Her nose was pretty big, but I didn’t think it looked all that bad. However, Lori claimed she was so ugly that people called her names and teased her children at school about her looks. To me she was average and even pleasant in appearance, but she decided to have her nose diminished, her chin built out, her teeth fixed, her cheeks filled out — as well as other enhancements on ABC’s show called Extreme Makeover. In the interview she seemed as though she was a likeable person with a sense of humor. She had a husband who loved her and children with whom she seemed to be close, yet her perception of her appearance was like a black cloud over her life. She wore sunglasses and ball caps to hide behind, but she won’t be doing that any longer. Here is what Lori looks like now. She is obviously more physically attractive, but I wonder if her life is really measurably happier. More than that, I wonder if she is a better person because of it. Wouldn’t it be interesting to go to her town a year from now to see if her life has changed, and if the change was a change for the better? Will her new appearance make her more concerned about the homeless and hungry in her area? If we talked to her husband a year from now would he say that there marriage was stronger? If we talked to her children would they say she was kinder and more thoughtful? Would her friends say she had become a better friend and more caring neighbor? She looks better, but will she be better? I trust she will.
Most of us think about what it would be like to have an extreme makeover. I wouldn’t mind a little liposuction myself. I could use a hair implant or two. It looks like little hair lumbermen have been foresting on my head and there are fewer hairs every month. I can now see through the trees and there has some serious de-forestation in some areas. I am at the age where I can grow hair on my ears easier than I can on my head. I look through the L. L. Bean catalog and I see these great clothes advertised and I say to myself, “The only problem is that those clothes won’t look as good on me as they do that perfect male model.” With his handsome face and chiseled torso you could throw rags on him and he would still look better than me with the best clothes in the catalog. But do you really think Tom Cruise is happier than me? He has a lot more money and is a lot better looking, but I don’t know that he enjoys life any more than me, if as much. Is Britney Spears any happier than you? She certainly has the perfect looks, the talent and the money, but I have a feeling if you actually lived in her world you would not trade places with her.
This is a culture where youth is worshiped and physical appearance is everything. So shows like Extreme Makeover have a huge draw as people think about what they would like to change about themselves. But what if our values were kingdom values? What would we think about changing then? There is nothing wrong with enhancing our appearance. None of us would have combed our hair today or brushed our teeth if we did not care about our appearance. There is nothing wrong with putting on makeup. Caring about our physical appearance is good, except when that concern becomes extreme, and we forget about the things we should be concerned about.
I think we all need an extreme makeover, but not the kind you will see on television. It is not a makeover of your body, but of your spirit. In biblical terms, we need a transformation. Here is how the book of Romans puts it: “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is — his good, pleasing and perfect will” (Romans 12:2). That is the kind of extreme makeover we need.
Did you see the move Shallow Hal? It is a movie about an unattractive, really shallow middle-aged man named Hal Larsen who judges women on how “hot” they are. But then one day, Hal gets stuck on a stalled elevator with a motivational guru who helps him overcome his shallowness by hypnotizing him so that he sees only the inner beauty of people. Leaving the elevator, Hal sees large, unattractive women as supermodels. When a 330 pound blonde named Rosemary shows up, to Hal she looks like. . . well like Gwyneth Paltrow. He is overcome by her kindness and humor, and she becomes the most beautiful girl in the world to him.
Somehow I think that is the way it is when God sees us. He does not even notice our weight, our shape or our nose, or if he does, we look very beautiful to him. When he comes into our lives, he gives us an extreme makeover. He sees the person we are inside. He sees the person we can be. He is attracted to us because he sees the image of his Son in us. He sees the Holy Spirit living in us. He sees us growing into the likeness of his Son.
How do we get this makeover that makes us new, inwardly beautiful people? The process is painful and pleasurable. It is much more painful than any physical makeover, but has much better results. Some of you have had a masked man with a knife stand in front of you, but you were not afraid at all, because you knew he was your surgeon. You came to him because you needed help. Here is the first step in coming to God, our divine Surgeon. We realize the truth that: We all begin as ugly people. Without God we are all inwardly ugly. The Bible tells us that we have all sinned and fallen short of God’s glorious beauty (Romans 3:23). I like the way The Message puts it: “Since we’ve compiled this long and sorry record as sinners. . . and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us, God did it for us. Out of sheer generosity he put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we’re in and restored us to where he always wanted us to be. And he did it by means of Jesus Christ” (Romans 3:23).
In the novel Moby Dick Captain Ahab is frightened by what he sees in himself. He asks the question that many of us have asked: “What is it, what nameless, inscrutable, unearthly thing is it; what cozening, hidden lord and master, and cruel, remorseless emperor commands me; that against all natural lovings and longings, I so keep pushing, and crowding, and jamming myself on all the time; recklessly making me ready to do what in my own proper, natural heart, I durst not so much as dare?” John Calvin answers the question by saying, “There remains in us a smoldering cinder of evil, from which desires continually leap forth to allure and spur to commit sin.” There is a blackness in our hearts that we must take seriously.
One of the problems we face is that we think we can become beautiful on our own by just trying harder. But no amount of effort will do it. In C. S. Lewis’ book Till We Have Faces one of the characters is struggling with the ugliness she sees within her and says, “I would set out boldly each morning to be just and calm and wise in all my thoughts and acts; but before they had finished dressing me I would find that I was back in some old rage, resentment, gnawing fantasy, or sullen bitterness. I could not hold out half an hour. And a horrible memory crept into my mind of those days when I had tried to mend the ugliness of my body with new devices in the way I did my hair or the colors I wore. I’d a cold fear that I was at the same work again. I could bend my soul no more than my face. Unless the gods helped.”
We have a God who is willing to help. A spiritual makeover is the work of God. This is something that only the divine Surgeon can do. And one thing is for sure, we will never come to him if we think we look okay without him. The prophet Isaiah describes our plight and our appearance: “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away” (Isaiah 64:6). Theologians call this ugliness “original sin.” It is not a pretty word, but it is an important one. Until we understand that we were born into a world that has been broken and ruined by sin, and that we have inherited that ruin and inclination to sin from our human ancestors, we cannot understand life. We are confused by what is going on inside of us and perplexed about why the world is the way it is. But once we understand that sin has made us and the world ugly, then we are ready for God to operate on us.
We keep wanting to believe that we and the rest of the human race are basically good. We think it will help us if we think that and we will feel better about ourselves. But, in fact, the opposite is true. That naive belief keeps us from coming to God for his cure. Once we accept the reality that we are not born basically good, then a lot of things begin to make sense. It is interesting that my parents never had to teach me to be selfish or cruel. Those things came very naturally to me, even as a small child. They did have to teach me to be kind, not to fight or say unkind things. I was not born good. I had a problem, and thank God he revealed it to me so I could come to him for healing. The Bible says, “For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death” (Romans 7:5).
The second step in our journey toward God is to realize: We have the beauty of God stamped on our souls. At first this sounds contradictory. How can we be ugly, yet have beauty in us at the same time? How can we be born sinful and also born with the image of God? The answer is that God’s original design was a beautiful human race that was full of nothing but goodness. Adam and Eve were a part of that design. But the parents of the human race rebelled, and sin and evil entered their hearts. We are all stained with that “original sin,” because we have inherited the rebellion and love of sinning from them. But we have also inherited from them the image of God which he impressed on our souls. We were made for God. There is something in us that can respond to him. There is a divine beauty that can be awakened. I see that beauty all over this sanctuary today. You are aglow with the Spirit of God. I love the way you look The outside world might think we need a makeover physically, but I see the beauty of God on your faces and it is emanating from you.
It wasn’t always that way. The Bible says, “Remember that at that time you were separate from Christ. . . without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ” (Ephesians 2:12-13). As God brings us near, he makes over us and gives us a makeover. He takes away the ugliness of sin in us and gives us a heart that loves the beauty of holiness.
King David’s heart was heavy with sin. He was at odds with himself, his family, his friends and the world. His heart was full of sin, but not so full he could not respond to the call of God. He was a broken man until he prayed this prayer: “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin” ( Psalm 51:1-2). With that God gave him a complete makeover. And he will do the same for you. You have the image of God stamped on your soul and you can respond to God.
The third step to God comes when we realize: God offers to make us new people. Yes, we all have a sin problem, and we’ve had that problem from birth. But we were also created in the image of God. And that part of us can respond to God’s call on our lives. We can say yes to God, and we will. And when we do, something wonderful happens: God makes us new. It is interesting to watch what happens in the life of someone who has received an extreme makeover by God: they exhibit extreme kindness, they manifest extreme commitment and make extreme sacrifices. They have an extreme love for God and others. It does not happen all at once, but it is an ongoing transformation that takes place throughout their lives. Paul put it like this: “And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).
This makeover results in a renewed heart and character. The Christian life, then, is not defined by what we do not do, but by the renewed heart God has given us. Our attitudes and desires have received a makeover. We want to love God and live for him. This is what Jeremiah prophesied: “‘This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time,’ declares the Lord. ‘I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people’” (Jeremiah 31:33). The Christian life is not about what we give up, but what we get. It is a positive holiness, not negative. It raises us from death and gives us life. The slavery to sin is broken and the freedom to live for God breaks forth in our lives with joy.
We have extreme sports, extreme dating and extreme makeovers propagated in our entertainment industry. It is time that we have some extreme Christians who are making a difference in their world.
One of the most interesting commercials on television never said a word about the product it was advertising. It panned several people who had just one thing in common — a nasty injury or scar. There was a cowboy with a huge scar around his eye, and you could tell his eye was damaged as well. Another fellow had a huge cauliflower ear. Still another had badly callused feet. Throughout the ad there is no explanation, except at the end when the Nike swoosh appears along with the words “Just Do It.” The commercial is surprisingly moving, because the whole time Joe Cocker is singing in the background: “You are so beautiful . . . to me.” To those athletes — the wrestler with the cauliflower ear, the surfer with a shark bite, the bullrider blind in one eye — their injuries are beauty marks. And to their fans, these athletes are beautiful because of their scars. Mike Folino, the ad’s creator, says, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” God is our beholder. He is also the one who makes us beautiful, and we are beautiful to him. Our beauty comes from him. He sings to us, “You are so beautiful ... to me.”
Rodney J. Buchanan
October 19, 2003
Mulberry St. UMC
Mt. Vernon, OH
www.MulberryUMC.org
Rod.Buchanan@MulberryUMC.org
(Note: Power Point slides are available upon request.)
An Extreme Makeover
Questions for October 19, 2003
1. What is your reaction to the extreme makeovers on television?
2. Why is our culture so obsessed with physical appearance?
3. If you had an extreme spiritual makeover what would you have worked on?
4. Are beautiful, successful, rich people happier than the rest of us?
5. What would it take to make you happy? What are the desires of your heart? How do we get our desires met according to Psalm 37:4?
6. Why do we want to think we are born good? What is the truth? See Psalm 51:5.
7. There is something else besides sin inside us. According to Genesis1:27 what is it and how does this affect us?
8. What promise is God making to us according to Romans 6:4?
9. Read Psalm 51:1-2. If we follow David’s example, how can the ugliness in us be taken away?
10. According to Jeremiah 31:33, what extreme makeover does God want to do for us?
