Thanks for hanging around – it’s Day 3! We are finishing up the definition of Fortyologie today by studying strength and beauty.
Strength – the quality or state of being strong; moral power, firmness, or courage; power by reason of influence. Gals, we’ve been around for a bit by now. We know some people and have seen some things. We have been strengthened through challenges and experiences and it’s time to put all that learning to good use.
Have you grown stronger in the years it has taken you to get to midlife? Me too. And if I were a betting woman (which I’m not because I’d rather spend my coins on a cute pair of shoes) I would say the 2nd half of our lives will have us continuing to grow in this department.
Strength is a strange concoction. We like to think it all comes from us. Others would say it all comes from God. For our purposes here, it’s a blend of the two. Of course, God is in control and is the driving force enabling us to do anything we do, but we are also bringing to the table the lessons learned from the experiences we have had. He has taught us much in the years we’ve been alive.
How can we use that combination of God’s strength + leading + our experiences to lend a hand to those coming along behind us and to forge the way ahead?
Beauty – the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind, whether arising from sensory manifestations (as shape, color, sound, etc.), a meaningful design or pattern, or something else (as a personality in which high spiritual qualities are manifest). Let’s make “beautiful inside and out” more than just a cliché. Let’s live it.
Yes, let’s live it…BEAUTY is experienced…there is action involved…it’s a sensory or emotional experience that calls us back to God. I think of beauty often as encountering some part of God that my heart recognizes even if I can’t name it. It’s my soul connecting to Him sometimes in obvious ways and other times in ways I cannot understand or express.
As we become the women that God created us to be, we become more and more beautiful. I don’t mean that in a physical sense, of course, but in the sense that people will see Him in us and be enlivened, attracted to Him. We will point others to Him as he radiates from us. This is the most desirable form of beauty…that points to the glory of God.
And while that is TRUTH, I think we will also discuss physical beauty…our appearance…what we can do to put our best foot forward to the watching world. When we care for ourselves, we are caring for the body He created.
So, we’ll think about beauty, how it applies to our lives in the middle and how we can LIVE “beautiful inside and out”.
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