Here is the revelation that is shaping my life today – embracing my ugly opens the door to beauty.
Matthew 9:12-13 NLT
[12] When Jesus heard this, he said, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor-sick people do.” [13] Then he added, “Now go and learn the meaning of this Scripture: ‘I want you to show mercy, not offer sacrifices.’ For I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.”
Observation
‘Only sinners welcome.’ Most often God is portrayed as only welcoming good people into His presence. It goes like this ‘God is holy and cannot be around the riff-raff.’ But this is completely and utterly wrong. If you think you’ve got it all together then you will never find God, for you are not looking for love and mercy you are looking to transact your goodness for a ticket at the table. And there are no transactions, no trades when it comes to God. So only those who are real about their rap sheet will ever come looking for mercy and only they will find their place is already set at the table. “For I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.”
So here is what gets me…why do we hide away from our sin, our mess, our brokenness, our ‘ugly?’ This is our ticket to God’s mercy. It’s only in the embrace of my stuff do I find His embrace of mercy. I think whenever I find in me what would be labelled as ‘sin,’ or ‘ugly’, then it’s time for celebration for mercy, love, and transformation are awaiting me. God never brings revelation of my stuff in order to condemn, threaten, or manipulate me into better performance. His pointing out to me is for me, for what He points to He wants to work through with me and shower me with His mercy and love. This always leads to transformation. I live in a world that hides the ugly and tells me to hide my ugly, whereas God loves ugly, for He can see within ugly, beauty.
If we condemn and punish ugly when God embraces and covers it with mercy, then we are not on the same page as God. Ugly is not always chosen, sin is not something I always choose freely. Often it is a response to my trauma, a cover for my pain, a learned family generational conditioning, an unawareness of my brokenness and its overflow, and so on. Why is it we condemn and judge when what is needed is mercy, healthy listening, awareness and freedom? Our quick judgement of ‘ugly’ in others may make us feel more beautiful by comparison, but it avoids a response of mercy that sees being ugly as a behavioural response to a personal story and looks to bring mercy and healing, so that beauty can be restored. Judgement and condemnation rarely change ugly to beauty, it reinforces it. Maybe God is onto something here, maybe mercy will restore beauty to the world.
Application
I will never judge ugly in me or others. I will embrace ugly as an invitation to mercy, love and transformation. I will never condemn ugly but see its beauty and offer the pathway to release that beauty. I will never try and manipulate beauty through manipulation of punishment and reward, rather I will always bring mercy, love and acceptance.
Response
Thank you that you don’t want me to bring a sacrifice for my ugly but you bring to me your mercy. Thank you that you love ugly. I can live within that beauty.
Meditation
Meditation thought – God wants to show mercy.
Consider:
How often do I judge and condemn ugly?
Do I embrace my ugly as the invitation to beauty?
JOURNEY DEEPER
