This past Sunday we sang Michael Gungor’s song Beautiful Things, and it has been one of my favorite songs we sing during our church service.
The song felt particularly timely for me this past weekend. I’m participating in our church’s Ash Wednesday service this year so Lent has been on my mind more than normal. I didn’t grow up in a church that practiced Lent so when I discovered the church calendar in college, I fell in love with the seasons of the church. For how somber this coming season is supposed to be, I LOVE Ash Wednesday.
There is something about being reminded of our mortality that makes me hunger for life, for goodness, for beautiful things. Ashes on my forehead remind me of the ash I came from and the ash I will return to. Beginning and ending as dust makes me feel small and insignificant in the grand scheme of things. And yet, this reminder of smallness stirs life and gratitude and creativity in me. And this song, Beautiful Things, moves me in the same way.
The chorus repeats “You make beautiful things. You make beautiful things out of the dust. You make beautiful things. You make beautiful things out of us.” I found myself singing this in my head this week. Not only does the melody stick with me, but the words are a mantra I wish we could all carry around with us. Put them in our pockets like candies we’re saving for later. Wear them in our hair like flowers for everyone to see. Write them on our shoes so when we look down we are reminded. We are reminded that God has made a beautiful thing in us, in me, in you.
Out of dust our lives have come and to dust our lives will return. But the whole inbetween is a beautiful thing. Our lives might not always contain joy, but there is beauty in us nonetheless. We won’t always be able to see it, but hopefully someone in our lives will see it for us. They’ll call it out, name it, will it to come forth, and maybe one day we will be able to see that we, too, are beautiful.
And when we begin to see the beauty in ourselves, we can look outside and see the beauty all around us. It’s springing forth from the ground in greens and whites and reds every spring. It’s growing up in the children in our lives. It’s playing basketball down the street with the neighbors that look different from us. It’s marching through the streets in solidarity with those more vulnerable than us.
Beauty is finding that even though we are small and insignificant, we also have the power to shape and change the world around us for better. Beauty is knowing that our future rests in the hands of the tiny children our communities are raising, hopefully with more love and more kindness and more perseverance to see justice come to fruition than we could ever imagine.
Beauty comes to us in the laugh of a friend, the touch of a lover, the peace between enemies. Beauty finds its way under our doors and in through our key holes. It reaches us in our happiest places and it consoles us in our loneliest hours. Beauty is ever present, waiting only for us to uncover it and proclaim it to the world. If you’ll be receiving ashes on your head this coming week, remember that the God who created us from dust has made a beautiful thing in us. And if you won’t be, let this be a reminder to you that you are a beautiful thing. Let this be a reminder to us all that no matter how small or insignificant we feel, we are always beautiful.
Timothy Burge-Lape 