Physical beauty can be inherited. Good looking parents will often have good looking children. It is nice when our better features are passed on to our children.
We have been considering the beauty of the Lord. God’s children should want to be as attractive as their Father, showing the beauties of His nature and character. The prayer of Moses the man of God was ‘Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us’ (Psalm 90:17). Is it possible? How can it be achieved? By looking in a mirror!
No matter how long you stand gazing at your face in a mirror, nothing will change – you will not become younger, prettier or handsomer. But if we devote time to looking at the Lord in the mirror of His Word, a transformation of character will take place. Consider this verse: ‘But we all, with open face, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord’ (2 Corinthians 3:18). Close contemplation of the glories of Christ in His word will work a change in us. It is supernatural, produced by the Lord the Spirit.
Do you want to show in your life each day His compassion, His graciousness, His love, His purity? If you do, you will need to be as focussed as David. He spoke about the one thing he desired above everything else: ‘One thing have I desired of the LORD . . . to behold the beauty of the LORD’ (Psalm 27:4).
Looking in a mirror will not change you. However, if you spend significant time in the Lord’s presence, considering Him as He is revealed in scripture, people will see the difference – not in your face but in the way you speak and act. So, where do we spend more time – at the mirror on the wall, or with the mirror of the Word?
Someone has said, ‘You will only be truly beautiful when the character of Christ reflects from your true self’.
Let the beauty of Jesus be seen in me,
All His wondrous compassion and purity.
(Albert Orsborn)