Perfect Perspective

I have always loved flying. My husband, who is more traveled and more sophisticated than I am, doesn’t get as wound up about flying as I do. He will want to sit next to the window so that he can sleep! Sleep! Who can sleep? I revert to behaving like a five year old, I get so excited. I will beg to sit next to the window so that I can look out and observe the world from a cloud’s perspective. I don’t want to miss anything, especially if it is a clear day. I strain to find the local rotary as a reference point so I can try to find my house if we head south from Boston. I search the shoreline for landmarks to help me know which city or state over which we might be flying. I love how mountains look like wrinkles on the surface of the earth, and watching rivers snake back and forth through the expanse of the landscape below. I scrutinize the ocean with bated breath in anticipation of spotting a whale, an ocean liner or a carrier when flying over water. We have such an awesome perspective when flying thousands of feet above the earth!

Unfortunately, I do not always have such an awesome perspective on my spiritual life. Last week I blogged about my own perspective on an upsetting issue. As I prayed through my confusion, fear, and anger, God in His faithfulness revealed something that was painful for me to see. He started subtly since our Father is a gentleman and I can be somewhat slow on the uptake! However the subtlety ended when, through our pastor’s sermon, God hit me right between the proverbial eyes of my soul. Idolatry! I have been guilty of the sin of making my church an idol! And to add insult to injury, idolatry was the topic of the lesson I was teaching for the Women’s Sunday school class! Ouch!

After a time of confession and repentance I have gained a new perspective on the issues at church. Luke 6: 41 spells it out for me loud and clear: "Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye”? Why indeed? Jesus showed me very clearly that, as my mother would say, I should tend to my own knitting! At the end of the day, I am going to stand before God and account for my actions, my thoughts, my sins; no one else’s. I have plenty of work to do on myself in my quest to be more Christ-like; my time would be better spent focusing on Jesus, above the church, above my loved ones, above anything, especially the actions of others. Caring for the hearts of others is the responsibility of Jesus and frankly, He is much better suited to it than I am. After all, He has the perfect perspective!