More than Beautiful

This weekend, I was browsing through the back end of this website, and I came across all of the tags I’ve used over the past 15 years. I cringed a little when I saw the top tags and how many times I had actually used them.

Beautiful and beauty were some of the top used tags, and I knew immediately the message I was sending out in those posts.

People ask me why they don’t see any of my previously published books on my site, and I simply say, “I am writing from a different place and a different heart now. Those old books don’t necessarily reflect the message I’m giving today, so I don’t promote them.”

What I mean when I say that is exactly the reason I cringed when I saw these words among the top of words used over the years.

The Overall Message in Women’s Ministry Today

If you go to a women’s conference or study group today, you’re likely going to get an overall message regarding the beauty of a woman. You’ll hear about how delicately you were made, and let’s really be honest here… Messages in women’s ministry today are almost 100% about your physical attributes, self-image, self-confidence, and it’s easily a surface level and self-focused message that will leave you feeling good about yourself.

You leave feel empowered and beautiful and all the things you were meant to feel when you left the conference. Then, life hits, and you find yourself failing at being able to keep those same feelings…so you need more.

You may be one who attends any and all women’s conferences because of how you feel when you leave there. They’re filling a spiritual need you have, but we were never meant to have that need filled by ourselves or a prettily packaged message wrapped in a picture-perfect bow.

I hate to admit it, but this is the message I’ve preached most of my years of ministry, and it’s a message that leaves you needing more because you’re depending on the message of someone else to sustain you rather than the power of God and his word.

The enemy is so aware of human nature, and he’s crafty. He can create an idol out of a message, and it seems right as long as it has some scripture sprinkled in.

This type of message is what people want to hear. People like hearing about themselves and feeling better about themselves, but we have gotten so far away from the actual message of God.

It’s not about us.

It’s about HIM.

Of course, women are beautiful. We were created in his image.

So were men, but we don’t hear men’s ministry constantly preaching about how rugged and handsome they are. Do we?

Why is the focus of most women’s messages about their beauty?

That seems kind of gross to me. It seems like we are forgetting who we are all while giving messages about identity in Christ.

And, y’all, I’m guilty of this. My guilt is so clear when I look back at my early writing.

More than Beautiful

We are so much more than our beauty. In fact, our beauty is of such little importance in the grand scheme of life. It has no effect on our eternity. It has no effect on our ministry. It has no effect on any part of our lives that isn’t self-indulgent or self-seeking.

Read that again: Our beauty has no effect on any part of our lives that isn NOT self-indulgent or self-seeking.

When messages are based on our beauty, we miss the mark on who God created us to be. Don’t you think the enemy LOVES this message we so often hear in women’s ministry today?

He loves it because it’s taking our focus off of God and placing it on us – all in the name of Jesus.

He loves it because when our focus is our beauty, we fall hard when we face things that change how we look on the outside: weight gain or loss (even when it comes from the amazing gift of carrying a child), illness or accidents that cause scars or blemishes, cancer that takes away our hair, changes our weight, or takes away our breasts, ovaries, or uterus – those things that we feel make us a woman.

He loves it because if all of our focus is on our beauty, he can take it away (or bring someone into our lives who we find to be more beautiful), and our confidence is shot because we’ve wrapped our identity into it all. THEN, we feel insufficient and ill-equipped to walk in our purpose – the purpose that has nothing at all to do with how beautiful we are.

Let’s Cut to the Chase

Let’s just cut to the chase and start out by coming into agreement that you’re beautiful.

You’re beautiful, and I’m beautiful.

You’re beautiful, I’m beautiful, and the woman you are constantly comparing yourself to is beautiful.

We are all beautiful.

BAM! Look how easy that was. We don’t need a whole weekend designated to teaching us this. We’re already there.

Now what?

We have taken Psalm 139:14 and turned it into something it was never intended to be.

As difficult as it is for me to say this, let me say I have taken this verse and turned it into something it was never intended to be.

I hate that I’ve done this, but I have, and I’m here to correct my mistakes and wrong teaching.

James 3 warns us about becoming teachers because we will be held responsible for our wrong teaching, and as a writer and speaker, I carry that weight. I don’t take this warning lightly, so I am apologizing for how I’ve taught this in the past.

This passage in Psalm 139 was written by David, a man, speaking of his awe regarding how God made humankind. It had nothing to do with beauty and everything to do with all the intricate parts of us and how distinct we are from all other parts of creation.

We each have different abilities and gifts in life. Women’s ministry tends to focus on the attributes of the Proverbs 31 woman, especially when it comes to being a wife and a mother. Somehow, we don’t hear stories of the other women: the judge, soldier, queen, benefactor, missionary, prophet, apostle, disciple, protector (of both men and women), and the list goes on.

You, my friend, are more than beautiful!

You have been given a gift. You have been called by name by the Creator of the universe to lead people to Him, and the way you do it is not going to be the same as the way I do. The best way to lead people to Him is in the way you live and the way you love others. How are you using the gifts and passions God has so intricately knitting within you when you were made in that secret place of your mother’s womb?  How can any of us genuinely love others if we’re so focused on loving ourselves and comparing ourselves to others?

Don’t compare yourself to the woman next to you because her gifts are different than yours. Let her walk out her purpose while you walk out yours.

Together, we make up the Body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12:12-27). We each have a role to play, and when we stop comparing ourselves to the person next to us and serve and walk in our own role, WOW! Can you imagine the people who will come to know Christ and all because we’re working in harmony and reaching different people in different ways but in the perfect way God intended each of us to reach them?

Let’s move away from this superficial teaching we are seeing in today’s messages to women. Let’s remember every single one of us is a warrior – a soldier in the Kingdom of God. I promise when you are walking and working in the authority and gifting of the Holy Spirit, your beauty will be seen by everyone, and I can also assure you beauty has nothing to do with what culture and media says it is. They’re just trying to sell a product. That’s why what is considered beautiful in the world’s eyes is always changing.

Your identity, purpose, gifting, and beauty are never changing…

…and I know you probably had a verse immediately pop into your mind to correct that last thing I said. I feel certain of it because Proverbs 31 has been so pounded into our heads in our women’s studies and messages that we know it by heart.

That verse isn’t what you think it is, but that’s another topic for another day.

Today’s challenge: You are more than beautiful. Think about what that means to you. Who are you? What are your gifts and passions? Are you using them, or has the enemy creeped in to make you feel insufficient, ill-equipped, and less than?