Every Woman Has A Beauty to Unveil

This post is going to take you from a story that tells of the depths of depravity to the complete and polar opposite kind of story. You will come away knowing why the enemy of our souls has a special kind of hatred for the daughters of Eve. Then, you will see that because every woman bears the image of God, she has a beauty to unveil. Beauty is an essence that is given to every woman at her creation.

First, unfortunately, we have to see and face just one example of the depths of depravity permeating our world today. Then, we will see who is behind it all and why.

Several weeks ago, my daughter and I watched a Lifetime movie called, "Human Trafficking." I have to admit, the horrendous treatment of women, girls (and sometimes even little boys) who are sold into sexual slavery haunted me for days. I wondered how anyone could ever be so cruel as to be involved in such a horrible, despicable industry.

In my current Bible Study on the book of Genesis, we all read the following verse which described what man was like just before the flood:

Genesis 7:5 - The LORD saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.

I thought of that verse when I was watching Human Trafficking because it perfectly described the type of people involved in such a horrendous trade that inflicts continual pain, harm, and death on its victims. It is evil depravity at its worse!

Then, I thought of the verse in the New Testament where Paul tells us that "God gave them over to their sinful lusts," (another Bible version states it as "gave them up unto.") I can better understand that verse in the context of realizing Genesis 7:5. When a person reaches the point where every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time, what else could be done for them? The terms "vile affections" include all types of sexual sin.

Romans 1:26-27:
"For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet."

Romans 1:28-32:

28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; 29 being filled with all unrighteousness, *sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, 30 backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, 31 undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, *unforgiving, unmerciful; 32 who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.

In the following excerpt from the book "Captivating," I was given some new insight about why sexual violence against women is rampant throughout the world:

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" It is also rampant against little girls and boys, but more than one million girls are sold into the sex trade every year! Dear God - what is to account for the systemic, often brutal, nearly universal assault on femininity? Where does this come from?

Do not make the mistake of believing that "men are the enemy." Certainly men have had a hand in this, and will have a day of reckoning before their Maker. But you will not understand this story - or your story - until you begin to see the actual Forces behind this and get a grip on their motives.

Where does this hatred for women, seen all over the world, come from? Why is it so diabolical?

For we are not fighting against people made of flesh and blood, but against the evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against those mighty powers of darkness who rule this world, and against wicked spirits in the heavenly realms. (Eph. 6:12 NLT)

The assault on femininity - its long history, its utter viciousness - cannot be understood apart from the spiritual forces of evil we are warned against in the Scriptures. This is not to say that men (and women, for they, too, assault women) have no accountability in their treatment of women. Not at all. It is simply to say that no explanation for the assault upon Eve and her daughters is sufficient unless it opens our eyes to the Prince of Darkness and his special hatred of femininity.

Turn your attention again to the events that took place in the Garden of Eden. Notice - who does the Evil One go after? Who does Satan single out for his move against the human race? He could have chosen Adam...but he didn't. Satan went after Eve. He set his sights on her. Have you ever wondered why? It might have been that he, like any predator, chose what he believed to be the weaker of the two. There is some truth to that. He is utterly ruthless. But we believe there is more. Why does Satan make Eve the focus of his assault on humanity?

You may know that Satan was first named Lucifer, or Son of the Morning. It infers a glory, a brightness or radiance unique to him. In the days of his former glory he was appointed a guardian angel. Many believe he was the captain of the angel armies of God. The guardian of the glory of the Lord.

"You were the model of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.

You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone adorned you:

ruby, topaz and emerald, chrysolite, onyx and jasper, sapphire, turquoise and beryl.

Your settings and mountings were made of gold; on the day you were created they were prepared.

You were anointed as a guardian cherub, for so I ordained you.

You were on the holy mount of God;

you walked among the fiery stone." (Ezek. 28:12-14)

Perfect in beauty. That is the key. Lucifer was gorgeous. He was breathtaking. and it was his ruin. Pride entered Lucifer's heart. The angel came to believe he was being cheated somehow. He craved the worship that was being given to God for himself. He didn't merely want to play a nobel role in the Story; he wanted the Story to be about him. He wanted to be the star. He wanted the attention, the adoration for himself. ("Mirror, Mirror, on the wall...")

Your heart became proud

on account of your beauty,

and you corrupted your wisdom

because of your splendor. (Ezek. 28:17)

Satan fell because of his beauty. Now his heart for revenge is to assault beauty. He destroys it in the natural world wherever he can. Strip mines, oil spills, fires, Chernobyl. He wreaks destruction on the glory of God in the earth like a psychopath committed to destroying great works of art.

But most especially, he hates Eve.

Because she is captivating, uniquely glorious, and he cannot be. She is the incarnation of the Beauty of God. More than anything else in all creation, she embodies the glory of God. She allures the world to God. He hates it with a jealousy we can only imagine.

And there is more. The Evil One also hates Eve because she gives life. Women give birth, not men. Women nourish life. And they also bring life into the world soulfully, relationally, spiritually - in everything they touch. Satan was a murderer from the beginning (John 8:44). He brings death. His is a kingdom of death. Ritual sacrifices, genocide, the Holocaust, abortion - those are his ideas. And thus Eve is his greatest human threat, for she brings life. She is a lifesaver and a life giver. Eve means "life" or "life producer."

"Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living" (Gen. 3:20).

Put those two things together - that Eve incarnates the Beauty of God and she gives life to the world. Satan's bitter heart cannot bear it. He assaults her with a special hatred. History removes any doubt about this. Do you begin to see it?

Think of the great stories - in nearly all of them, the villain goes after the Hero's true love. He turns his sights on the Beauty. Magua goes after Cora in The Last of the Mohicans. Longshanks goes after Murron in Braveheart. Commodus goes after Maximus's wife in Gladiator. The Witch attacks Sleeping Beauty. The stepsisters assault Cinderella. Satan goes after Eve.

This explains an awful lot. It is not meant to scare you. Actually, it will shed so much light on your life's story, if you will let it. Most of you thought the things that have happened to you were somehow your fault - that you deserved it. If only you had been prettier or smarter or done more or pleased them, somehow it wouldn't have happened. You would have been loved. They wouldn't have hurt you.

And most of you are living with the guilt that somehow it's your fault you aren't more deeply pursued now. That you do not have an essential role in a great adventure. That you have no beauty to unveil. The message of our wounds nearly always is, "This is because of you. This is what you deserve." It changes things to realize that, no, it is because you are glorious that these things happened. It is because you are a major threat to the kingdom of darkness. Because you uniquely carry the glory of God to the world.

You are hated because of your beauty and power.

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Add on 11/28/05:

Stasi (co-author)mentioned that the term that God gives Eve when she is created is ezer kenegdo. God states, "It is not good for the man to be alone, I shall make him [an ezer kenegdo]" (Gen. 2:18 Alter) Robert Alter, who has spent years translating the book of Genesis, says that this phrase is "notoriously difficult to translate." Alter gets closer when he translates it "sustainer beside him."

The word ezer, is used only twenty other places in the entire Old Testament. And in every other instance the person being described is God himself, when you need him to come through for you desperately.

Blessed are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the LORD? He is your shield and helper, and your glorious sword. (Deut. 33:26,29, emphasis added)

I lift up my eyes to the hills - where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. (Ps. 121:1-2, emphasis added)

May the LORD answer you when you are in distress; may the name of the God of Jacob protect you. May he send you help. (Ps. 33:20, emphasis added)

O house of Israel, trust in the LORD - he is their help and shield. O house of Aaron, trust in the LORD - he is their help and shield. You who fear him, trust in the LORD - he is their help and shield. (Ps. 115:9-11, emphasis added)

Most of the contexts are life and death, by the way, and God is your only hope. Your ezer. If he is not there beside you...you are dead.

A better translation therefore of ezer would be "lifesaver." Kenegdo means alongside, or opposite to, a counterpart.

Stasi goes on to describe:"... that God calls us to a life involving frequent risks and many dangers. (Isn't that the truth!) Why else would we need him to be our ezer? You don't need a lifesaver if your mission is to be a couch potato. You need an ezer when your life is in constant danger."

(Jesus told us in John 16:33 - These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you *will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.")

Stasi also mentions:

"That longing in the heart of a woman to share life together as a great adventrue - that comes straight from the heart of God, who also longs for this. He does not want to be an option in our lives. He does not want to be an appendage, a tagalong. Neither does any woman. God is essential. He wants us to need him - desperately. Eve is essential. She has an irreplaceable role to play. And so you'll see that women are endowed with fierce devotion, an ability to suffer great hardships, a vision to make the world a better place."

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Now, I have done a lot of "skipping around" in the Captivating book within these last two posts. I do want to make it clear that this beauty being described is not just physical beauty. In the "What Eve Alone Can Tell" chapter, we discover why beauty matters and it is vividly described in many different ways. Now, we will see that because every woman bears the image of God, she has a beauty to unveil. Beauty is an essence that is given to every woman at her creation.

Every experience of beauty points to [eternity]. - Hans Urs von Balthasar

There are powerful descriptions of what beauty is within the book. For now, I will just list them.

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Beauty is powerful because it matters.

First, beauty speaks. (see Psalm 99:3)

Beauty says "all shall be well."

Beauty also invites.

Recall what it is like to hear a truly beautiful piece of music.

Beauty comforts.

There is something profoundly healing about it.

Beauty inspires.

A life of beauty calls us to something higher.

Beauty is transcendent.

It is our most immediate experience of the eternal.

Beauty says, There is a glory calling to you. And if there is a glory, there is a source of glory.

Beauty is, without question, the most essential and the most misunderstood of all of God's qualities.

All of these things are true for any experience of Beauty. But they are especially true when we experience the beauty of a woman - her eyes, her form, her voice, her heart, her spirit, her life. She speaks all of this far more profoundly than anything else in all creation.

Knowing a woman's beauty requires an unveiling. Whatever else it means to be feminine, it is depth and mystery and complexity, with beauty as its very essence.

Please don't take this wrong. Don't despair. Remember this:

Every woman has a beauty to unveil.

Every woman.

Because she bears the image of God. She doesn't have to conjure it, go get it from a salon, have plastic surgery or breast implants. No, beauty is an essence that is given to every woman at her creation.

Pause for a moment and realize this.

We did not say that a woman is prized only for her good looks. We did not say a woman is here merely to complete a man, and therefore a single woman is somehow missing her destiny. What we said was, first, that Eve is the crown of creation. There is something uniquely magnificent and powerful about a woman. We tried to reveal the immeasurable dignity, the holiness of your feminine heart by showing that it is God who longs for Romance; it is God who longs to be our ezer (helper, companion, help meet); it is God who reveals beauty as essential to life. You are the image bearer of this God. That is why you long for those things too.

There is a radiance hidden in your heart that the world desperately needs.

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Did you know that the word "beauty" appears 49 times in 49 verses of the KJ Bible? Here are just a few:

Psalm 27:4 - One [thing] have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to enquire in his temple.

Psalm 29:2 - Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name; worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness.

Psalm 50:2 - Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined.

Psalm 90:17 - And let the beauty of the LORD our God be upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it.

Psalm 96:6 - Honour and majesty [are] before him: strength and beauty [are] in his sanctuary.

Psalm 96:9 - O worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness: fear before him, all the earth.

Again, realize that there is a radiance hidden in your heart that the world desperately needs.

Don't let the enemy of our souls prevent you from revealing just who you truly are in Christ Jesus our Lord!