Inner Beauty and a Gentle Heart — Morning Devotions

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I hope that you’re well, and that’s gonna be a really good day for you. It was Jennifer Lopez who once said, Beauty is only skin deep. I think what’s really important, she said, is finding a balance of mind, body and spirit. Someone said to me not too long ago, until you’re 20 you have the face you’re born with, and after that you have the face, you deserve. And Jennifer Lopez says, I really love that, the idea that you wear who you are on your face. That’s an interesting comment, isn’t it?

What do you think? Is it true that beauty is only skin deep? We seem to place great value on outward beauty. The teenage magazines sponsor the Dream Guy and the beauty queen contest with great emphasis on looks and personality, and men and women of all ages work and diet and exercise to remain trim and to try and get rid of those awful wrinkles.

And as for this inevitable ageing process, the cosmetic and fashion companies provide lots of ways to cover it up and make us appear more beautiful than we are than we look in the morning mirror. So I guess we emphasise skin deep beauty. We’d say yes, beauty is only skin deep, but do you know that psychologists are now saying that physical beauty can actually have a profound effect on our.

For example, some studies have shown that attractive looking people tend to be treated with more respect than less attractive people, and the attractive people, whoever they are, are generally perceived in a much better light. So what that’s saying to me is we live in a superficial world. Beauty is how you look on the outside, but it doesn’t make you a good or a bad person. It refers really to the outward beauty of a person, and of course, we must realise that a person can be beautiful on the inside.

Without being attractive on the outside, we talk about someone as being a lovely person. We’re referring to not just their outward appearance. It says that the outward appearance of a person counts for nothing, but what it is really is what lies beneath the skin, you know, that actual person he or she is. So it means that really you shouldn’t care about what a person looks like because it’s only on the outside. Now, if someone’s really good looking and is really not a very nice person, do you want to spend time with that person?

But if a person were ugly but really a nice wholesome person, would you like to spend time with that person? You’d say probably yes. So again, there, beauty is just the outside, it’s really what’s on the inside that counts. One of the only things that should matter, I guess, is the personality of that person, not what they look like. So just because they’re beautiful on the outside doesn’t mean.

That that automatically happens on the inside. People who may not be attractive in their looks can actually have a greater impact on the world. For example, it was May 2006 that a nine year old boy named Jeremy Gabriel from Quebec and Canada was actually chosen to sing for the Pope in Rome’s Vatican City. Now I don’t know if you’ve heard Jeremy Gabriel or seen him on the internet. He’s got a beautiful voice, but he was born with what’s called a Treacher Collins syndrome. It’s a rare birth defect that causes facial disfigurement and deafness. And as this boy sang, uh, the adults there were profoundly moved. They, many of them wept because of this beautiful voice. Now Jeremy, looking at him as I have on the internet, he’s certainly not a handsome boy, but his gift and sincerity is quite outstanding.

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You look beautiful, be beautiful in your heart by being gentle and quiet. This kind of beauty will last, and God considers it very special.

So why do we have this emphasis today on the externals, you know? Why do we take the outward appearance to determine what a person’s like? Some people I know feel they’re very inferior. They’re no good because they’re not attractive as other people are, and they feel sort of rejected as a result. And that’s really sad because real beauty, and we could spend time another time.

I’m talking about this comes from deep within the soul and the heart of the person. That’s why it says in Proverbs 31:30 from the Old Testament referring specifically to women, charm can be deceiving and beauty fades away, but a woman who honours the Lord deserves to be praised. And Peter in 1 Peter 3 says, Don’t depend on things like fancy hairdos or gold jewellery or expensive clothes to.

You look beautiful, be beautiful in your heart by being gentle and quiet. This kind of beauty will last, and God considers it very special. Beauty, skin deep. Well, Lord, we do acknowledge that some of us don’t have a lot of attractiveness in our looks, but we know that we count to you. Help us to see people as they really are. I pray in the name of Jesus.

Amen.

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