Why Did God Make Me So Ugly?
During a week-long road trip through the southern United States with my manager and a colleague in the early 2000’s, one of our many conversations shifted to religion. My manager said, “If there even is a God, he is a hateful one because He allows so much suffering in the world. So much hunger, war, little kids suffering, and so much of our youth dying from addictions to heroine and meth. What kind of God could allow such things?”
I was sitting in the back seat and chirped up, “It isn’t God’s fault, it’s our fault. Man is guilty of all those things. God is a gentleman and never forces Himself on us, because if He did, then all we’d be are a bunch of mindless automatons. It’s men who are guilty of making war, killing their babies all through the ages, addicting them to drugs for money…”
Dead silence.
I was laid off a month later. It was a very small company, and the reason I was given was that the company wasn’t making money, but I read between the lines and realized that I had stuck my neck out on that day during our time together on the road, but perhaps, not far enough. I really should have let my manager have it, since he was basically calling the Lord a devil. It’s water under the bridge now, but I’ll bet this guy will never forget me for making such a stand. It was worth it.
Even if some of us don’t believe that God hates us, some of might question, “Why did God make me so ugly? Why did God make me black or white or Asian? Why did God cause me to live in such poverty? Why did God imprison me to a twisted body of disease, lameness or missing limbs? Why did God make me born blind or deaf, or both? Are these the actions of a loving God?”
Well, I suppose in the instance of all such questions, such as ugliness, we need to understand what the “standard” of all of this is. Is it God’s standard, or is it the standard of the youth-crazed so-called, beautiful people of the world? If we look to God’s standard in all such inquiries of why God made me (fill in the blank), then we know that our ‘worldly rationalization’ has no place in His standards. For instance, consider that every painting or illustration or Hollywood actor’s portrayal of Jesus Christ personifies Him a beautiful, handsome, tall man endowed with a manly physique, manly voice… a real man’s man in every way.
However, read Isaiah 53: “He had no form of majesty that we should look upon Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by men (and women), a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; as one from whom men hid their faces. He was despised, and people esteemed Him not.”
Does that sound like the Hollywood type? I don’t think so. In fact, I’ll bet that Christ Jesus was short and stocky, and like Moses, may have had a speech impediment. I believe his face was very normal, and possibly unattractive. If I were Christ, and I had the opportunity of designing my human body, the last thing I’d need would to have a fanbase of gorgeous women fawning all over me like religious groupies everywhere I went, so it stands to reason that having a normal or perhaps an unattractive face would have been a blessing for him. He could preach without being an “American Idol”, for instance. He could preach to the masses with the emphasis on God’s word and not on his physical appearance.
Are you ugly? Are you “deformed” in some way? To whose standard! Yours? The world’s? The world is full of flowers that wilt with age and bad behavior. The world is passing right before our eyes. In your Maker’s eyes – Who thoughtfully and meticulously designed you with his own hand from the beginning of time, made you to be a special, one-of-a-kind creature. He intended for you to worship Him as your Creator and His intention has always been to bless you and love you and to make you stand on His shoulders as a guiding light for the lost; His salt and light of the world.
Don’t get caught up in what the world values. This world is going STRAIGHT TO HELL.
You are a member of His chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. Regardless of what you think of yourself, He chose you and appointed you and has given you His name. His Spirit is with you, and day by day, He is changing you and purifying you and then He’s going to come back and take you as His bride, if you don’t go to be with Him first.
In His eyes, you are the most beautiful thing He’s ever created.
Keeping it real,
Brett