All the days of his vow of separation, no razor shall touch his head. Numbers 6:5
Growing up, my interest in a girl was directly proportional to how attractive I found her. I know that’s shallow, but the reality was that my value of a girl was attached to her physical appearance. So, I believed the same thing about myself. I was a bit of a dork though, and girls weren’t terribly interested in me romantically. So, because of my own view of girls, I assumed this lack of interest was due to my physical appearance. I felt that I must not be very attractive and therefore, I had less value than those who were attractive. There are still echoes of this in my mind today. If someone complements my physical appearance, I feel valued. If, however, someone criticizes my appearance, I’m hurt and feel devalued.
It’s shallow and absurd, but still, it’s a real feeling that I must keep in check, because I know that my satisfaction and meaning in life cannot be attached to my physical appearance. I know that the things that matter most in life have nothing to do with my looks. The most important thing about me is my relationship with God and I know that my purpose in life is to love him and to love those around me. I believe that finding my value in my physical appearance is futile and vain, so, when I feel valued or devalued because of my looks, I must choose to abandon those feelings because they’re simply not helpful.
Where do we find our value? That’s the question of today’s passage. In it, God described the Nazarite. The Nazarites were those Israelites who desired to take a special vow to set themselves apart to seek God. One of the requirements of the Nazarite was that he (or she) must not cut his hair. To make this commitment was to abandon concern about physical appearance. The Nazarite was to recognize that his value came from God alone and that any dependence on appearance was a vain and futile distraction.
We may never take a Nazarite vow, but we too were made to find our satisfaction and meaning in God. Finding our center in anything else is a distraction. This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t cut our hair or engage in personal hygiene. It does mean though, that we should purposefully avoid finding our value in our physical appearance. Beauty is fleeting and vain. Attempting to find fulfillment in it is futile. Daily, we must go to God, finding our life in him. God doesn’t age or fade, and it’s only in him that we may find the joy, purpose, and meaning for which we were made.