*For context, it may be helpful to read this post first.
Visualize
Unattractive: Plain or dull.[1]
“There was nothing to attract us to him.” – Isaiah 53:2c
Read
When our friend Janet[2] moved into her new apartment in a HUD[3] high-rise, we carted cardboard boxes filled with her meager assortment of IKEA furniture, dishes bought off QVC[4], and an entire collection of Disney dolls, into her fifth-floor unit. I lost count of the trips I took up that creaky, shuddering elevator while praying it wouldn’t die mid-floor. The building originally housed an upscale Jewish assisted living facility, and you could see lingering hints of its former beauty—the soaring ceilings, the circle stairs winding wide and wonderful up and then down into the basement level, the empty fountains, cracked tile, and perhaps my favorite of all—an out-of-tune grand piano sitting listless in an empty cafeteria space.
Each time I visited Janet, I’d hold my breath to ward off the smell of body odor, musty carpet and stale smoke that nearly knocked me over. A youngish black man with two stub legs sticking straight as pins off his wheelchair sat in the foyer most days, waiting to be wheeled out to fresh air and sunlight or a trip to the grocery store. He’d lost his legs during Hurricane Katrina and somehow found his way back home to the Midwest. He was a cheerful sort of fellow but his family never visited him, and I could see the hollow sadness in his dark eyes.
The first time we visited Janet on Halloween, a meager group of residents sat in the foyer gripping plastic buckets of dollar store candy in their hands, hoping to see little boys and girls in costumes saying, “Trick or treat?!” All through Kansas City suburbia, parents drove to wealthy neighborhoods and walked pristine streets as their kids loaded up on giant-sized candy bars and packs of Sour Patch. But hardly anyone showed up to Janet’s building for Dum-Dum suckers and off-brand chocolates. There was nothing attractive about the location—one street over from a high-crime area—or the disabled residents who lived in it. In years past, Jon and I were among those parents driving their kids to safe, wealthy neighborhoods, but this year we dressed up our kids in home-made costumes and headed for the bad part of town. When we walked through the front doors of Janet’s building, the delight on the faces of 105-year-old Eva, Janet, and the other residents as they gave away their widows’ mite in candy to kids they didn’t know, fractured my heart. We lingered, listening as the residents shared memories of long-gone days with their own kids.
I noticed a woman with scraggly blonde hair, missing front teeth, and cool blue eyes hugging the edge of the foyer, one foot on the stairs, one on the landing, half-in the space, half-out, as if she couldn’t decide to come in or stay out. Maneuvering around the edge of the room to where she stood, I gauged her openness to conversation. I felt her soften as I began asking questions about her life. I don’t remember the details of everything she shared, but what she said as we moved to leave seared my soul: “Thank you for looking at me,” she said earnestly. “No one ever cares to look at me anymore, you know.”
As we drove away, I teared up, my mind replaying her words—no one ever cares to look at me anymore, you know? Ugly, unseen, unlovable—I’d felt that way. Most of us have, or we’ve avoided those who do.
Like this woman, Jesus wasn’t physically attractive. He was a homely Jewish boy who grew into a plain-looking Jewish man. He didn’t live among the clean, attractive people of his time—the religious leaders, the kings and queens, the Roman officials—but among the marginalized and disabled.
Perhaps the most unattractive humans of Jesus’ time were lepers. Missing fingers and limbs, covered in patches of discolored skin, bleeding ulcers, and ugly nodules, lepers were by law required to alert others to their presence by yelling “Unclean!” which was code for “Don’t see me, don’t touch me, don’t come near!” Yet Jesus, unafraid, drew near to the disabled and diseased, and touched them, saying, “Be clean!”[5] For the diseased who saw Jesus for who he really was—the only one who could heal their souls—he declared, “Go! Your faith has made you well.”[6]
Jesus’ beauty came not from his appearance, but from his ability to see past the ugliness, the scars, and the filth to a soul desperate for his healing touch. We too are beautiful when we seek out the unlovely and unlovable to offer the gift of seeing.
Ponder
How might Jesus be calling you to offer the gift of seeing to the unseen?
Pray
Inhale: When I am at my worst . . .
Exhale: You draw near still . . .
You can read the rest of this series here.
Above: Some of Janet’s photo creations, often with a Disney twist:)
[1] Merriam-Webster.com
[2] Names and some identifyers have been changed. Photos shared with permission.
[3] HUD housing refers to housing programs run by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) that help provide affordable housing, often for low-income families, seniors, and people with disabilities.
[4] QVC is a global multi-channel retailer that sells a variety of products through live television, streaming, and online platforms.
[5] Matt. 8:3. NIV. Biblegateway.com
[6] Luke 19:19. NIV. Biblegateway.com
Pursued 