don’t have to push past them and do more.

2. I have nothing to prove in all of this waiting and “down time” and I AM NOT missing out on what He is doing. This one is HUGE for me. My identity never was and never will be found in just what I can do. I have nothing to prove to others. I am not failing by recognizing my weakness and need to take breaks. I AM NOT missing out on what God is doing as if He only exists to be glorified in the tasks I complete for Him in formal ministry. He doesn’t remove His presence in my life until I can jump back on the bandwagon at church. What He is doing isn’t just OUT THERE. He is at work in our home and my children and me. That is no small thing.

3. Life is found in walking with God and doing what He requires of me, NO MORE and NO LESS. This is another big one for me because I think I can confuse what I think God is asking of me with what my desire is to do for Him or what I think people’s expectations of me are. When I try to prove myself and do more than what He has asked, I get burned out. When I do not step out to do what God desires even when it feels stretching then I get stuck. He gives us rhythms and limits not to cramp our style but to bless us and reveal new things about Himself. He is GOD and is fully capable of using anything and everything for His glory not just the tasks that I deem good enough. Thank goodness!

I want my life to speak of the greatness of God by embracing my limitations and not pushing past them to control and prove myself. I want my children to grow up knowing that God is near in all situations and not just the ones that we consider big and exciting. They don’t have to strive and burn themselves out. I can literally be still and know that God is God. The world hasn’t stopped because I have to slow down and neither has He. That is comforting.

--Sophia Howard

Behold, The Fear of Knowledge is the Root of All Sorts of Problems

I was once told that my relationship with God cannot be based on simply knowing about him, but must also be based on experiencing him. I was in high school, and while I felt like I had a pretty solid relationship with God, this youth leader proceeded to point out that I was not very emotional or expressive about my faith. What I was passionate about (that he didn’t seem to notice) was learning about God. I spent several years after that discussion wondering what was wrong with me. I could look around and see people having these wonderfully expressive and emotional spiritual experiences, but I could never really get all hyped up like they could.  

If you know me, you know that I am not an emotional person. I once teared up at my grandfather’s funeral, but that’s only the second time in my adult life I remember almost crying. It’s not that I think emotions are bad, I just tend toward analytical processing over emotional. This has given me a unique perspective in my spiritual journey, one that that youth pastor couldn’t relate to.  

It also allows me to offer this “mirror” warning: Your relationship with God should not be based solely on experiencing him, but also on knowledge of him. And I honestly believe this is a problem in the American church. We have made Christianity all about the experience, at the expense of pursuing knowledge. We are afraid, perhaps, that too much information will spoil our buzz.

Ask the average American Christian about their faith, and they will almost certainly tell you about God’s love for them, their love for God, how their faith makes them feel hopeful, secure, joyous. Ask them about Calvinism (for example), and you’ll be met with blank stares. I’m not suggesting the first answers are bad, nor that everyone should have a deep understanding of Calvinism, but when a huge percentage of a population has knowledge as deep as a frisbee, we are bound to have problems.

I know that Joel Osteen is an easy target, but he’s familiar, so I’ll go with it. The reason he has such mass appeal, and the reason he makes some people’s ears melt (including mine), are the same. He preaches (if you can call it that) a Prosperity Gospel that is all about how you feel, and is utterly devoid of substance. Even late night comedian Stephan Colbert, when asking him about his book, The Power of I Am, expected it to be a reference to God as the “I Am”. He was quickly corrected by Osteen, who went on to tell him about how powerful positive thinking could be in your life, no need for theology.

I believe that this over reliance on emotion and skepticism of knowledge has even deeper ramifications. It relieves Christians of the need to think for themselves, and replaces it with a herd mentality that we can just do what all the other Christians are doing. I can go with the flow as long as I get to hear some encouraging words on Sunday. Not so sure you agree with what that pastor, politician, or Christian TV personality said? Oh well, don’t worry about it. He listens to worship music too, and it’s not like we have anything objective to judge it against, right?

Thankfully, there are opportunities to build your knowledge. At LFA, we have Truth for Living classes, Alpha, and events like the Parent Summit where we can gain useful knowledge and begin to think critically about what we’ve been told. Information and understanding are not to be feared, nor is it a waste of time to study theology, science, global politics, etc. We need to stop “dumbing down” Christianity in the American church. Faith can begin and be expressed through emotional experience, but it is grown and strengthened through knowledge of God’s word and his plan for humanity.  Emotions come and go, but knowledge tends to stick around.

--Jeff Hyson

Choices for 2018

Well, it’s not quite light and I’m snuggled up on my couch. I’m watching the lovely snow dance and swirl around the trees in my woods--then settle, exhausted and silent, on the frozen ground. Now, normally, I would be filled with delight at its beauty and its accompanying solitude, the unexpected gift of a day interrupting the routine. But I am supposed to be in my car, on my way to celebrate Christmas with my southern belle granddaughters in Durham tomorrow. And one of my wonderful grandsons is graduating from the College of Missionary Aviation on Sunday in Florida. Instead of clicking off the miles heading south, I am clacking away on my laptop going nowhere. Rats!

Life doesn’t always go according to my plans, even my good ones.

But now I get to choose. Will I choose to be angry? Will I let my frustration and my disappointment control me? Will I then lash out at Kenny or be short and rude to my dear in-laws (who now live with us)? Will I be uptight and anxious and make myself feel physically rotten? Will I kick the dog—if I had one? I am disappointed and frustrated, there is no doubt. But I do have a choice.

Author Max Lucado, in a preface to his devotional, Grace for the Moment, addresses this idea of choosing. I think you will appreciate his thoughts as much as I do. This is something I aspire to as I greet an unknown and uncharted 2018.

Each Day…

 It’s quiet. It’s early. My coffee is hot. The sky is still black. The world is still asleep. The day is coming. 

In a few moments the day will arrive. It will roar down the track with the rising of the sun. The stillness of the dawn will be exchanged for the noise of the day. The calm of solitude will be replaced by the pounding pace of the human race. The refuge of the early morning will be invaded by decisions to be made and deadlines to be met.  

For the next twelve hours I will be exposed to the day’s demands. It is now that I must make a choice. Because of Calvary, I am free to choose. And so I choose.

I CHOOSE LOVE

No occasion justifies hatred;

no injustice warrants bitterness. I choose love.

Today I will love God and what God loves.

I CHOOSE JOY

I will invite my God to be the God of circumstance.

I will refuse the temptation to be cynical…

the tool of the lazy thinker. I will refuse to see

people as anything less than human beings, created by God.

I will refuse to see any problem as anything less than

an opportunity to see God.

I CHOOSE PEACE

I will live forgiven. I will forgive so that I may live.

I CHOOSE PATIENCE

I will overlook the inconveniences of the world. Instead of

cursing the one who takes my place, I’ll invite him to do so.

Rather than complain that the wait is too long,

I will thank God for a moment to pray. Instead of clenching my

fist at new assignments, I will face them with joy and courage.

I CHOOSE KINDNESS

I will be kind to the poor, for they are alone.

Kind to the rich, for they are afraid.  And kind to the unkind

for such is how God has treated me.

I CHOOSE GOODNESS

 I will go without a dollar before

I take a dishonest one. I will be overlooked before I will boast.

I will confess before I will accuse. I choose goodness.

I CHOOSE FAITHFULNESS

 My debtors will not regret their trust. My associates will not

question my word. My wife will not question my love.

And my children will never fear that

their father will not come home.

I CHOOSE GENTLENESS

Nothing is won by force. I choose to be gentle.

If I raise my voice, may it be only in praise.

If I clench fist, may it be only in prayer.

If I make a demand, may it be only of myself.

I CHOOSE SELF-CONTROL

I am a spiritual being…

after this body is dead, my spirit will soar.

I refuse to let what will rot rule the eternal.

I choose self-control. I will be drunk only by joy.

I will be impassioned only by my faith.

I will be influenced only by God.

I will be taught only by Christ.

I choose self-control.

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,

goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

To these I commit my day.

If I succeed, I will give thanks.

If I fail, I will seek His grace.

And then, when this day is done

I will place my head on my pillow

 and rest.

 It’s still snowing and the wind is relentless.  There is no way we should be out in this. A bit reluctantly, I am choosing patience. I am trusting God, who is not surprised by this blizzard- wannabe nor the thwarting of my plans. It has been a good morning to write, reflect, and pray, a special gift of unexpected time from my Dear Father who knew just what I needed. 

It feels good, doesn’t it, to make the right choices, to walk in the Spirit, making decisions according the Holy Spirit’s guidance and acting with the spiritual power that He provides? I wish I could say my life always bears fruit like this, which is pleasing to God.

I am praying it will be my pattern for this year.

How about you?

- Eileen Hill

How Will You Walk in 2018?

These days still afford us the opportunity to consider how will we walk out our lives in this new year. The Apostle Paul challenges us in the letter to the Ephesians (chapter 5) to examine our walk. Click here and consider three important ways we are called to walk in. As you do so, you will also be reminded by Scott Hubbard that the "Christian life is not a sprint. It is a journey of ten million steps.” 

May God give us all grace so that our walk will bring glory to His Name.

- Diego Cuartas