This past month (January), Mary and I worked with Josie’s Angels. It is a ministry that works with pre-teen and teenage girls from the local neighborhood of Valley Golf (a suburb of Manila, Philippines). . I also attended a basketball practice and two games. We spent time with the girls before and after school. We would also lead Bible Studies for them. On Mondays, we had the oldest group of girls (ages 14-17). On Tuesdays, we had the middle ages (12-13 year olds). On Wednesdays, we have the youngest group (8-11 year olds).
As we were working with these girls, we heard them calling themselves ugly. We reassured them that they were beautiful but they would repeat again that they were ugly. As we worked with the different ministries that month, we had a girl from the feeding ministry tell Angela (Team Refresh) that Angela was beautiful because she was white. Angela told the girl that she was beautiful but the girl would not accept it.
On one of the last feeding days we participated in, Cara (from my team Team W.O.W.) came back to eat lunch with us. When she was introduced at the school’s feeding program, the teachers would ask the kid’s what color Cara’s skin was. The kids would say white. The teacher would then say Cara was beautiful because she had white skin. This made us frustrated that we were fighting against authority figures who were telling society that they were not beautiful because their skin was not a certain color!
Mary and I taught our Bible Studies to the girls about how God already thinks they are beautiful. They do not have to do anything in order to be beautiful in his eyes. We also taught them a memory verse to help them remember that truth. The verse is: “All beautiful you are, my darling, there is no flaw in you.” -Song of Songs (aka Song of Solomon) 4:7
As I would see the girls (and one boy) from our Bible Studies, I would ask them our memory verse. They would repeat it. The title of this blog “E cow I mog-an-da.” That is the pronunciation of how you would say “You are beautiful” in Tagalog.
In our society as well as here, girls need to be reminded that they are beautiful. We are bombarded with images of what the perfect woman should look like but God made us all different. If we all looked the same, it would be really boring. God did not make a mistake in making any of us. If we do not remind girls and women that they are beautiful, they will seek out that attention from boys or men instead. I know many women who went down the path of seeking that approval from boys or men and were hurt because of it. Please TELL the GIRLS or WOMEN in your life that they are BEAUTIFUL.
