What Are You Looking At?

The first question that popped into my head upon awaking this morning was just that.
What are you looking at?

We live in a generation of self-help, pop psychology..and pay millions of dollars for hours of therapy...and medicate when the self help and therapy doesn't work.

Please hear me.
All meds aren't wrong.

Therapy is good.

Read...discover...acknowledge...change.

Although...
It can all become very self absorbing.
Very quickly.
I know.
From Experience.
I am seriously analytical for being such a creative person.
I think I am what they call mixed dominance.

I live deep.

Sometimes I forget however..that the depths I exist in are in God not myself.....

I become the focus..exploring, analyzing..investigating..excavating.

This morning I had a clear view of myself...self-help just took on a whole new aura.

It is IMPOSSIBLE.

See the ancient text tells us that Jesus..the Christ..the Son of God..the savior, redeemer of all mankind...HE is the author..and finisher of my faith.

HE wrote me.
HE knew my beginnings....he knows the plot line and he knows the end of the tale.

It says in the same passage right before this that I am to FIX my eyes on Jesus.

Whew.

I have a friend who is for all intents and purposes, in his last week of life.
He is dying of ALS.
I read his blog today.
One of the comments left by a friend was a story of how silver is refined.
This was in reference to a passage in Malachi 3:3 which states that:
" ...he sits like a refiner of silver..."
Research into the refining process reveals that a silversmith holds the silver in the center of the fire where it is the hottest. He cannot leave the silver but must remain during the whole process..never taking his eyes off the silver..which can be destroyed if left in the fire a moment too long. When asked how one knows when the process is complete, the silversmith replies:

'That's easy...when I see my reflection in it."

oh God!

This morning....God reminded me that he is the reason for my being.

He is the refiner.

I am in his care.

He is watching over me.

He started the whole process and oversees it to its completion.

In my over analytical...compulsive need to verify where I am and how I am doing... to solidify my position...and give reason to my life, I sometimes forget what it is all about.

What am I looking at?

Me???????

I am not that good looking!

I need to change my focus.

I need to allow him to do what he does best.

Let him get on with it...and stop messing around in his business.

Easy and light...that's what he said.


My friend Stephen...whose body is decaying by the second?
What do you say?
Where is my analysis now?
What am I looking at?
I don't know!

I know what I want.

I want him restored.
I want him healed.
NOW!

What am I seeing?

Where am I looking?

The only place left to look.
In the eyes of the one who has gone before.
Those are his footprints leading off into the distance.
I can't guarantee the terrain, the weather or the duration of the journey or the state of my body at the end.
Do I truly mean it when I say:
"Where he leads I will follow?"
or...." I surrender all"
What about the Kevin Prosch song we all belted out back in the day...
" When you've been broken..broken to pieces... and you crush me like a rose..."

In a world fraught with identity theft it is no wonder we seek to make our mark..to not be invisible..to establish ourselves...to become more and more concrete. We are conditioned by our environment.

Somebody please look at me.
Please see me.

As I am looking at Stephen....through this fiery...gut wrenching...earth shaking time...he is becoming more and more transparent.
Less and less substantial.
But the God he looks to...trusts in..wrestles with...is becoming more and more visible.

I can't imagine his journey. I only watch from a distance.
Crying. Praying. Hoping.
I can't fathom his pain. I only see the results.
The stuff of nightmares.

So... at the end of the day...in the last possible moments of a precious life...
can we ask with true passion...
What are you looking at?
...and crave to hear the answer....

I am looking at Jesus.

Stephen...that's what I see.