for the girls.

"Flowers and sunsets, moon on water and delicate grasses in the starlight - would the designer of all this dress His own children, created in His image, in clothing which would make them unhappy and self-conscious? Would He have them all be alike and look alike? 

- Edith Schaeffer, The Hidden Art of Homemaking

Two weekends ago, I worked with a local photographer to capture 15 of the most beautiful girls I know in one of the most beautiful places in Tallahassee. It was a day I'd been planning for months, long before I'd grown attached to these girls, long before I knew just how much a day like this would be needed.

My intention was simple: to teach these girls more than the standard party line about modesty and inner beauty. If you've grown up in a church environment and you're a female, you've heard these lessons all your life. Have a quiet and gentle spirit. It matters what's on the inside, not what's on the outside. You're beautiful in God's eyes. Modesty is the best policy. 

These words are important and true, but they're a little bit meaningless when your face is breaking out and your mouth is full of metal and your friend with the short skirts is the one getting all the guys. 

I wanted to go deeper with these girls. I wanted them to know that not only were they beautiful, but that the beauty they possess -- every unique freckle and quirky grin -- comes from a Creator who designed them that way. And that beauty isn't intended to be hidden.

Our society dwells in the extremes. It's easier that way. Either you're a slut, or you're a prude. You're Lindsay Lohan, or you're Jenna Duggar. There's no happy medium, no balance to be struck. We look into the beautiful eyes of our daughters, sisters, cousins, friends and we tell them to hide. Hide behind make-up so we can't see the lines on your face. Hide behind dull, baggy clothes so men can't lust and women can't be jealous. 

The Creator says differently. 

That's what I wanted these girls to know. That they are each breathtakingly beautiful, and that the beauty they possess can't be taken away from them. Not by pimples, or by a cruel classmate, or by a careless word. 

I kept it a secret. I told them to set aside the weekend, but I didn't give them a reason. Looking back, that was a pretty big request for 15 teenage girls with schedules to keep and parents to see. But they came. All of them. And the Wednesday before, when I shared with them these truths that I've now shared with you, when I told them that it's possible to be beautiful and kind, to be gorgeous and faithful, I also told them they were going to be photographed. By a real photographer. In a real photoshoot. The realest versions of themselves. 

Their reaction was more than I could have asked for; the excitement and giggles were the confirmation I needed. When an idea floats around your head for so long, you begin to wonder if you're crazy: crazy for trying, for breaking out of the box, for asking teenagers to step out of their comfort zones and in front of the camera. 

But I wasn't crazy. The girls jumped on board. We talked about modesty and style icons and fashion and beauty. On Friday night, 10 of them came to my house. They ate and talked and laughed. I heard them in the bathroom and in the bedrooms, talking about clothes and make-up and how much fun they were going to have. And then I started to listen more carefully, and I heard the words I had desperately not wanted to hear. 

"I'm fat." 

"My face looks funny."

"Oh, this looks awful on me." 

Who had done this? Who makes us this way? 

Designed by a Creator who knows every mole, every wrinkle, every smile and every tear, we are no match for the world's hold on us. Every magazine cover, every television commercial, every movie star and every critic. We hear them all, and we listen. We take note. We reject our Creator's definition of beauty and fashion our own. 

Thin. But not too thin. 

Toned. But not too toned.

Tall. But oh, not too tall. 

Flawless skin. Gorgeous hair. Impeccable smiles, perfect enough to mask the pain. 

Because it is painful. This new definition of beauty comes with a price. In designing a new definition of beauty, we sacrifice our selves. 

At some point, some awful age when we become more aware of the world and what it asks of us, we begin to look in the mirror, and we don't like what we see. 

Our hair is too straight or too curly. 

Our teeth are crooked, and our nose is too big. 

We pour over ourselves, every nook and cranny, until we cannot see anymore. 

And these girls -- these precious, beautiful, giggly girls -- already had lost it. They already knew. Knew what makeup covered up zits the best. Knew what jeans would hide the most. Knew what foods they could and could not eat. 

My heart broke for them. Breaks for them. 

Because beauty was never intended to look like that. 

The girls rocked it, by the way. When I was 16, I was wearing Converse tennis shoes with my knee-length skirts; my khaki pants had to be pleated, and my license plate belt was my favorite accessory. I had no idea what a fashion icon even was. 

But these girls? Oh, they knew. They've grown up watching Tyra tell us how to work it, so they did. They dressed to the nines. Their make-up was, for the most part, tasteful, and honestly? So much more fun than I make it. In high school, you're still experimenting with color and glitter and what looks good and what doesn't. I loved watching that. I loved helping them pick out accessories and fixing their hair. 

They were flawless. 

There is something, I think, that all good mothers tell their little girls. I say good mothers, because I had one. I'm not sure if other mothers tell their children this or not, but I am so glad mine did. 

Beauty is confidence. 

Two Saturdays ago, the girls I teach every Wednesday were captured in some mindblowingly gorgeous pictures. But the pictures weren't gorgeous because of their cute outfits or their well-coiffed hair or their perfect make-up. 

That particular day, these girls knew they were gorgeous. 

They had primped for hours, thought long and hard about the exact jeans to wear. So they got in front of the camera willingly. They knew they were beautiful. 

What would life be like for these girls -- for every girl -- if we went around every day knowing just how beautiful we are? What kind of power would that knowledge produce? 

Would Hillary still wear pantsuits? Would I pick at my pimples or pull at my oily hair? Would that 100-pound girl look in the mirror and think about the pizza she ate for lunch? 

Or would we finally be able to look at ourselves and think: Gosh. We are amazing. 

Our bodies sustain the generations. Our faces detail every laugh we've ever shared with friends. Every inch of our arms and legs moves with a precision we cannot even begin to fathom. 

We are so incredibly beautiful. 

I wish I could take every woman I know to a photoshoot. I watched those girls relish in spending time with one another, strutting their stuff for the camera, and I knew: Every woman should do this. Not on her wedding day, for posterity's sake. But on an ordinary day, for beauty's sake. You want women to stop being catty and start being real? You want a women's retreat that really gets personal? 

Put them in front of a camera. Make them confront themselves. Make them see what the Creator sees. 

I bet it would be breathtaking and mindnumbing and incredibly, incredibly humbling.

Edith Schaeffer writes that if the Creator of this universe put so much detail and attention and beauty in the glistening waves and the glowing moon, how much more detail and more attention and more beauty did He put into us, His defining masterpieces? 

I don't know why we forget that, why we ignore that. I don't know why we turn to men and models and Hollywood to tell us what beauty is, when one look in the mirror should tell us.

It's us. We're the answer we've been looking for. 

We -- every love handle, every out of place hair, every toe and finger -- are beauty.

It's time we own it, work it, rock it. 

The world is waiting. 

*all photos by the ridiculously talented lindsey vinson.