Beauty

A girl with sad eyes walked around the store today while I was there.  She looked lost in every way.  Beauty is sad in this life because she knows she cannot last.  We want beauty to stay the same but she doesn’t.  She moves, she changes, she runs and fades and hides so we must always look for her.  

That sad-eyed girl was beautiful and sad because beauty isn’t all.  Beauty doesn’t stop the pain, it only promises something better beyond the pain.  True beauty is God’s hint to us of what will be when all is set right again.  When we mistake beauty for the truth toward which she points, we exploit her, thinking we can take from her something she is unable to give, something she was never meant to give.  

Beauty is a messenger and we are most moved when we listen for the message rather than try to capture and hold captive the messenger.  When we ask of something beautiful, “What are you trying to say?” we move closer to God, whose messenger it is.