God, The Original Transfiguration Professor

I remember back in the old days...

*flashback to Adam and Eve*

No, not that far!

*fast forward to a year or two ago*

Back in the days when I was a lowly fast-food worker, I would stand around in the kitchen with a lot of other guys. Most of these guys were non-believers. You know, the types who believe in sex before marriage, drugs, and stuff like that. A lot of them were very derogatory towards women. By that I mean judgmental. They'd talk about which co-workers they thought were hot (in other words, which women they'd f***). They'd also talk about any physical flaws they could find and laugh about them. I would think to myself just how stupid they were.

What a hypocrite I was.

You see, I was pretty similar in respects. I was more judgmental than I care to admit. I was capable of finding even the most minuscule flaws in women. Whether their hips were just a little too big for their body or their nose was a little off center, I could typically find something. Whatever I could find would bother me. Now, I say "flaws" in the context of my way of thinking back then.

I also used to be big into make-up. I thought it was a sign of maturity. I thought that without make-up women were most likely ugly. I say most likely because I was literally surrounded by women who wore make-up.

I don't know when it was that my viewpoint started to change. I started to despise the country's standard of blond, thin, supermodel photoshopped image that doesn't actually exist. I thought it encouraged everyone to look like everyone else. What was so great about that? Wouldn't it be better to have a girlfriend or a wife who looks like herself and NOT like every other girl you know?

I started to think make-up was stupid. What was the point of it? Aren't people more beautiful how God made them? Interestingly enough, I wound up with a woman who rarely even wears make-up in the first place and looks very pretty with or without it. Maybe God wanted to change my way of thinking for her. Or maybe bringing her along was His way of saying, "Since you don't want a woman who wears loads of make-up, here you go." I like to think it's a mix.

I also stopped caring so much about "flaws." In fact, I started to not view them as flaws, but as differences that made them who they were. It's a process, one that I think is still ongoing.

I can only attribute this change to God. Thank You Lord, for changing the way I think. And I really mean thank God! I look back at the way I thought and I'm disgusted. Sometimes I worry that that old me will come back. But I have faith that God really does change hearts and minds.

Here's my way of thinking now: Everyone is different. And every single detail, whether physical, mental, or otherwise, is of the full intention of God. That's what makes beauty beautiful.

'Nuff said.

Conquering...LIKE SPARTAAAA!!

So there's a passage in the Bible that I've known about for a while now. But last night Sarrah, the most beautiful woman ever, caused me to see it in a different context than I had for several years.

The passage is Romans 8:28-39:

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:

"For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (NIV)

Now, the part that I've known about is "In all these things we are more than conquerors..." I've always read this as meaning that, with God, we can conquer anything. I saw the more than conquerors part as the meat of the verse. I still think that meaning applies. But Sarrah read it in a bit of a different way, a way that, when I thought about it, I preferred.

She took that part that I knew about and continued to "through him who loved us." She saw THAT as the important part of the verse and interpreted it as saying that we aren't conquerors. I thought about it and, as Sarrah put it, fleshed it out.

Through God's love, we are more than conquerors. This is not to say that we conquer anything. God is the One Who conquers. To be more than a conqueror means, not that we conquer, but that we are on God's side when He conquers something. To be more than a conqueror means that God is glorified when we overcome something through Him and His power. To be more than a conqueror means that we have received God's grace, and as a result, anything He triumphs over is no longer an obstacle for us.

Personally, I like this idea. It shows a lot more God than my original idea did. Sarrah read it in a unique way that made me think. Thank You Lord, for Sarrah and for conquering!

Thoughts and comments are welcome and encouraged.