Beauty as an essential ingredient to living spiritually? I had not considered beauty as a part of developing my spirit until lately as I re-read both Eldredge’s book Captivating and Frances Mayes’ book Bella Tuscany. Beauty, I might have considered, a physical and external distraction to my walk with God, a vain pursuit that revealed a self-centered preoccupation with the temporal and earthly. Certainly not eternal. Beauty is, after all, only skin deep, right?
Still, I could not fully explain the impact upon my inner person that the grand majesty of the Grand Teton mountains or the quiet cathedral-like beauty of the Muir redwoods has. A rural Tuscan countryside or the blue waters of Cozumel. The sun setting on the Gulf.
Now I am beginning to see natural beauty (pristine, pure, and glorious) as an expression of God’s beautiful person. And our attempts to create beauty in this world as an expression of our design: an image-bearer of our Creator.
In contrast, that which has no light or no life has no beauty. Decay, destruction, death; carnage, corruption, catastrophe— results of the fall and the curse, these hold no beauty for us, for they were not part of creation as God intended and purposed. And not part of His plan for eternity.
Have you read the final chapters of Revelations? The ones that describe the city of God, the crystal river, the jeweled foundations, the eternal light and joy? Everything there is beautiful because it is a true expression of God’s love and holiness.
Everything here that is truly beautiful, shining out from this sin-darkened world, is a reminder of who God is and what is in store in His eternal kingdom. Beauty ties the believer, not to the temporal and earthly, but to the spiritual for it stirs a longing for what is good and pure and lasting.
Beauty here is fleeting. In a moment, the sunset fades. The redwoods get ravaged by fire. The view of the Tetons gets obscured by storm clouds. The azure liquid in Cozumel grays when the sun removes its gaze.
The beauty that is in Christ and that is experienced in a relationship with Him is a treasure to be sought every day and to be fully realized in the eternal. Let the beauty that is around you draw you to the One who is truly beautiful and good. And let your life be a beautiful expression of who He is in and through you.
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