Perspective
If you prefer listening over reading, please click below to hear the audio version of this post:
As the world closes in on us,
Our eyes move as we wander, searching, desperate for something, for direction, for hope.
And then our eyes catch a glimpse,
We do a double take: HOPE in the form of perspective.
It makes the difference between seeing something as good or bad…
It shifts our eyes…
From dark to light
From empty to full
Despair to hope
Offense to compliment
Curse to blessing
From crying to laughing
End to beginning
Evil to good
Satan to God.
Intentionally picking our perspective isn’t just a strategy for psyching ourselves out or putting up a smokescreen and blinding ourselves. It’s making our free choice to take our eyes off the negative and placing it on the equally real positive that is also present. We’re not making anything up, not putting blinders on. We’re acknowledging the negative realities out there and then pointedly choosing to shift our gaze to dwell on what’s good, on the equally powerful—if not MORE powerful—hope.
Too often, news and media present only the negative—the robberies, muggings, rapes, murders, fires, disasters—because humans tend to be awestruck by these. We can get morbidly mesmerized by tragedy, so media keeps on feeding it to us since it’s good for business; it gets high numbers and ratings. But, really, there is just as much good happening out there; just as many people in the world doing “random” acts of kindness, just as much progress as there is regression. So, let’s take our eyes off the calamity of this world and place them squarely where our spirits can thrive. Let’s give attention to things and thoughts that are worth our time and focus and those things that we have power to change.
Even as we actively work to heal and be healed, to seek and find redemption, as we pro-actively make a difference in this world, let’s take our eyes off the destruction and turn our eyes upon Jesus.
Shifting our gaze from calamity to Christ gives us power to keep going, to move past the paralysis of trauma and—instead—to help repair what’s been destroyed, to receive hope and share it with others.
2 Responses
So much has gone wrong this year in 2020, it is good to hear the voice of others like you who have a different perspective. Thank you. I needed to hear that! I need to be reminded of the good that is still present in this world by keeping my focus on what’s most important and still good!!
It’s so easy to see only the perspective that we’re being fed, but intentionally shifting our gaze really helps! Thank you for sharing, Anon Angel! I appreciate your voice. May the new year be blessed by keeping our eyes on Him!