Perspective...to See Clearly

The Lasik eye surgery I had almost a decade ago produced instantaneous and wonderful results. Sitting up in the room at the surgery center, I looked out the window and was amazed at the vivid clarity of my vision. Color and detail came flooding into my sense of sight with a brilliance I had long ago ceased to experience. Thankfully, my distance vision has maintained that 20/20 crispness over the intervening years.

Prior to the surgery, the doctor had been very straightforward in telling me that I would be trading my distance glasses for reading glasses. For a number of those years, his prediction was not immediately forthcoming. But then, slowly and gradually, my close range vision began to deteriorate, exactly as he had said would happen. For a while I managed that by stocking up on non-prescription and inexpensive reading glasses purchased at a local dollar store. Then, if I lost a pair, which seemed to happen with some frequency, I was only out a dollar.

With the passing of time, I grew more and more frustrated with the growing lack of clarity provided by my dollar solution. So I finally bit the bullet and went to the eye doctor for prescription reading glasses, which I am wearing as I am now sitting at my computer. They are bifocals, with specific intent. The lower half is for reading range and the upper half is for computer range. And, if I look above the glasses entirely to gaze out the window, I achieve clear distance vision. In effect, I experience trifocal vision. At each distance I can see clearly.

That is the precise definition of perspective: to see clearly.

Let’s apply this to our spiritual lives. Often, we use or hear the phrase, “We need to keep matters in perspective.” Translated, that means, “We need to keep seeing matters clearly.” The assumption of that statement is that we have, or at least one time had, matters in perspective. I did not say to the eye doctor, “Doc, help me to keep seeing clearly.” Rather, I said, “I am not seeing clearly and I need to and want to see clearly.”

We no not need to try to keep our perspective. We need to gain a new perspective, a Biblical perspective, a Christ-centered perspective. You see, the fall, our sin and our resulting selfishness produces a wrong, defective and even dangerous perspective. Why would we want to keep that! As followers of Christ, we should relish the idea for getting rid of it. The old nature does not require glasses. It requires that we recognize we are blind and need to receive the gift of sight. This is best summarized by the Biblical statement in 1 John 2:16, “For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world.” We never had perspective in the first place.

If you and I are going to see clearly, as the Lord intended, it will only happen as use the vision provided through our salvation in order to see life through the lens of Biblical revelation and truth.

The Word of God tells us that the Gospel is necessary to “…to open our eyes and turn us from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that we may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in Jesus” (Acts 26:18). Paul prays that the “eyes of our hearts might be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you…” (Ephesians 1:18). Hebrews encourages us to “…fix our eyes on Jesus…” (12:2).

Wisdom, biblically defined, is to see life from God’s point of view and then reordering our lives accordingly. Do not seek your perspective. Do not seek the counsel from others about their perspective. Rather, seek the Lord’s perspective through regular, disciplined and diligent reading and study of the Word of God, thereby gaining a brand new perspective.

“But we see Jesus…” (Hebrews 2:9). This is better than trifocals. The perspective – the seeing clearly – you and I need and long for, is available. Spiritual vision is provided for us to enjoy, so that we might live to the glory and praise of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Are You Kidding Yourself?

Daily Bible reading is a daily essential for your spiritual life. There is no substitute. Nothing can, or should, take its place. There are a myriad of excuses used as to why people who say that the Bible is important to them, in reality, spend precious little time actually reading it. And every one is simply that...an excuse.


Having an established program to help develop the discipline of reading through the Bible each year is a necessity. Many followers of Christ have never read through the Bible from cover to cover, front to back, Genesis to Revelation, in the order established by the Holy Spirit. I encourage and challenge you to do this, beginning today. A daily reading guide is helpful in this endeavor. An excellent one is found on the following link: http://www.backtothebible.org/index.php/component/option,com_guides/category,15/

• If you frequently go an entire day without reading your Bible, do not kid yourself...the Bible is not important to you.
• If you spend a few minutes a day reading a devotional page entry that usually has one short verse at the top, do not kid yourself...the Bible is not important to you.
• If you think that you know the Bible well enough so that you don't need to spend significant time reading it, do not kid yourself...the Bible is not important to you.
• If you substitute reading a book by your favorite Christian author for reading the Bible, do not kid yourself...the Bible is not important to you.

By the way, I am not sounding this encouragement/challenge to you so that you will please your Lord by reading the Bible. Rather, it is because you absolutely, positively, unequivocally need to read the Word of God on a consistent, disciplined, regular basis for your spiritual health, growth and maturity.

• Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.' " Mathew 4:4
• I have hidden Your word in my heart that I might not sin against You. PSalm 119:11
• All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:16,17

A spiritual feast is at your fingertips. How sad it is when people are suffering through a famine when the Lord has supplied a feast. "They all ate and were satisfied" (Matthew 14:20) does not only describe those who were at the miracle of the loaves and fish, it describes everyone who partakes of the Bread of Life. Enjoy your meal! And make sure you eat again tomorrow.

The Craving We Should Crave

Knowing people care is a powerful spiritual resource that accompanies membership in the body of Christ. As a local church pastor, throughout the years, there have been many 'adoptive mothers' in my life. Their counsel and concern comes from the wisdom of the years and their desire for the best for me.

No area of my life has generated more motherly exhortations than my diet and eating habits. With my "Type A" personality, coupled with an engineering background and a near-phobia regarding the use of time, it is no secret that I am a structured and disciplined person. Except when it comes to dietary decisions and eating habits. For me, the four basic food groups are coke, red meat, ice cream and the all-inclusive 'junk food.' You can only imagine the kindly lectures that have come my way from my well-meaning adoptive moms. Just last night, upon arriving home at about 10 PM from a day that began at 6 AM, I made a bee-line to the kitchen for a 'well-deserved' treat following the long work day. Two cans of coke and a handful of homemade caramels later, my craving was satisfied for the time being and I was ready for a good night's sleep.

Cravings are real, universal and powerful. Placed in the lives of fallen people living in a fallen world, they become conduits for that which is harmful and destructive. But when Christ gets involved, cravings can be turned to that which is helpful and constructive.

The Bible uses the word 'craving' to address our spiritual lives. The myriad of spiritual side dishes, spiritual desserts and spiritual junkfood available to us presents a potentially serious problem. This problem pops up in Numbers 11. As we pick up the story, the Provider God had already acted by supplying food for the people as they began their trip from Egypt to the promised land. His supply, as always, was sufficient and continuous. Then, in Numbers 11:4, the inspired Word of God records, "The rabble with them began to crave other food, and again the Israelites started wailing..." This craving featured a dissatisfaction with what the Lord had provided. We know this from the commentary on this episode provided in Psalm 106:14: "In the desert they gave way to their craving; in the wasteland they put God to the test."

The craving is not the problem. That which is being craved is the issue.

Peter presents the other side of this issue. "Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good." (1 Peter 2:2,3). In the context, it is clear that the pure spiritual milk is the 'living and enduring Word of God.'

Craving books about the Bible, craving positive feelings and emotions, craving the latest fad invading the church, etc. will lead to the decrease in the craving that is an essential for our spiritual life and well-being.

Do you crave the Word of God? If so, great. Keep feeding that craving and the craving will strengthen. If not, face the issue head-on right now through admitting, confessing and repenting. Turn away from the side-dishes, desserts and junk food. Turn to the spiritual nourishment that satisfies, strengthens and sanctifies.

I think that I might be sounding a bit like one of my adoptive moms. Maybe I need to go home and have a salad.

"Lord, grow and develop in me an insatiable craving for the pure spiritual milk of Your Word."

Sanitizing God

It is really a form of political correctness in the church. There is a general consensus floating around that God must be protected from bad press and must be kept a great distance from the disasters and evils of the world. This view so emphasizes the love of God (although this love is often only a glamorized human emotion type of love) that He certainly has nothing to do with all of the pain and misery all around us.


So, we sanitize God. This posture requires us to pick and choose those parts of the Bible we take seriously and those parts of the Bible we flee from like the plague. I saw this in action recently in a study I was leading with a group of young men as we were seeking to expose ourselves to the vitally important doctrine of the absolute sovereignty of God. God is fully and perfectly love and fully and perfectly wrath. He is fully and perfectly mercy and fully and perfectly justice. He brings glory to Himself through every act of righteousness and every act of evil. He brings glory to Himself through every soul entering heaven and every soul entering hell.


Some of the verses read nearly took away the breath of some around the table. Here are some of the verses too many of us think are among the plague-ridden:

• The Lord said to him (Moses), "Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord?" Exodus 4:11
• Surely Your wrath against men brings You praise and the survivors of Your wrath are restrained. Psalm 76:10
• "I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the Lord do all these things." Isaiah 45:7
• The Lord works our everything for His own ends - even the wicked for the day of disaster. Proverbs 16:4
• When a trumpet sounds in a city, do not the people tremble? When disaster comes to a city, has not the Lord caused it? Amos 3:6
• What if God, choosing to show His wrath and make His power known, bore with great patience the objects of His wrath - prepared for destruction? What if He did this to make the riches of His glory known to the objects of His mercy - whom He prepared in adv acne for glory... Romans 9:22,23

God does not need to be sanitized. He does not need to be made politically correct. God does not need us attempting to make Him acceptable to our sensibilities.

God is to be revered, worshipped, honored and glorified. One of the main ways that we engage in each of these responses to Him is to take Him at His Word. God says what He means and means what He says.

Christianity is not to make God more like us. It is to conform us more and more to the image of His Son, and our Savior, Jesus Christ.