It’s What’s on the Inside that Counts

As I prepared to give Christmas gifts in 1994, I realized that a lot of time, money, and effort goes into the buying of wrapping paper and the wrapping of gifts. In less than a minute, this accomplishment is destroyed by the recipient of the gift.

In 1994, I decided to turn my brown-paper grocery bags into wrapping paper. I bought two inexpensive rolls of green and red ribbon. I had the tape. I wrapped my gifts. That idea was great until stores started using plastic bags. Inside or out, a plastic bag is a plastic bag. I’m not going that route to wrap my Christmas gifts.

I am not going to use a plastic shopping bag to wrap Christmas, birthday or anniversary gifts, especially the latter one. Neither am I going to spend a fortune on wrapping paper. Like others, I think it is what is on the inside that counts, not what is on the outside.

I have always found natural beauty the most pleasing to the eyes. I’ve always been a little cautious around people who have a lot of augmentations to their natural appearance. I believe God created me and you.

There are things about myself that I would have liked differently, but I believe and trust the work of my Creator. This life is but a blip on the radar of eternity. Looks are not everything. It’s the person inside the body that makes a person. It’s the Lord living in that person which makes him or her the beautiful or handsome person on the inside.

You can have all the looks on the outside, but it is what is inside of the person and the God within that person that really counts. For within a naturally beautiful person is a person of character, kindness, love, forgiveness, laughter, honesty, encouragement, and empathy.

Within a genuinely ugly person is a person who has no character and no abilities to be kind, to love, to forgive, to laugh, to be honest, to encourage, or to be empathetic. Additionally, God is not present in such a person, but desires to be one day.

And friends, all the augmentations that humanity can create to alter the looks of these kinds of people will never make them look beautiful or handsome on the outside. Ugliness or beauty bleeds from the inside out. The real you can never be covered or altered.

This brings me back to the Creator. If the Creator lives within you, you will be and are beautiful or handsome in the eyes of God and in those who call themselves Christian. Don’t worry about your appearance. God created you. You are beautiful. You are handsome. Rejoice in God’s creation.

If you ever have the urge to alter or change your appearance in order to be accepted, spend more time with the Lord and in the Bible and you will realize what a great person God created when you were born.