Sunday, December 06, 2020

Take a look and see if what you think you see is actually what is seen...

Take a look and see if what you think you see is actually what is seen...

"You have grease on your face," I said to a friend while working on a car. He did nothing. Later on, I told him again. Again, he did nothing. Some time after that, we were riding to the store, he looked in the mirror and said, "Whoa! Wow, I do have grease on my face. I didn't know it was that much."

Mirror don't lie.

"As in water face reflects face, so the heart of man reflects the man." (Proverbs 27:19 ESV)

Looking into a mirror is a fairly easy, very accurate exercise. We can see what we look like, if something is indeed on our face, our hair is out of place, or any other physical inspection we'd like to investigate.

And, in looking to a friend or other person, "face reflects face" for we will surely find some similarities and some difference in each other. We'll find reason to commend and reason to condemn. In the end though, we'll find that we both are lacking. We cannot look at another and judge whether we are okay; we need to look to Jesus.

Looking into the heart is different. Our hearts will fool us (see Jeremiah 17:9). The "heart of man reflects the man" for sure, but we are often able to hide our nature through disingenuous speech and behavior. We'll fool others about our hearts, and our hearts will fool us about ourselves!

We need God's help. We need God to look at our hearts and tell us about ourselves. One Proverb says, "Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the heart." (21:2 ESV) In other words, it's easy for us to think our ways and actions are right, but God is the one that really knows the deal.

What we really need to do is lay our hearts -- motives, affections, intentions, etc. -- before the Word of God, and be tested in that way. Pay careful attention to the what the Spirit delivered to us through the writer of Hebrews: "Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account." (4:11-13 ESV)

And, let us give heed to what the Spirit says through the Apostle James: "But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing." (James 1:22-25 ESV)

Using God's word as a mirror, we will discover that we are many times not the people we want to be or the type of people He wants us to be. It will reveal our deep need of Him. The great thing is He is ready and willing to advocate for us and work in us to shape us into the image of Jesus.

Let us, then, not be afraid to look. We may find we are not who we want to be, but God is good, and He is willing to receive us, ready to transform us and able to complete us.

 


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