In the Eye of the Beheld

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God couldn’t have filled a woman with more admirable traits than Cassie possessed. She cooked like Julia Child. Entertained others as well as Martha Stewart. She had a faith as big as Corrie Ten Boom’s. She lived every word from Elisabeth Elliot’s books on womanhood. In short, she would have made the perfect wife.

I suspect she’s still waiting for that gold ring, though.

You see, to call Cassie “pretty” would have confused Webster. No heads swiveled when she walked by. Young guys on Sunday never anxiously dropped the question, “Have you seen Cassie in church today?”

No, Cassie wasn’t blessed with the one thing so many men crave above all else: physical beauty.

Cassie loved me. I didn’t return “those feelings,” though. Sure, her dowry of other fabulous qualities overflowed, but I could never get past the fact that she wasn’t physically beautiful.

I lost track of her years ago.

Looking back, I probably had two or three other Cassies in my single days, girls whose hearts would have leapt if I asked them out.  Fact is, each was a better person than I could ever hope to be.

I turned 44 last week. In thinking over my life, I realized I’d done all those Cassies wrong. I love my wife immensely, don’t misunderstand me. I had my 25th high school reunion and I can say with confidence that despite all the gorgeous girls in my high school back in the early Eighties, at the reunion my wife eclipsed them all. I’m very fortunate to have married a physically beautiful woman.

But I still dealt poorly with Cassie. Only now do I realize that the one thing Cassie was missing in her life was a real flesh and blood Christian man to tell her she was beautiful.

Time has a way of giving us room to think. As I look around this country and witness the Girls Gone Wild culture that threatens to tear our social fabric apart, I can’t help but think that most of those girls are dying on the inside. Why? Because they simply don’t believe they’re beautiful because no man they respect has ever told them so.

I don’t know what dads are doing at home that they turn out these shattered girls. Either dad doesn’t tell his daughter she’s beautiful, or he doesn’t command enough respect for his word to mean anything. Melancholy girlAnd we all know the story: If a girl doesn’t get admiration from her closest male relatives, she’s going to search for it elsewhere. And elsewhere isn’t always a nice place.

Ultimately, in our churches, the fault lies with Christian men of all ages. I perpetually hear how men in the church are bored. Yet when our young people are getting mugged by the world, where are all those Christian men? If we’re supposed to be the image of Christ, what are we saying about Him by our silence?

I can’t imagine what it does for a young woman to hear from a Christian man she respects, “God made you beautiful.” I don’t think there’s enough of that candor in our churches today. I think a lot of young women are dying to hear that they’re beautiful, but for whatever reason they never hear it. Or they hear it from the wrong people.

It’s sad to me that we’ve fouled this up so badly. Whether we can ever redeem this lack in our churches without it seeming “weird” is a question I can’t answer. Perhaps the older men in the church could pull this off without it being judged inappropriate. I don’t know. All I do know is that young women today simply aren’t hearing it enough from the right people.

Cassie needed to hear she was beautiful. No, she’d never be confused for Miss America. But how did we ever get to a point that her other traits garnered her no accolades? If we looked in her eyes, could we not find the beauty of God?

No doubt Cassie stayed true to the Lord, even when the rest of us didn’t give her the time of day. Still, I’ve got to believe that plenty of young women not as devout as Cassie would have found a word or two said in their favor to be all they needed to keep from straying.

I’m not sure that we cherish our young Christian women as much as we should. Few of us men stand in the gap for them. We don’t pray for them and their families. We don’t keep a watch out for them. We don’t build them up as we should.

Is there a young woman in your church who gets overlooked? Someone needs to tell her she’s loved and appreciated. Someone needs to encourage her to use her gifts for the Lord.

Someone may even need to tell her she’s beautiful.

The Best Letter You’ll Write This Week

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Letter writing

Remember letters?

When I was younger, I had a reputation as an encouraging letter writer. When you're a guy, that's high praise because men in the 1980s were not know for their letter-writing skills.

Sure, guys love e-mail. Invent a techno-gadget and men will find a way to incorporate it into the simplest activity. Getting a piece of paper and a pen out to write a letter causes brave men to weaken in the knees. On the other hand, spend five minutes waiting for a computer to boot up, wade through the new e-mails, start a new one, spend a couple minutes re-reading it, run the spell-check, wait while Microsoft automatically downloads a new system update that bogs you down, and send.

Ah, technology! But that's the way men like it. As for women, they'll still handwrite a note, so it's not them I worry about.

The best letter you'll write this week will be the old-fashioned kind. Dig out some stationery, find a pen that still works, and write a note to your pastor telling him you appreciate his hard work and dedication.  Ask him if he has any prayer concerns you can pray for. Write out a small prayer for him as a conclusion to your handwritten letter. Put in envelope. Write out address. Affix stamp. Mail.

Be blessed to be a blessing. 

An Encouraging Word

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We all need a dose of encouragement. The world weighs heavy on many. Today, all I have to say is this:

God loves you with an everlasting love that no trial, no pain, no despair can overcome. The weight we feel is life, and while we cannot always avoid the pitfalls of life, we have a sure hope, a God who meets us in our time of need:

7 In my distress I called upon the Lord;
to my God I called.
From his temple he heard my voice,
and my cry came to his ears.

8 Then the earth reeled and rocked;
the foundations of the heavens trembled
and quaked, because he was angry.
9 Smoke went up from his nostrils,
and devouring fire from his mouth;
glowing coals flamed forth from him.
10 He bowed the heavens and came down;
thick darkness was under his feet.
11 He rode on a cherub and flew;
he was seen on the wings of the wind.
12 He made darkness around him his canopy,
thick clouds, a gathering of water.
13 Out of the brightness before him
coals of fire flamed forth.
14 The Lord thundered from heaven,
and the Most High uttered his voice.
15 And he sent out arrows and scattered them;
lightning, and routed them.
16 Then the channels of the sea were seen;
the foundations of the world were laid bare,
at the rebuke of the Lord,
at the blast of the breath of his nostrils.

17 He sent from on high, he took me;
he drew me out of many waters.
18 He rescued me from my strong enemy,
from those who hated me,
for they were too mighty for me.
19 They confronted me in the day of my calamity,
but the Lord was my support.
20 He brought me out into a broad place;
he rescued me, because he delighted in me.

21 The Lord dealt with me according to my righteousness;
according to the cleanness of my hands he rewarded me.
22 For I have kept the ways of the Lord
and have not wickedly departed from my God.
23 For all his rules were before me,
and from his statutes I did not turn aside.
24 I was blameless before him,
and I kept myself from guilt.
25 And the Lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness,
according to my cleanness in his sight.

26 With the merciful you show yourself merciful;
with the blameless man you show yourself blameless;
27 with the purified you deal purely,
and with the crooked you make yourself seem tortuous.
28 You save a humble people,
but your eyes are on the haughty to bring them down.
29 For you are my lamp, O Lord,
and my God lightens my darkness.
30 For by you I can run against a troop,
and by my God I can leap over a wall.
31 This God—his way is perfect;
the word of the Lord proves true;
he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him.

32 For who is God, but the Lord?
And who is a rock, except our God?
33 This God is my strong refuge
and has made my way blameless.
34 He made my feet like the feet of a deer
and set me secure on the heights.
35 He trains my hands for war,
so that my arms can bend a bow of bronze.
36 You have given me the shield of your salvation,
and your gentleness made me great.
— 2 Samuel 22:7-36 ESV

He rescues us because He delights in us. His gentleness has made us great. From His temple He hears our cries and He shakes heaven and earth to come to our aid.

This is the God we serve, the Lord we love, who loves us immeasurably and without ceasing.

If you feel low, or are buffeted by trials, remember who our God is. He will reward you for your faithfulness.

A prayer:

Lord, we thank you, praise, and bless you for your faithfulness. Your promise is that you will meet all our needs according to your riches in glory in Christ Jesus. No good thing do you withhold from those whose walk is blameless.

We come to you today as your children seeking your great mercy. Father, be our deliverance today, be our salvation in our time of need, even as you have promised to from the beginning of all time. All good comes from you, every blessing is yours, infinite and rich.

You know we are like dust and that we cannot save ourselves. Unless you build the house, we labor in vain. Shake heaven and earth to stoop low to our defense, Lord, that we may know your mercy and rejoice in your gentleness toward us. Come make our enemies flee and turn our trials to gold, not for us alone, but for your namesake.

This we pray in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

May the Lord richly bless you today!