HIMPower Magazine HimPower March 2018 | Page 6

FOR YOUR INSPIRATION Does God See Beauty in Me? by Juliane Wiebracht I will be honest, I struggle with this pas- sage in the Bible for various reasons. The scriptures I refer to are 1 Peter 3:3-4: “Do not let your adorning be external—the braid- ing of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear—but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperish- able beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious.” When I dissect these verses, I am struck by the contrast God sees between external and internal beauty. First, He makes it clear that the type of adornment which He values is the kind that never fades. The sort that is found in the “hidden person of the 6  HimPower March 2018 heart”. This manner of beauty is not only precious to Him, but “very precious”. He also reveals the ingredients of this beauty- a “gentle and quiet” spirit. Ugh. This is where it gets sticky for me. I’m talkative and highly opinionated. When reading “gentle and quiet”, I can’t help but picture a little house on the prairie wife, who is perfect in almost every way and who loves to fold dish towels. Nevertheless, because I love God, I want to dive deeper into the expanse of what He values. Therefore, I will begin with the gentle spirit. What does it mean for my spirit to be gentle? Well, one of the first things to come to mind, are the times when