A Matter Of Perspective

If you're like me, seventh grade art class was where we learned how to draw perspective on a flat piece of paper. We used a ruler and drew lines the way the teacher told us to. After that we learned how to make roads, houses, boxes, and fences that looked real. We moaned and groaned as we learned the technique, sure that we'd never use perspective again.

This photo that I took last week in my back yard shows perspective that can be observed in the real world. The shadows of the trees and the spit rail fence converge on a single point of focus in the distance. However, the shadows of the trees and fence spread out and get larger as they get farther from the focus. Perspective shows us the effect of distance.

As a Christian, I'd like to say that my heart, my mind, my body, and my soul are always concentrating on a single focus. I'd like to say that I am focusing on doing all things as unto the Lord. If I compare myself to obviously wicked people, I think that I'm doing pretty good. However, if I compare myself to what the Bible says, I find I am guilty of being indifferent to the Lord. I don't let him take first place in my heart.

It's a matter of perspective. Either I'm sensitive toward godly things (being focused on letting Jesus live His life through me), or else I've given myself over to satisfying myself (greedy for more and more of almost anything that gives me delight apart from Jesus).

Let me explain.

Some examples of people trying to find satisfaction by ever increasing amounts of experience might be these: those who do drugs, addicts to pornography, and participants in extreme, death defying sports. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. Ephesians 4:19 No doubt you are nodding your head along with me, convinced that this kind of sensual greed is worthy of condemnation. It's like the tree shadows in the sunlit photo getting longer and farther apart, leaving their focus behind. We'd say to ourselves, we'd never be like that! But we are like that.

How can that be?

The Holy Spirit within us nudges us with a still small voice. A Christian must be sensitive to those nudges; God's gentle leading is felt that way. We'd never want to miss those nudges and lose our focus on Christ. But it happens. How can we recognize when that begins to take place? How can we recognize when we are becoming callous to God's prompting in our lives? This word callous in Ephesians 4:19 can also be translated as being past feeling and not being sensitive. How do we recognize that we are beginning to be callous toward God, not feeling His nudges, no longer being sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit?

It's when we recognize we are starting to find our delight in all kinds of things that move us farther away from Jesus. It's when a variety of experiences spread out, enticing us away from our focus. The word "dissipation"describes this situation. Dissipation means "to scatter, to waste, to spend much time and energy on indulging in pleasure".

We'll find our own places of dissipation if we lose our focus on Jesus. For me, it's overeating. It's visiting bookstores. It's an obsession to keep up with the news. For you it might be clothes shopping or collecting new recipes. It might even be busyness in ministry or surfing the net. All of these activities can be good when done under the Lordship of Jesus. But when we find ourselves spreading out and expanding these activities to get more and more personal satisfaction out of them, we're no different than a drug addict looking for the next high.

We need to look at the shadows of our lives. Are they pointed toward a single focus? Or are they spreading out in dissipation?

If we find we are far from our Lord, not being sensitive to the Holy Spirit, and not feeling God's leading in our lives, the remedy is simple. We need to turn from our dissipation's, and focus on Jesus!