BEAUTY MARKS

God made women as one of His crowning achievements of beauty. Paul, a single man, and Peter, a married man, are led in their writing by the Holy Spirit to identify three distinct beauty marks of God’s ideal woman.

Good Works (1 Tim. 2:10). This mark is set in contrast with the immodesty of ungodliness in verse 9. Whether overdressing or under dressing, the ungodly woman accentuates her outward self. This is not true beauty. When a Christian lady is engrossed in good works, like visiting, teaching, soul-winning, and raising children, she is a rare and remarkable beauty.

A Gentle and Quiet Spirit (1 Pet. 3:4). Peter preaches a message that could not be more different from the world’s sermon. The world tells a woman to allow herself to be a sexual object for men, to flaunt what she has, and to be provocative in dress and manner. Peter tells her to be chaste in conduct (3:2). This is “incorruptible beauty,” literally not subject to decay. The godly woman grows more beautiful with age. Her godly disposition and disciplined righteousness beautify her in a way Cover Girl cannot!

Holy And Trusting (1 Pet. 3:5). Peter mentions another beauty mark in his description of a woman of God. She is like Sarah and other Old Testament women. She is holy. She lives near to God and far from the world. What truer beauty is there? She hopes for, counts on, and puts her confidence in God. The world’s ideal woman boasts of her self-sufficiency, self-reliance, self-confidence, and self-making. Selfish persons of either gender are decidedly unattractive. The Christian woman appears beautiful through her dependency upon God and His ways.

Neal Pollard