We had a bit of a moment recently; I sent a photograph of a clean pair of shoes to my daughter who panicked and replied, ‘what have you done. My work shoes have gone silver?’. It was nothing of the sort of course, just a trick of the light and not a problem.
When I was at school, I put significant effort into finding new and imaginative ways of avoiding sport, all of which I saw as pointless. Once I left school and it was no longer necessary to pretend about sport I found a new outlet for my avoidance tendency, namely, being the subject of photographs. So it is that for over 40 years I have got increasingly skilled at keeping out of pictures.
Some of us are photogenic and others of us are not. Helen’s shoes may turn silver in a good light but to my eyes I simply deteriorate even further in photographs. (And before someone lectures me about loving my body image, don’t waste your time as I am quite happy as I am, I promise!)
The point is the one that God made when the selection process for King David was in full flow. Outward appearances are all very well, God said, and something we seem to worry a lot about but to him they are of less consequence than what goes on in the heart.
Some of us scrub up well for a photo shoot, others of us all less so. Some of us have an over inflated view of our own beauty and others put themselves down – to us all God’s message is the same – ‘what I see is not altered by tricks of light – I love you as you are, which is how I made you.’
I may have slightly altered the sacred words of God in scripture but nothing alters how he sees and cares for us as we are.
A Prayer
Lord, help me to worry less about how I am seen physically and spend more time being the ‘me’ that you love so that my relationship with you can flourish in the unchanging light of your constant presence. Amen.