The Importance of Beauty

Beauty gets me. Sometimes it just makes me smile. Sometimes it feels like my heart is expanding inside my chest. Sometimes it just leaves me open-mouthed in wonder. And just occasionally it even brings me to tears.

I don’t mean magazine-cover or movie-star beauty. Who knows how much of that is real anyway? I mean the beauty of a sunrise, a smile lighting up the face of a child, a blue fairy wren hopping from reed to reed, the breeze against your skin on a warm summer day, birds singing in the trees, rays of light breaking through storm clouds.

From the power of a waterfall to the fragility of a butterfly, beauty is all around us if only we would notice it.

The beauty in us and around us reflects the glorious beauty of God. We desire beauty and appreciate it because we’re made in his image – beautiful. And we express it with words and through things like art, music and dance. We express it with our actions. Today I watched a father guide his small son safely across the road; a small hand enveloped in a larger one. And it was beautiful.

Don’t neglect beauty, it’s essential. Beauty nourishes the soul. Beauty helps us to delight in the One who made us beautiful. Look for it wherever you go, whatever you’re doing. Our world may be filled with misery and ugliness, but there is still so much beauty to behold. Let beauty move you, let it inspire you, let it fill you with wonder, let it draw you closer to God. Let it remind you that the best is yet to come.

I don’t think of all the misery but of the beauty that still remains.
~Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl

“…whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” (Philippians 4:8 NIV)

Where do you find beauty, and what does it mean for you?

Image courtesy of dan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net