He Said it Was Good

          Several months ago I went to the dentist for my regular six-month appointment. The hygienist cleaned my teeth and raved about the health of my gums. The dentist came in, did his exam, told me to keep up the good work and told me he’d see me in six months.

A lady came in and asked permission to talk to me. A little confused about her role in the office and what she could possibly want to talk about, I agreed to listen. She began, “I see you have several metal fillings. Some are in your smile line and cause your teeth to have a grayish cast. We can change those fillings to white fillings which will whiten up your smile line. When you pay for one, we’ll pay for one.”

          My head was spinning with one thought after the other. I’ve had these fillings since I was a child and they have given me no trouble. Do they really think I’d let them drill them out and replace them with white fillings just to improve my smile line after all these years? I could smell the acrid odor of the drilling as I pictured the scene. My toes wanted to curl in my shoes at the thought of voluntarily coming in to be tortured.

* * *

          My granddaughter, sitting in the backseat as we motored toward town, asked me, “Grandma, did your hair used to be black.” I said it was and asked why she was asking. Her reply, “I was just looking at your eyebrows.” My hair, once a dark, dark brown, turned gray while I was in my thirties. Over the years, I have been asked by more than one person why I don’t dye it. My response has always been, “I think God is doing a pretty good job of it all by Himself

* * *

          At my great granddaughter’s first birthday party I met a young man who introduced himself by saying, “My name is Charley* and I hate brown hair.” It seems this three-year old was born with blonde hair and as he’s gotten older, it has darkened. Some family members and others have commented on this in his presence and he processed it as being a negative thing. Now there is a little boy walking around thinking he is less than he should be because of the color of his hair.

* * *

          Have we become a society which values people based only on their pristine outward appearance?

* * *

          On the day God created you, He took extra care to choose all the parts that make you who you are. When He finished, He stood back and looked at you and said, “Um mmmmmm! She/he is good. This is some of my best work! Perfect, no corrections needed.” What happened between the perfection He saw and society feeding us the line, “your smile is imperfect? Let us fix that for you. Your hair is the wrong color. Let me dye it for you.”

          In 2011, $10 billion was spent on 9,200 plastic surgery procedures in America. Half a billion dollars is spent each year on hair dyeing and hair dyeing products. $40 billion is spent annually on weight loss systems and products. These are just a few of the costs associated with changing our outward appearance to make ourselves more appealing to those around us.

          There are no estimates available for the costs we incur to make ourselves more appealing to God.

Going out with joy today, satisfied to be who I am-

Cathy

*Name changed