Women of God
In a changing world, Christian women
hold on to an unchanging hand: God's hand.
Forever Beautiful
                                     by Antoinette Green

Turn your television set to any channel at almost any time of the day and you will be bombarded with fad
diets, weight loss aides, and beauty aides.  This all speaks to our society’s preoccupation with beauty and
much of it is geared at women.  Society pushes us towards particular molds in which they want us to fit.  
The purpose of this article is not to determine what model of beauty the world should adopt.  Instead the
purpose of this article is to provide a contrast between the world’s standard of beauty and God’s standard
of beauty.

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” “Beauty is only skin deep.” These are two phrases with which all of
us, as women, are familiar.  Many of us repeat them, but what exactly do they mean?  It is important to
realize that both of these phrases do not refer to true beauty but speak ,instead, of the outward physical
appearance.  Nevertheless, we cannot discount the truths found in these sayings.

First of all, let us examine the first quotation. What we can glean from this saying is that physical beauty is
subjective.  That is, everyone has their concept of physical beauty.  Some people think a beautiful woman
has blonde hair and blue eyes while others see her as having red hair and brown eyes.  Still there are
others who see beauty in the red-boned girl with “good hair”. There are those who find womanly curves
beautiful while there are those who prefer an angular look.  It all depends on who is looking.

Let us now take a look at the second saying. “Beauty is only skin deep.”  What this is saying is that
physical beauty is superficial.  What we see with the human eye is only a small part of the picture.   

We all know of someone whose physical appearance turns heads.  However, when that person opens her
mouth, we cringe at the words that come out. Such a person proves that the saying is true “Beauty is only
skin deep.”
Matthew 23:27 illustrates this principle. Jesus speaking to the Pharisees said “for ye are like unto whited
sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward,but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all
uncleanness.”
Many people speak about beauty without making a distinction between physical appearance and true
Godly beauty.  However, God himself makes that distinction.  A look at First Samuel 16:7 reveals the
difference between the two concepts of beauty.  God told the prophet Samuel,
“ Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have       
refused him: for the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the
outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.”

This verse illustrates the difference between what the world sees as beauty and what God sees as
beauty.  Man measures beauty by what he can see but God measures beauty by looking at the inside.

Briefly we will look at some characteristics of Godly beauty.  As mentioned before, God beauty comes from
the heart (1 Peter 3:3-4).

Secondly, Godly beauty is obtained by adopting the mind of Christ.  Philippians 2:5 urges Christian to allow
the mind of Christ to dwell within them.  This will lead to the adoption of characteristics such as humility,
submissiveness, obedience, and compassion.

Beautiful women can also be identified by their devotion to God.  They adopt Ecclesiastes 12:13 as their
life’s motto. The beautiful woman realizes that her entire duty in life is to “fear God and keep his
commandments”.  When we choose to follow after God’s concept of beauty, we know that our beauty will
never fail.    We can be comforted by the words of the proverbial writer as written in Proverbs 31:30.
“Favor is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman who serves the Lord she shall be praised.”
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