She failed them.

She failed them.

She is a child who wasn’t what her parents or the doctors expected. Unfortunately, now she’s here and she needs to be put somewhere that doesn’t require anyone to be reminded of her failure. Her life is just too much to cope with. Had her failure been know before she was born, her parents would have chosen to stop her from entering the world. She was born different than the rest of us, and someone else can deal with the mess. Someone else can give it a name. Maybe “Failure” is sufficient.

She is just one child tucked away in an institution in a far corner of the world. She will probably die before her fourth birthday, and very few will ever know she even existed. Her voice is silent and the image within her is crushed.

But, how are we supposed to help? How are we supposed to react? How are we supposed to deal with this brokenness? We know this isn’t right, but are we really capable of doing anything about it? We have our own issues, and the kid’s soccer practice starts at 6:00 pm.

I think we turn away because we fear that in her we find ourselves. We fear that if people saw the real us, they would reject us. We fear being unwanted, unloved, and undesired. We may not use that language, but there is evidence all around us saying different.

When was the last time you looked in the mirror and saw someone truly beautiful? Yesterday? Never?

The world has a beauty problem, and it begins with us.

In 2010, Americans spent $10.7 billions dollars on cosmetic surgery and another $12.4 billion dollars cosmetics alone. Creating & maintaining beauty is big business, and Americans are going to great lengths to fix our problem. We cover it up, alter it, tuck it, augment it, hide it, deny it, and compare ourselves to those who aren’t as beautiful as we are. We fear our own humanity, because being human is painful.

So, how can a culture that has a beauty problem be expected to truly engage with the ugliness and brokenness of the world?

We must learn to recognize the beauty in our own lives.

As followers of Christ we must own this truth.

Every life holds within it the image of our Creator.

Every life is beautiful.

Our life is beautiful.

Her life is beautiful.

Maybe, just maybe, in finding the beauty in her life, we can begin to see the beauty of a God who uniquely created each of us to uniquely reflect His perfect beauty.

Today, may you begin to discover the beauty in your own life, and then use that beauty to rescue the image of those who have been discarded into the farthest corners of the world.