Blue Eyes Are Better

Bumping along in a van on a tiny dirt road in Managua, Nicaragua, an intern named Mallory relayed a story about the House of Hope (a nonprofit organization that helps women and girls escape sex trafficking), where we were volunteering. Mallory told us that one night she found the girls piled in one bunk whispering and giggling.

Questioning them, Mallory learned that several of the girls had discovered discarded blue contact lenses from a recent mission team. Naïve to the concept of prescription and hygiene, the girls promptly popped them on their eyes. They desperately wanted blue not brown eyes, because when they were "in the life" customers preferred blue.

Mallory's tale reminded me of Amy Carmichael, beloved Irish missionary to India in the early 1900s who spent her life rescuing orphans destined for temple prostitution. At the bold age of three, Amy decided that she disliked her brown eyes. Taught by her mother that God was the answerer of prayer, Amy knelt by her bed and made one simple request: true-blue Irish eyes. She went to sleep with confidence, jumped out of bed the next morning, and looked in the mirror—into the same brown eyes.

While most folks hearing that story would smirk at the ridiculousness of childish prayers, I commiserated with Amy's longing and disappointment.

Eyes Are Fine, Hair Not So Good

Our struggle with self-image never lets up, does it? No matter what age, continent, or era, we dislike how the Creator put us together.

Since I was a little girl I could recite Psalm 139's poetic prose of how God is wild about the way he wonderfully wove me together. Yet sitting in the back of that van it hit me hard: I have blue eyes, but not once have I thought of them as assets, my ticket to beauty, the better color. Instead, I wanted to change my hair.

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