Beauty. Trickery. Simplicity. Ecstasy. Oh but beauty reigns over all. Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the fairest one of all? What do you give to the world and what does the world give back? Only beauty gets into the world… Oh but I have separated you from the world. I have stood you up and made you Mine. I have tossed you and turned you, carved you and made you into what is beautiful. Beautiful. Beauty. I hate that word for what we have turned it into. I am ugly. I cannot make it. You will not survive. No. Don’t say that. But why? I have made you beautiful. Oh but is that enough? When you are called ugly it changes you. You must be beautiful. When you are called trash, when it is said among your peers that there can be no place for you, the one now left behind, you grow old. I grieve. Not for myself. Not for the ugliness I have been turned into by this world, by this ever-changing oh so constant world. I grieve for the lost, the lonely, the bitter, the ones who were always told they were ugly. no. No. NO!! I scream. But you can't hear me. You didn't call for me today. Your eyes didn't follow, your motives didn't sway. I don't understand. So many girls.... so many girls... my heart goes out to you, you beautiful, beautiful girls and you never even knew it. No one told you... oh but the one's who know it flaunt it. They sit there and strangle the life from it until they can get no more. You. You self-absorbed, insensitive, wretch. To destroy others means to build your beauty and to build your beauty means to heighten that awful ego. Alright!! Burn me down and I will remain ugly! But, Please Lord, let my beauty come from You, my God and my Redeemer, let my beauty come from You.

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Brandon Heath- I'm Not Who I Was Lyrics

I wish you could see me now
I wish I could show you how
I'm not who I was
I used to be mad at you

A little on the hurt side too
But I'm not who I was
I found my way around
To forgiving you
Some time ago
But I never got to tell you so

I found us in a photograph
I saw me and I had to laugh
You know, I'm not who I was
You were there, you were right above me
And I wonder if you ever loved me
Just for who I was

When the pain came back again
Like a bitter friend
It was all that I could do
To keep myself from blaming you

I reckon it's a funny thing
I figured out I can sing
Now I'm not who I was
I write about love and such
Maybe 'cause I want it so much

I'm not who I was
I was thinking maybe I
I should let you know
I am not the same
But I never did forget your name
Hello

Well the thing I find most amazing
In amazing grace
Is the chance to give it out
Maybe that's what love is all about

I wish you could see me now
I wish I could show you how
I'm not who I was....

*One of the most popular reasons for not being a christian is that christianity seems to be the only thing that makes logical sense. but if it is the only logical explanation as to how everything got here then that would mean that a perfect God made man in His image to have a relationship with Him and that man himself is not perfect.

(Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.)

(Genesis 1:27 So God created man in His own image in the image of God He created them male and female He created them.)

*but since man disobeyed God and sinned in the Garden of Eden he can no longer be with God until his sin is taken away and earased.

(Genesis 3:6-7 when the woman saw that the fruit of the tree's was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining wisdom she
took some and ate it. she also gave some to her husband who was with her and he ate it. then the eyes of both of them were opened and they realized they were naked, so they sowed fig leaves together and made covering for themselves.)

*So God sent His Son to die on the cross to pay for our ALL of our sins so that we ourselves would not have to die and/or be punished for the wrong things we have done, (cursing, lying, stealing, cheating, murder, adultry, etc.)

(John 3:16-17 Because God loved the world so much He gave His one and only Son so that whoever believes in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life. for God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world but to save the world through Him.)

*but if this is all true then that would mean that man is not perfect but that he needs a perfect God to make up for and take away his wrongdoing.

(Romans 3:10 there is no one righteous not even one.)

(Romans 3:23-24 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.)

*many people i have come in contact with are not christians, refuse the idea of christianity, or make fun of it solely on the very idea that to be a christian or accept christianity they would have to admit that they are not perfect, but are in need of a Savior who is. Even until the fifties america has been the greatest and most powerful and prosperous nation in the world because we have based every part of our existence as a nation on the Lord. We are still great, but as the years wear on our society grows more of a propensity for wrong and sinful behavior rather than pure biblical standards. only thirty and forty years ago the biggest problems in public schools were gum chewing and passing notes or talking in class. today we struggle with middle school, high school, and shockingly even elementary school students who bring weapons to school, use drugs, are involved in a gang, are pregnant, having abortions, drinking alchohol, reading pornography, cutting themselves, taking part in sexual activities, attempting suicide and much more everyday. Crime is the highest it's ever been and we are fighting to make such things as homosexuality, abortions, and having relationships with children legal in all our states. three out of five kids today live in split families with only one parent due to divorce when only forty years ago it was almost unheard of to do such a thing. When did these immoral and socially unacceptable things start creeping into our daily lives? mostly during the eighties, nineties and especially today after bible reading and prayer was banned from most schools and jobs. even now a lady named Madeline Murray O'Hare, an atheist who successfully managed to eliminate the use of Bible reading from public schools a few years ago, is petitioning to stop the reading of the gospel on the airwaves of America. slowely but surely we have managed to erase the God whom this country was built on almost completely if not totally out of our lives over the past few decades and America is spiraling downward faster than she was built upward. it seems that through simply studying and looking around that more than bad luck, more than coincidence, the God that we loved that made us beautiful and strong is waiting for us to come back to Him and until we choose to do so we will reap what we sow.

"America is great because america is good, when America ceases to be good, then America will cease to be great." -Alexis de Tocqueville

"The more profoundly we study this wonderful book [the bible] and the more closely we observe its devine precepts, the better citizens we will become and the higher will be our destiny as a nation." -President William McKinley

"That book [the bible] is the rock on which our republic rests." -Andrew Jackson.