Beauty Begins: Making Peace With Your ReflectionSample
Our Sacred Reflection
You know when your mirror is foggy after a shower and you really can’t even see your own face? Well, that’s often how we see ourselves; we aren’t getting a clear picture. We are seeing ourselves through a mirror dimly, but God is saying, “Just wait because some day you will see with perfect clarity.” And if you are calling God your Father, yet denying that you’re a princess, you’re saying more about Him than you are about yourself. You’re denying that He is King. We need to realize that God truly has made us beautiful and we are royalty in His eyes.
There are three different mirrors that we turn to in hopes of finding our sacred reflection: the mirrors of parents, peers, and culture. Starting from when we are born, and throughout most of our lives, we are looking into the mirror of our parents. We ask them, “Am I beautiful? Do you love me? How much am I worth?” and we base how we view ourselves on their projected opinion. Maybe you received a positive message from your parents. Or maybe not. But if you know how much you are worth and loved by God then no one’s opinion in this world should matter, not even your parent’s.
The second mirror is that of our peers. We tend to compare ourselves to others at work, school, church, and pretty much anywhere. We long to be like those ladies on social media who seem to have it all together – chiefly their appearance. We are subconsciously asking the world if we are beautiful when we post a selfie. We desire affirmation. We do it because we long for attention, we long to be liked.
The third mirror is our culture. Am I prettier than that model? Am I thin enough like that actress? We are comparing ourselves to random people that we don’t even know! We are bombarded by unrealistic pictures of what this world thinks we should look like. And in doing so, we are often comparing ourselves to a lie.
We are really searching for our sacred, truest reflection but we are only going to be able to find it in the mirror of Christ’s eyes. We will never see our true beauty if we keep turning to other mirrors. Only when we fix our eyes on Jesus we stop trying to fix ourselves, because then we are able to see our true worth.
Think about it: What mirror will you choose to look to today?
Verses for further reflection: 1 Corinthians 13 Hebrews 12:2 Psalm 45:10-11
About this Plan
Society’s standard of beauty varies from what we see on television, magazines and social media, and because of this, all of us have defined some idea of what it means to be beautiful. Beauty Begins offers all women a genuine understanding of what real beauty is, how we can find it and how to make peace with our reflection.
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We would like to thank Megan Shook Alpha and WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for providing this plan. For more information, please visit: www.BeautyBegins.com