Participating in church this morning (still online instead of in-person), I sat with my back to a big picture window, so the pine forest and sparkling blue Colorado sky reflected off my laptop screen. The superimposition was striking–singing praises to God and hearing a great sermon about our Creator with reflections of His created beauty floating around the picture.

Life is beautiful, and there is beauty all around, if we have eyes to see it. If we focus on sunshine and flowers and the smell of freshly cut grass and people being kind and loving toward others. Or life can be bitter and ugly if we focus on that which is bitter and ugly in the world.

Which perspective we take is our choice.

We usually can’t choose our circumstances, but we can choose how we respond to them. This is what Paul is talking about in Philippians 4 when he says he has learned how to have an inner wellspring of joy regardless of what’s going on around him.

There’s something else we should keep in mind about beauty:  whenever we see someone behaving in a kindly, loving way toward us or another human being, we are seeing a reflection of God, albeit pale and dim compared to the real thing. I say this because God made us in His image. Since Jesus, with His sacrificial love for all of us, is the ultimate expression of God in human form, then we all must have been intended to be a reflection of His love and beauty. So even if someone is not yet a follower of Christ but they donate time or money to help the poor, or they give you a kind word and a smile on a rotten day, they are reflecting the love of our Creator, and that is a beautiful thing to behold.

Another awesome thing about this is that we all, each in our own way, have something beautiful, some small aspect of our great and gracious God, to reflect to everyone we meet. In what special way has God gifted you to reflect His light to each person He puts in your path?