Trusting What You See
We See A Different World With The Eyes Of Our Heart
by Eric Elkin
“The Lord upholds all who are falling and raises up all who are bowed down.”
How well do you trust your eyesight? My eyesight is slowly becoming worse. I’m now beginning to understand why older people drive slowly. It takes forever for road signs to become clear enough to read. I find myself slowing down to read them.
My interest is not in how well you see, but what you see. Do you trust what you see?
On Monday, I wrote a reflection about the case of an adult Cub fan taking a ball from a young boy. On the way to work that morning, I heard the rest of the story. Earlier in the game, the adult fan grabbed a foul ball and handed it to the boy. This part of the story was not communicated in the video shared with the world. What we saw was not the whole truth.
During that same ride to work, I listened to a story about a partial park closing in Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming. Park rangers discovered a growing rock fissure in the large buttress above the Hidden Falls. The crack in the rock runs horizontally for 100 feet and is about 100 feet above park visitors.
Since I have not seen it with my own eyes, I am forced to trust their report.
The commentators on the radio then started talking about the supervolcano in Yellowstone National Park. The fissure in the rock led researchers to speculate if the crack was a sign of activity in the supervolcano. The experts say it is not, but they cannot see the action taking place underground. They trust the readings of their equipment and sensors.
“The sheer magnitude and force of God’s presence, God’s activity in the cosmos, world, and in human experience is more than the human mind can fully comprehend or discern.”
The general public can see evidence suggesting a supervolcano. However, for the most part, it is not visible. Matter of fact, it is barely visible to researchers who study it.
Experts tell us not to worry about an eruption. The odds of a total explosion are one in 730,000. Publicizing these odds are meant to help calm fears. But, the odds of winning a Powerball lottery is one in 292 million, and that happens all the time.
When you stop and think about it, we trust a lot of things we cannot see. We listen to the words of experts and the witness of bystanders to form opinions. These opinions shape how we live. Most of the stories forming our view of the world are negative. The baseball story made people angry. The stories reporting the activity, or presence of a supervolcano, breed fear.
Psalm 145 invites you to see with your spirit a reality you cannot always see with your eyes. The psalmist wants all to know the power and presence of God in the ordinary moments of life. How might your daily grind become a source of hope and strength if you trusted God was present in it?
We see a different view of the world with eyes of our heart. The eyes of our heart help us to see hope even in the midst of fear and anger. They see the hope that God is present and upholds all those who feel like they are falling.
Click to read Psalm 145: 10-18
Reflection Questions:
- When have you felt tricked by a story which only told part of the truth?
- How much of your emotional health is determined by the words of others?
- How much of your view of God is shaped by people professing faith rather than the eyes of your own heart?
- What can one do to improve the sight of their heart?
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