Perspective is Everything
I love Exodus 14:14 – “The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.” Next to I Corinthians 13, Exodus 14:14 has become a strong guiding verse in my life.
It is in my nature to talk, to write (aha!), and to defend. That is genetic and comes from my very passionate and at times, extreme, bloodline. I don’t apologize for being this way as it is the reason we are a family who has survived and overcome.
But, what I am learning is that “not everything I think has to be said, not every lesson I want others to get has to be shared and not every Facebook or Instagram friend I have need know every good or bad deed I have ever done since birth.” (I am aware of the irony here)
In fact, as I head toward 59 years of life, I am learning that being quiet and letting God handle things is usually best for all involved.
The reason I believe this to be true is that everyone has her/his own perspective and “Perspective is Everything.” Perspective by definition is “one’s mental view” of things….how we perceive it, how it feels to us, the weight it carries, the joy or pain it brings, the understanding one has of its truth”
And, we all have one….a perspective
And, in general, this is a good thing….
However, perspective without heart can be deadly and that is what I think we see in our world today. Everyone is so bent on ensuring that their perspective is publicly viewed, known, and respected as well as placed in the forefront that we have forgotten to marry our hearts to that perspective.
And perspective without heart leads to death…of all that is holy and good and wise
Perspective without heart leads to the deepest levels of selfishness which appears to be one of the greatest sins of all…putting ourselves above others for our own gain.
Did not Jesus emulate for us the epitome of sacrificial love – dying to self both emotionally but also physically as His role modeling of genuine Love?
Jesus truly lived by Exodus 14:14 in that He went mostly quietly through the days given Him sharing the Good News and accepting the free will that was his brothers and sisters. While he did correct, He did so with love and compassion and genuine desire that all of us be brought to our knees in service and holy living.
But what I think He does the very best was remember that each of us has our own personal perspective of things and He meets us there. If our perspective is off, He patiently waits for us to come to clarity. If we stubbornly refuse to gain insight, He lovingly removes His hand so that we stumble and fall until we get to the bottom of ourselves.
“When we get to the bottom of ourselves, we get to the beginning of God” – Anon
This is one of my favorite quotes because I have lived its truth. Not until God allowed me fall to the very depths of my own sinfully selfish self, did I finally gain the accurate and blessed knowledge of God. It took my not just laying down my own beliefs but picking up HIS. And, to do that, I had to release my own vain glory whom Webster defines as
“ excessive or ostentatious pride especially in one’s achievements”
And this is the devil of it all…
In a world where everyone seeks simply to be loved, it is understandable that we would use every avenue/venue (social media; Facebook, Instagram, Texting, Snap Chat, gossip, Blog, etc.) to throw ourselves out there to the masses so that we can have some sense of the ever illusive feeling that we matter, that we have a circle of people who think we are good and wonderful and worthy. But the problem is that either requires constant feeding into those relationships to gain connection or constant fear if we stop the feeding, we no longer matter
And that is just not true
We matter…I matter…you matter
Equally
In the eyes of God, our creator, we all matter
And not only do we matter, we matter equally
The minister who shares the Gospel in his home and from his pulpit matters no more than the lowliest of sinners who is caught in the act of a heinous crime
The individual who stands at the playing of our anthem matters the same as the individual who chooses to kneel
The woman who sits at the well near Jesus matters to Him just as much as the one who washes His feet
It is not ours to judge
We know not the heart of any of those individuals…
God does
When we allow our personal perspective to overcome the love God calls us toward one another, we lose
Not the person we are judging for they are God’s child, too
But we lose and when we lose, we lose everything….
When our personal perspective cuts out the very heart of God we claim to seek to grow, and we condemn our fellow man or woman to their own spiritual death
We kill the very the calling God has for each of us
The Greatest Commandment
34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”
37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[a] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b] 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Matthew 22:34-40
I am reminded of myself, a lowly sinner sitting in church on many Sundays crying internally and sometimes externally for God to guide me on what to do. I was harshly judged, criticized and condemned by those who did not know my perspective or how I got to where I was. They could not see my broken heart, begging God to help me join the fold of his sheep.
There were a few who never did any of those things, choosing to be like Jesus and love me, correct me, and leave the 99 to get the 1 and it has made all the difference….
Their love and correction enabled me to find my way back and because they chose to love their neighbor as themselves, I felt that love and drew closer to God. And in the drawing closer to God, a clarity came over me that enabled me to right and correct myself and that has made an eternal difference in my life. I am convinced that the laying down their perspective of me which I am confident was ugly but choosing to love me as Christ called them to, was the very lifeline it took to help me rejoin the fold.
We are all sinners saved by God’s grace. Every one of us.
What makes the difference is your perspective of yourself
And, of others
I choose to view others through the lens of Christ, not wanting a single one of my brothers or sisters to be lost but rather, to lay down my personal perspective for the only one which matters
His
Lesa