Windows and Mirrors
A mirror in my life is anything I can look at and find application. Anything I grasp or try to understand that somehow changes what I think or do. They're everywhere, you know? They can be drawn out from almost everything!
A window is different. Its a place thats somewhat free of the burden of application, more of a place set aside to just stand in awe! Take the word of God. If I look at the bible as a mirror, reflecting back at me things to change, things to love, things to understand, all of these are just things that I think on or act upon...
My gut feeling is that this is how ive ALWAYS veiwed the bible, but lately my heart has been LONGING for a window. for an escape from grinding through life with seemingly nothing to look forward to but more application. If I look at Gods word as a mirror this is all I can see in it... Me... me, me, me, me, and the world around me, and what I think of me, and what God thinks of me, and me! But what if I can change my mind to look at the word not as a mirror but as a window? maybe as a passing scene, not to be applied to the way you live, but to be simply enjoyed. Not to be recorded but appreciated. I think thats a place where I will be moved out of the way and Ill see God. Ill see His handywork and His presence.
One way of thinking about all this is the stars. I was out looking at them and they are just beautiful... but of what use are they to me? Can I use them to tell where Im going? yes! Can I memorze their patterns or even their workings? yes! But when I look at the stars is this my first thought? Do I look at them and immediately think of myself and how they apply to me? or do I just LOOK at them and see the uncanny and absolute beauty that is in them?
And all this just for little lights in the sky. I have before me a letter from God himself. The God who breathed a word and every star was placed! I have his word and when I look to it as a mirror, I only see myself. I only see what I want to change and what I should do and how I truly want to love.
But if I look to God's word as a window, I will see HIM. If I look to Gods word not as a place to find ways to better myself and try to grow and gain understanding of God, but rather as a place simply to gaze upon Him. Imagine yourself on an airplane, flying along at such a great height. Imagine just staring out the window at the whole of earth and the land of clouds stretching out before you. Do you try to count the houses or streets? Do you number the clouds? Thats foolishness! To look upon this land and sea and sky and simply Wonder at it all... thats what I long for. Thats what I want to find in his word! A place to fall back in awe of my saviors love!
Now all this isnt saying that the mirrors in our lives arent useful or even necessary. Timothy says that the bible is good for reproof and correction! But are my eyes on me or Christ in the book? On the window or the mirror?
Job 38: 3 "Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me."
4 “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?
Tell me, if you understand.
5 Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?
6 On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone—
7 while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels[a] shouted for joy?
8 “Who shut up the sea behind doors
when it burst forth from the womb,
9 when I made the clouds its garment
and wrapped it in thick darkness,
10 when I fixed limits for it
and set its doors and bars in place,
11 when I said, ‘This far you may come and no farther;
here is where your proud waves halt’?
12 “Have you ever given orders to the morning,
or shown the dawn its place,"
16 “Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea
or walked in the recesses of the deep?
17 Have the gates of death been shown to you?
Have you seen the gates of the deepest darkness?
18 Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth?
Tell me, if you know all this.
19 “What is the way to the abode of light?
And where does darkness reside?
20 Can you take them to their places?
Do you know the paths to their dwellings?
21 Surely you know, for you were already born!
You have lived so many years!
22 “Have you entered the storehouses of the snow
or seen the storehouses of the hail,
23 which I reserve for times of trouble,
for days of war and battle?
24 What is the way to the place where the lightning is dispersed,
or the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth?
25 Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain,
and a path for the thunderstorm,
26 to water a land where no one lives,
an uninhabited desert,
27 to satisfy a desolate wasteland
and make it sprout with grass?
28 Does the rain have a father?
Who fathers the drops of dew?
29 From whose womb comes the ice?
Who gives birth to the frost from the heavens
30 when the waters become hard as stone,
when the surface of the deep is frozen?
31 “Can you bind the chains[b] of the Pleiades?
Can you loosen Orion’s belt?
32 Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons[c]
or lead out the Bear[d] with its cubs?
33 Do you know the laws of the heavens?
Can you set up God’s[e] dominion over the earth?
Psalm 19:
1 The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
2 Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they reveal knowledge.
3 They have no speech, they use no words;
no sound is heard from them.
4 Yet their voice[b] goes out into all the earth,
their words to the ends of the world.
In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.
5 It is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
like a champion rejoicing to run his course.
6 It rises at one end of the heavens
and makes its circuit to the other;
nothing is deprived of its warmth.
14 May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart
be pleasing in your sight,
LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer. "
Phil 2:15
"That you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like STARS in the universe."
(all verse from NIV, Photo from spacespin.org)
