You Are Not Your Looks!

These days when I hear people talk about #BodyShaming, I want to run them by a mini-bible study. And that is sort of what I’d be doing today in this post. A lot of people live miserable lives because of how they look and how that is perceived in the society. Some have even gone as far as committing suicide or doing harmful things to themselves and it really leaves me wondering. This seems as great a time as any to remind everyone that You Are Not Your Looks!

You Are Not Your Looks! Click To Tweet

Now the truth is this: In life, you really can’t control how other people behave to you. You can, however, control your reaction… When it comes to body shaming, it is important to understand who you really are. If you do not, you (your emotions, mood, esteem) would be tossed to and fro by everything people say.

Concerning a person and how he/she looks, two things are involved.

Firstly, Nothing else defines a man that the one who created Him.

Psalms 139:13-14 says – “...For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well…”

So God made you wonderfully and fearfully. This calls for Thanksgiving and should continually resound in your heart. It should excite you that the arms that created the universe crafted your very beings. Do not let society or what people say undermine that fact. This is God we are talking about, He can not do anything short of perfection and excellence.

I mean after creation, God looked at everything plus man and said… “This is good” If someone thinks otherwise, the fellow’s judging lenses are faulty. And truly that shouldn’t matter to you because you are worth God’s love. God has accepted you in the Beloved even before anyone ever body-shamed you or condemned you. None of the things anyone says about you stands true safe what God has said about you. Only the truth of God’s word remains valid.

Even if by accident or any other external means, you appear deformed, just know there is more to who you are than this outer container (your body).

This leads me to the second point.

Man is not his body.

Man is a Spirit because we were made in the image of God (Gen 1:26) and God is a Spirit (John 4:24). Although man is a spirit, he lives in a body. This is because for us to transact (exist) in this world, we need a legal means (a physical body). God could not just have sent us as spirits down to earth, as that would limit our interaction and ultimately our impact on this earth. So the body of a man is actually just a container. Man would absolutely exist with or without the body. Knowing this, we should not define ourselves by our ‘container’.

Finally, we have a hope, an expectation. We know that:

“He will change our lowly bodies to conform with His glorified body by the power that enables Him to also bring all things into subjection to Himself!” – Philemon 3:21

This is exciting!!

While we await this glorious conversion, we ought to be grateful to God for our looks and learn to be content, having our hopes in God rather than our looks. Remember the bible says in 1 Corinthians 3 and also 6, our bodies house the Holy Spirit. This calls for honour for our body. We don’t eat unhealthily or treat it in an unworthy manner.
But even then don’t forget to pay more attention to your inner man. That is the real you.

Shalom!

Read next;

On The Issue of Identity Crisis

Modesty Hacks: Revamping Your Dresses Into Modest Wears

Quit Looking Like A Christian