Ugly is O.K.

by Dr. Don Kuehle, United Methodist, Retired, Jackson

I’m trucking down the Interstate when a message on a billboard caught my eye, “Ugly is O.K.” What’s that all about? I have no idea what the message was promoting; it did cause me to do some serious thinking about “ugly!” Has ugly become acceptable? Will ugly become the norm?

Ugly is in the eye of the beholder! Both ugliness and beauty exist in the mind of the observer. God created all things and every person with a spark of beauty in them. God sees the beauty and potential in all of us.

We, however, have been taught/conditioned to see things from a human point-of-view. We see what we want to see! What we see often reflects how we feel about ourselves: if we feel good about ourselves, we tend to see the beauty in the world around us; if we feel that we are bad, worthless, we tend to see the ugliness around us.

What seems ugly to us, moreover, might be beautiful to someone else.

We played an ugly game! Game-winners like to say this; game-losers never do. Interpretation: “We didn’t play our best, but we did enough to win.” We made a lot of mistakes. We didn’t follow our game-plan. We didn’t deserve to win, but we did. It was an ugly game!

Sometimes extra effort and perseverance negate an ugly game. Sometimes a little luck and getting the breaks outshines our ugly play. We like to take credit for a win, even if it’s an ugly one; we dislike accepting the blame for a lousy game.

The hardest thing for us to say, in a game or in life, is: “We played an ugly game and we lost. The other team deserved to win.”As John Suckling put it: “Success is a rare paint that hides all the ugliness.”

Beauty is skin-deep, but ugly goes to the bone! We see, and judge, people on their outward appearance. First appearances are important, but they are not necessarily correct!

People put up a false front; it’s only when we get to know them better that we discover the person behind the facade. God sees us as we truly are; He sees both the beauty and the ugliness in us. God also sees the potential in us for a greater good, and challenges us to be better than we now are.

They’re ugly as sin! Sin is the ultimate ugliness. We’re all ugly; all of us have sinned. God created life to be beautiful, wonderful, and good.

When we put ourselves at the center of life, life turns ugly. When we allow pride and lust and greed to rule our thoughts, life becomes ugly. When we rebel against God’s authority, life is no longer beautiful, wonderful, or good.

God cleans up the ugliness in our lives, and the ugly mess we’ve made of His creation! Because of Christ’s death on the Cross, God has forgiven our every sin and cleansed us of all our ugliness. God restores the beauty to life. God encourages our goodness. God has set the standards for life at a higher level; the “norm” in God’s kingdom is life as God designed it to be!

Lent is a time to accept God’s standards as our own!