I’m reading a book now by Armand Maurer called “about Beauty’ concerning Thomas Aquinas on beauty. He makes the statement that a dancer is beautiful when they are sleep, but beauty is not just being and it is when a dancer is dancing that they are the most beautiful of all. Beauty consists in acting according to form.
As I pondered this later, I thought of the saying of Irenaeus that John Eldridge quotes often. The glory of God is a man fully alive.
What is beautiful in a man is when he is being a man and doing that which a man is supposed to do. I believe this is one reason we exult in our masculinity. (Or rather, we’re supposed to.) We believe we are being that which we are supposed to be. God created us as men (I speak to the males of course) and he is exalted when we are truly men.
Could this be why we love action movies also? When we see the man beating up the bad guys, it makes us think that he is being a man and we glory in that. Every man wants to be that hero. Rest assured, no man, despite his physical stature, would say that he wants to be a wimp.
In the same way, this is why we find women attractive. A woman is attractive simply as a woman, but when she lives as a woman doing things as a woman, then she is even more attractive. If she acts indecent though in a sexual way that does not appeal, as much as we might admire her sex, we don’t really find her attractive. She is ceasing to act as a woman.
I also ponder that this is what makes sexual intercourse so fascinating on one level. The man is doing that which only he can do. The woman is doing that which only she can do. In the act, it is impossible to change roles. The man must be the man and the woman must be the woman. That is just the way God made us.
This is also why we men like to excel. We want to be the best at what we are. We don’t want to see a man living more than we are. We long to catch up to him. Watch men get together sometime and tell stories. No matter what, each man thinks that he has to top the other man.
Man is not to be a static creature. He is meant to be active. He is not a passive being. He is an acting being. The glory of God is a man fully alive for in that, the man is taking the role God gave him and is showing the glory of God. He is properly taking care of the lady in his life, the world around him, and living the nature that God gave him.
Glory to God.
Support Deeper Waters on Patreon!
