So, 'Dear Old Mom' WAS right. It's the inside that counts, not the outside. 
I certainly agree with the spirit of what you've written. What Jesus has displayed to our eyes (as expressed in word and deed over physical appearance) is highly important. Isaiah (53:2b) says, "He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him." The crux of the issue is this: "In Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form," reports Colossians 2:9, "for God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him (Col. 1:19)." Jesus made the attributes of the invisible God visible to us in human form, but not all men believe.
"The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God (2 Corinthians 4:4)," and so men would rather look at windows, pieces of burnt toast, shrouds, et al, than at the perfect image of the Living Word of God, Christ, which God has graciously passed down to us through the Scriptures.
The Gospel of John, 1:14, makes the reality of "seeing the image" plain: "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth."
In short it is the substance, not the appearance, that qualifies.
So, 'Dear Old Mom' WAS right. It's the inside that counts, not the outside.