A Gentle and Quiet Spirit: Attempting the Impossible?

I have always struggled with the idea and reality of beauty. Growing up in a culture obsessed by physical appearance, I wanted what every other girl wanted—to be beautiful. As a teenager though, I became confused about beauty. I had a well-intentioned friend who often told me I would look great if I just lost a few pounds. My idea of beauty became linked with how much I weighed. Far more dangerous though was the seed planted that personal, physical perfection was attainable. I felt like such a failure because I never quite made it to perfection; I never measured up to someone else’s idea of beauty.

As I grew in my relationship with God, I realized that I was missing the mark of true beauty by looking at the world’s standards. I then turned to the Bible to see what God had to say about beauty. What I found was both pleasantly surprising, and alarming.

~The first thing I noticed is that the role of women in society defined what society considered beautiful. In Biblical times, a woman’s desirability was defined by her ability to have children.  A strong body, a body capable of bearing multiple children—that was what was important.

~The next thing I noticed was that beauty wasn’t talked about in the same way it is today. Solomon compliments his Beloved by saying, “Your hair is like a flock of goats,” and, “Your eyes behind your veil are doves.” These compliments don’t really translate so well today. (Both verses are from Song of Songs 4.) Checking my commentary shed a little bit of light on these passages and other passages like these from the Song of Songs, but left me unsatisfied as to true beauty.

~ In Genesis, Sarai is called beautiful. Sarai was so beautiful that a couple of kings, in addition to her husband, desired her for themselves. But Genesis never mentions her hair color, her eye color, or how big or small she was. It just says that she was beautiful. A little more information is given regarding Esther. The Bible says, “She had a lovely figure and was beautiful.” A lovely figure - no measurements, size, hair color, no specifics - just “a lovely figure” and “beautiful.” This was both satisfying and unsatisfying. I wouldn’t miss out on true beauty because I wasn’t blond and blue-eyed, but my search for specificity regarding beauty in the Bible remained unsatisfied.

Then, in my searching and studying, I found a passage of Scripture that had some surprising things to say about beauty.

“Your beauty should not come from outward adornment such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.” 1 Peter 3:3-4

On the one hand this was good news. It wasn’t about my hairstyle, and I wasn’t disqualified from being beautiful by not having a lot of valuable jewelry or expensive clothes. It seemed as though at last I was getting somewhere! Beauty that never stops being beautiful is based on something inside me: a gentle and quiet spirit. Gentle? And quiet?

Then I knew I was in trouble.

I am sure you can think of someone you would describe as gentle and quiet. My daughter, Katheryne is someone who I consider to have a gentle and quiet spirit. She would never hurt anyone, even someone she didn’t like. But honestly, there are very few people she doesn’t like. And she is quiet. Even when she is loud she is quiet; her yelling is the equivalent of some people’s talking. I love my daughter and she is someone I consider to be truly beautiful. She has the physical beauty as well as the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit. But if you know me and you know my daughter, you know that we are opposites. Everything she is, I am not. I am not usually considered gentle. Plain spoken, honest, sometimes blunt—these words describe me. But gentle? And I don’t come close to quiet. I don’t talk non-stop, and it isn’t that no one else is able to participate in the conversation if I am around, but I can definitely hold up my end of the conversation. What are those of us who are not gentle and quiet supposed to do? Does this mean we can never be truly beautiful?

I left these verses alone for many years; I did not know what to do with them. But honestly, I wasn’t ready for what these verses really meant. I still wanted the A, B, C approach to beauty—weigh this much, wear this size, have this body shape—yup, now I am beautiful. Thankfully, God is not about specific parameters designed to exclude; just as God wants everyone to come to repentance, He wants all women included in beautiful. So God brought me back to these verses the summer after my marriage ended. I was feeling hurt and rejected and everything except beautiful. But I was finally ready to learn what these verses really meant.

I started by looking at the same verse in different translations. “Let your adornment be what’s inside—the real you, the lasting beauty of a gracious and quiet spirit, in which God delights.” This is how The Voice translates this verse. The NASB says, “But let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God.” These translations mention the real you, and the hidden person.  

An adornment is something that decorates, so by definition would be outside—visible. If we are supposed to show on the outside what is hidden inside then true beauty involves transparency. I have to show people the real me: the person that I hide from everyone because I am afraid of my lack of perfection. While many people dislike transparency, for me, permission to be transparent was a welcome relief. I had spent so many years hiding who I really was and not only did it NOT help people to like me, but I lost myself in the process. No more hiding? I could handle that.

Then I grabbed a dictionary and discovered that, in addition to kind, gentle also means fair, moderate, not holding to the letter of the law. It considers the facts of the situation and behaves rationally, and is not argumentative. Quiet can mean making no noise, but it also means tranquil and peaceful. It is an inner peace that is not dependent on external circumstances.

This was not what I was expecting. God never expected me to change my personality. It is possible for me to be blunt but not argumentative, honest and yet fair, plain speaking and still full of grace. And I can talk. I don’t have to be literally quiet; rather when I talk, my words and my life should be filled with a serenity and certainty that comes from knowing and relying on God and not on whether everything in my life is going well. God expects me—us—to be fully, completely ourselves.

Today we have the ability to change our hair color and our eye color, but we can’t easily change our bone structure or our body shape. This is why beauty is not physically described in the Bible—because we have no control over our genetic makeup. And that is why beauty is not determined by the physical; beauty, true beauty, is determined by the things we control, the things we choose. It is determined by how we act and how we treat the people around us. When God decided that beauty would be about our inner person, He leveled the playing field and made beauty something that is possible for all women.

And for those of us who still struggle with the fact that we don’t measure up to society’s standard of beauty - consider Solomon’s love story found in his Song of Songs. Solomon wrote verse after verse extolling the desirableness of his Beloved, and yet she was considered unattractive according to the standards of the daughters of Jerusalem because she was not fair but was a dark beauty. In Song of Songs 4:7 Solomon sums up his thoughts about her when he says, “You are altogether beautiful, my darling; there is no flaw in you.”  I LOVE that!

Yes, I still struggle with feeling beautiful, but at last I know true beauty is attainable. While I do work on my outer beauty—haircuts, working out, wearing makeup—I also am intentional in working on my inner beauty as that is the beauty that will not fade. To remember what the verse means in all of its depth and detail I paraphrased it and I have included it below. Be encouraged knowing true beauty is possible!

Dyann’s Paraphrase 1 Peter 3:3-4:

 “We, all women, should not look to our hair, jewelry and clothes to define our beauty. Rather, our beauty should be defined by what shines out from within us - by the pieces of ourselves that we share with others. The qualities that make us truly beautiful with a beauty that does not fade are the qualities of fairness and equitable treatment, not flying off the handle but being moderate in behavior, not acting rashly but considering the facts and responding rationally, thinking about what we say before we say it, extending grace to others, not always having to be right, and being at peace, knowing that our lives and the circumstances of our life are in the hands of God. These qualities are the qualities that God values and considers beautiful.”