Tuesday, August 13, 2002
Tuesday, August 13, 2002
For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know
only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.
Do you remember the classic fairy tale RAPUNZEL? It is
the story of a young girl, imprisoned in a tower with an old
witch. The young girl is in fact very beautiful, but the old
witch insistently tells her that she is ugly. This was the
witch's way of keeping the girl in the tower with herself.
One day, however, Rapunzel is gazing from the window of
the tower. At the base of the tower stands her Prince Charming.
Rapunzel throws down the end of her long and beautiful golden
hair to the prince. He takes it and braids it into a ladder and
climbs up to rescue her.
The point is this. The real prison Rapunzel finds herself
in is not the tower, but the fear of her own ugliness which the
witch has described so often and so effectively. The witch has
convinced her that she is of no value. However, when Rapunzel
sees in the eyes of her lover her own reflection and that she is
beautiful, she is freed from the real tyranny of her own imagined
ugliness.
We need to see in the eyes of the God who created us,
sustained us and loved us with an everlasting love the beauty
which may be ours in Jesus Christ.
(1 Corinthians 13.12
NRSV)
God sees us not as we are but as we can yet
be. We see ourselves with all our warts, our blemishes, our
failures. That is not how God sees us. Because we ask Him for
forgiveness, He blots out all out past failures. Then He sees us
as we can yet be--without the curse of our many imperfections.
God of creation, show me the beauty you have created in me through Jesus Christ, my Lord
and Savior. Amen.
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