The Choice of Perspective

Gravity of Grace Episode 1: The Choice of Perspective

If you want to listen to the video format of this blog entry, you can do so here.

Has anyone here ever tried to break a bad habit or perspective? It is not a simple thing to do, is it? I mean, how often do you see someone who breaks a bad habit and immediately starts telling all of his buddies how easy it was?

Is it possible to break a bad habit or outlook overnight? How often has strong willpower been enough? Not very often. Right?!?

When I was young, I had several bad-perspective driven habits in my life. One of those was feeling extremely uncomfortable speaking in front of a group. This led to me speaking too quickly for my audience to follow what I was saying.

And to be completely honest, that habit can still linger. Like a bad penny. The viewpoint or perspective behind the habit is gone.

However, I still battle with the habit that came from that old perspective. You have heard it when I have limited time in front of an audience, like when I am giving a communion meditation; that habit pops back up.

But one of my best aids in breaking that habit came when I was in Central America and was speaking through an interpreter. 

Can you imagine?

Saying only a few words.

Each time you spoke.

Giving another person.

The chance to say.

What you just stated.

In another language.

That incident reminds me of a kintsugi jar. We are all made good by God when He knit us together in our mother’s womb.

Sin had damaged me and marred my perspective, which created a bad habit.

The Lord God Himself used this experience of me working with an interpreter as one part of His work of remaking me into a new person.

I needed this experience to continue developing a basic life skill. It improved my ability to communicate with others by slowing my speech, so they heard my words, not just noise.

This habit, stemming from a negative outlook, is incrementally coming under my control, in similar fashion to darkness being pushed out as a light brightens by a dimmer switch.

The more I have of one, the less I have of the other.

And it has been God’s handiwork in my life that has allowed every improvement, restoring a masterpiece in the brokenness of my life as He turns debris into artwork.

Shall we start with a short teaching from Jesus?

Please consider this passage from the English Standard Version.

As I understand it, Jesus is teaching us about our perspective on the world, not the physical health of our eyeballs.

You see, if I pull off these glasses, I have a very tough time even seeing the expressions of folks right in front of me, much less seeing the faces of those farther away. No, this passage must be speaking about more than physical eyesight.

Jesus is addressing what I have found to be a common Hebrew idea of His day. The healthy eye versus the unhealthy eye. A healthy perspective versus an unhealthy perspective.

Shall we inspect those contrasting perspectives together?

Okay. Now I am hitting on Hebrew words and phrases. So, shall we make this less scholarly and have a little fun with it?

And allow me the grace of using a sports announcer’s voice.

Ladies and Gentlemen! Welcome to today’s contest!

In the first corner, God’s champion, wearing the bright eye symbol…

He has a record of defending the place of light, hope, healing, and belonging.

He is a Hebrew expression for a healthy eye. Known as Mr. Good Eye.

Everyone’s favorite winner! Ayin Tovah!

And in the other corner, the challenger, wearing the marked-out eye symbol…

He has a record of advocating all the spaces of darkness, despair, pain, and isolation where he has often beaten up on many an under-prepared contender, including yours truly.

He is a Hebrew expression for an unhealthy eye. Known as Mr. Bad Eye.

The toughest challenger on the planet! Ayin Ra’ah!

Who is going to win today’s event? Which of our two choices do you think will prevail?

What do you see first? The good OR the bad? Not just in this picture, but in life.

I know. Trust me, I understand. I too spent many years of my life looking for the bad first. The challenger, Ayin Ra’ah, Mr. Bad Eye himself, once dominated my worldview and affected my life, my attitude, my patience with myself, and my treatment of others. He was scarier to me than Iron Mike Tyson and ruled in my mind through fear and intimidation.

That unhealthy perspective and where it led me is a major part of the darkness, despair, pain, and isolation that I have experienced, making parts of my adult life and my struggle with teenage epilepsy even worse.

You see, dear friends, the change from an unhealthy perspective to a healthy one is not rapid. Unlike choosing which corner to back in our fictional sporting event, this is not a quick process. This is not like flipping a light switch. This is more like a dimmer switch growing in intensity and becoming more prominent.

Like the kintsugi jar on the screen, God made each of us good. Sin has damaged each of us. And God is remaking everyone who will allow Him into a precious masterpiece.

I want to be abundantly clear: this thing that I am advocating is not a “rainbows, butterflies, and unicorns” type of denial of the bad things we see. I am advocating the choice of what we decide to focus upon.

Making the choice to see the beauty beyond the damage

This is my personal push to develop and use the healthy eye viewpoint when observing the things around me.

I can confidently attest to you that…

Evil does not win. Let me say that again for those who did not hear me.

Evil does not win! Sorry, Mr. Bad Eye, but your days are numbered!

I know it might not seem that way some days. I too have experienced days where nothing seems to go right. But that doesn’t mean God is going to lose this war with evil.

Like a kintsugi jar, damage has happened. But the master artist, our Heavenly Father, remakes His artwork, making something beautiful from the debris.

I have been to several museums in my life, admiring items recovered from various digs.

Items such as exquisite statues made of materials like jade, or marble, or other valuable materials have left an especially powerful impression on me.

And although these works of art sustained damage from events since their creation, their beauty emanates past the blemishes and harms inflicted upon them.

You see, as we stand before these works of art found in museums, each of us has a choice in how we view them. Each individual can choose to appreciate the beauty that remains and marvel at the complete beauty of the original creation.

The same is true for how we view that masterpiece of God’s handiwork: creation and the humans in it – including the person you see in the mirror.

And we can also individually choose to focus on the damage, despairing the loss of the perfect and ignore the remaining beauty right before our eyes. Well, that would be a beautiful statue of a young lady if she wasn’t missing an arm. Our companions can encourage us towards either attitude, but only the individual can make the choice on how to view that piece of art which is before them.

On that note of companions. I am thankful for this family. The church. The body of Jesus. And the encouragement we provided each other in those moments that tested each of us.

You see. We each get to select the type of eyes, the type of perspective with which we will view things. I get to opt for the viewpoint that will mold my assessment of what I see.

Will I elect to possess a good or healthy eye that sees the beauty which remains despite the damage? Will I opt to envision the original pristine state of God’s creation? Or will I choose to use a bad or unhealthy eye which focuses on negativity and minimizes or ignores the abiding beauty?

Let’s dive a little deeper.

Dear friends, please forgive me, but for illustration I am about to use a $10 word.

Supplication. Yes, this is one of those big Bible words we do not use every day in our lives. So, allow me to define this word better.

In times past, I have thought of this word solely in the meaning symbolized by this guy on his knees crying.

I only saw a humble prayer to someone in a position of power, asking that authority figure for mercy, aid, or a special blessing.

To be fair, that is part of the dictionary meaning of the word.

But that is not the complete definition of supplication. Supplication has an additional meaning.

Like a small child wanting communion with her parent, this word speaks to abiding in a relationship.

As a humble and earnest petition to just spend time with someone.

We have all experienced supplication in our lives. A spoken or unspoken request to spend time with your parents, or your child, or maybe a close friend whose mere presence helps you face the challenges that life can bring. And this is the aspect of supplication that I want to focus on as we continue investigating this issue.

So, now that we have our heads wrapped around this big word, let’s put that bad boy to good use.

You see, I had previously skipped past the first two chapters when studying to understand God’s interactions with humanity. I had previously started at the fall.

That choice affected my thinking.

I had what some teachers call a Genesis 3 approach to the Bible, which is represented by this first cycle, what I was often taught to call “the sin cycle”.

However, what I am learning to do now is to embrace what some teachers call a Genesis 1 approach to the Bible, which is represented by this second cycle, what I like to call “the supplication cycle”.

And yes, these cycles are presented rotating in opposite directions to help drive home the difference visually.

Now, I would like to camp here for just a few minutes and allow this subtle yet significant difference to sink in for a second.

I know, I know! I am using way too many “s” in this slide and in my speech. But bear with me. This is some good stuff. Or at least, I think so.

When I was using an unhealthy eye approach to the Bible (an Ayin Ra’ah), I began my cycle at “sin”.

By making that choice, I was looking for the bad first and circling back around to the bad, which is why I call that an unhealthy mindset.

Let’s walk through that cycle and allow it to speak to us. We enter the cycle at sin, which leads to suffering.

After suffering enough to humble us, we finally turn to limited supplication, asking God only for salvation from our situation, only to ultimately return to sin.

Does that sound familiar to anyone?

But what happens when we enter this same cycle at a different point?

What happens when we adopt a different perspective on the same thing?

Now, let’s walk through the cycle starting with “supplication”.

Remember, I am using the greater idea of supplication, which is more like a small child desiring interaction with its parent versus a teenager who is asking forgiveness for putting a scratch on the car when learning to drive.

The definition of supplication, which says, “I want God”, not “I want something from God”.

We enter at Supplication where we abide in relationship with our Heavenly Father, which leads to God providing for all our needs, our Salvation, and in time, by accident, chance, or choice, we fall into Sin.

We miss the mark by the smallest measurement or by going in the opposite direction.

I like to say that this is just like playing darts: missing the red dot in the center of the target is missing the red dot.

Whether I miss it by the smallest amount or if I choose to throw my dart in completely the opposite direction, either way, I miss the mark of perfection. 

Which brings us Suffering (all the spaces of darkness, despair, pain, and isolation), but as soon as we come back to Supplication, our relationship with the Heavenly Father gets restored through Jesus.

Returning to that place of light, hope, healing, and belonging.

This choice of perspective is mine to make.

Do I choose to live in perpetual pain and self-inflicted punishment, or do I choose to live in daily renewal, allowing God to remake me day by day.

This reminds of one event that took me several years to fully appreciate. During my early teenage years, one day several of us were roaming the hillsides and bottoms of Toler Creek over in Floyd County, KY. On this day we had slingshots and a BB gun with us, and we practiced our aim on various trees and other targets until we wandered into a small junkyard. Then we had the bright idea to target the various wrecked-out vehicles.

Then someone noticed a pickup truck which still had an intact windshield, and we had a collective bad idea. Yep, we started using the BB gun to shoot the windshield. About the third shot, an older man with a cane, who seemed to have just appeared out of nowhere, surprised us. We all froze, except Joe; he disappeared around the second shot.

We all expected punishment. And we fully expected that this man would call our parents to come get us and show them the damage we had caused. But that did not happen. You see, this man saw a group of boys who needed coaching more than correction. He took time and built a relationship with us instead of instituting punishment. This man made a choice about the perspective with which he approached us.

He did not allow our destructive behavior to define us, but he also did not allow our unacceptable behavior to continue either. The perspective he brought to that situation became a blessing to us. And although it took me many years to better understand what really happened that day, I have since understood something very significant. Something that directly relates to these 2 cycles on the screen behind me.

Bad or Good? Where will I select to place my emphasis? What will dominate my thinking?

My starting point affects my focus; it changes my attitude; it re-aligns my perspective. A good starting point helps me to remember that God made each person good, and that sin has damaged them.

Where I choose to enter this cycle affects how I live life, how I treat others, and how I see God. That choice helps me to see that God loves all of us and desires to restore us to a beautiful work of art through Jesus Christ.

Now let’s put that good perspective to good use.

I would like to conclude my time with you by sharing this insight.

Dear friends. The time required to create a kintsugi jar can vary, but it typically involves a multi-step process that includes breaking the ceramic, applying lacquer, and dusting with gold powder. This process can take several days to weeks, depending on the complexity of the repair and the drying time required for the lacquer.

And that does not account for the time to gain the gold and grind it into dust. Not to mention the time to either make or get the lacquer or glue that will bind the broken pieces back together.

I want to take a moment and appreciate the fact that creating a kintsugi jar requires adding something precious to the brokenness of the original vessel.

Gold becomes infused into the renewed masterpiece, making the post-damage thing more valuable than the pre-damage thing.

Just as the blood of Jesus renews our lives, restores us, and makes us a precious masterpiece in the eyes of the Father.

Action Step: Realize that the Christian walk is not a sprint; it is a marathon. And do not get tricked into placing an artificial time constraint on God renewing the masterpiece of your life.

God made you good. Yes, sin has damaged you. And God is working to remake you into a masterpiece.

Thank you for joining us on the Gravity of Grace blog/podcast. I am Stephen C. Meade, I am your friend, and you can reach me at Stephen@marblesuspendedinspace.com. I would love to hear from you. Until next time, goodbye and God bless!

Again, if you want to listen to the video format of this blog entry, you can do so here.