Rigoletto and First Peter

Recently, I watched my old favorite movie with a friend. The movie is called Rigoletto. I love it. I love the music, I love the characters, and I love the plot. But when I watched it this time, something really stuck out that I never really thought about when I saw the movie before. The man in this movie was struck in the face in a battle, which resulted in one side of his face being ugly and scarred. He knew that his face was ugly. But something that Bonnie, the main girl in the movie, had said got me thinking. This man wasn't the nicest guy ever in the beginning. And Bonnie knew that. She told him, "You have an ugly heart. That's worse than having an ugly face. You can't control the way you look, but you can control the way you treat others."

Isn't that true? What does it really matter what you look like on the outside if you're inside is ugly? First Peter 3:3-5a says "Don’t be concerned about the outward beauty of fancy hairstyles, expensive jewelry, or beautiful clothes. You should clothe yourselves instead with the beauty that comes from within, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is so precious to God. This is how the holy women of old made themselves beautiful."

Have you ever known someone who was really pretty and gorgeous on the outside, but the more you got to know them, the less beautiful they seemed because their hearts weren't beautiful as well? We need to be focusing on our inside more than our outside. After all, "Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord will be praised." (Proverbs 31:30). Outward beauty doesn't last. But your inside beauty, what you do for Christ, will last. That's more imporant to God than what you look like on the outside. I think all of us need to focus more on our inside beauty, than our outward.

Challenge: Keep tract of how much time you spend on your outward self in the next week. Then keep tract of the time you spend with the Lord and in His Word in that same time period. What do the results prove is more important to you?