#Perspective

1 Corinthians 4:17-18

For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Hey gang! It's a great day to be alive and well in the land of the living. First, I extend honor to those who celebrated Mother's Day this past Sunday. I intercede for those reading this and lost mothers and mothers who've lost babies. My heart goes to you. 

Sincerely. 

Well, I had such a bombtastic weekend as I spent some of it with women from all walks of life at my church's women's conference. We worshipped together. We praised together. We loved on each other, A LOT. We laughed together. We cried together. And we allowed ourselves to be poured into by various leaders of the church. It was such a beautiful experience. I enjoyed my time at this event. This is coming from somebody who was turned off by women's conferences. Ha! Maybe I'll share why at a later date. 

Anyway, shout out to those who took the time to digest my post #Clarity. It was a necessary angle that I had to approach or else this entire month of entries would be lopsided. We touched on being lost in God. We touched on lacking clarity because of the devil. 

I want to now have us consider a premise that I believe has a way of undermining people's faith. 

The Christian rapper, Andy Mineo, spit something so profound to me in his song, Clarity, He said, "The opposite of faith ain't doubt, it's when I have it all figured out!" 

We're getting ready to do some more investigative discovery work.

 You down? 

Alright, here it is. What happens when you're not lost because of God? Or you're not confused because of the devil?

But you're without clear direction because of YOU! 

Some of the hardest people to get through to and to move into a new shift are people who are relying solely on their intellect and what they know/have seen or can see. 

These people swim laps like Michael Phelps in their mind. Winning the same championship metal over and over for yesteryear's accomplishments. 

#Tragic 

When you live in your mind 24/7, you will automatically see everything from a skewed perspective. 

Case in point; if a person who survived some type of trauma in their life and they choose to reside in a never ending loop, that constantly replays the traumatic experience, 

they will inevitably have a warped perspective. 

A warped perspective that looks like victimhood. Show me a person who plays victim at the drop of a hat, I'll show you a person who's perspective is more distorted than a little bit. 

Someone like this, will do everything in their feeble power to preserve self and to protect themselves by rejecting something that can potentially benefit them, for fear of going through a rerun of a terrible episode in their lives. 

Yet, in their mind they're replaying the very episode they wish to avoid in real time. 

Does the fact that this doesn't make sense at all, make sense? 

It is by far, evidence of a perspective issue. 

I wear glasses when I'm going to engage in some extensive reading or note taking. I have to wear them in this case, because my eyesight is jacked. I honestly believe it has something to do with when I was around 6 years old and would sit on this little bouncy blue and white unicorn in my back yard. I would sit on this thing bouncing up and down and back and forward for hours. 

Singing made up songs to God, going on adventures in my mind, and staring at the sun without shielding my eyes. I thought I was Wonder Woman and didn't need to cover my eyes from the sun's rays. (I was an especially weird child. Don't come for me though lol) Needless to say, I believe those sun rays fried my eyes which is why now I'm nearsighted with astigmatism.  When you're nearsighted, you can see things up close but the object that are further away, tend to appear blurry. 

When you have astigmatism, according to healthline.com; it's a common vision problem caused by an error in the shape of the cornea. With astigmatism, the lens of the eye or the cornea, which is the front surface of the eye, has an irregular curve. This can change the way light passes, or refracts, to your retina. This causes blurry, fuzzy, or distorted vision. 

If y'all don't catch this, I give up! 

Ok, I'm being dramatic. No real talk though, so many believers right now are spiritually nearsighted and suffering from spiritual astigmatism. They can only see what's close. If the directive or vision is mentally too far to grasp, requires an emotional departure from dysfunction, familiarity, or comfort, that thing get's blurry. 

It gets harder to perceive. 

When pain or trauma is part of someone's history, if not healed and delivered from, it eventually reshapes their spiritual lenses making it difficult for the light of truth to enter in. Ultimately contorting ones perspective. Faith, then has no chance.

In the 13th chapter of the book of Numbers towards the latter part, Caleb, Joshua, and ten other men were commissioned to go and spy out Canaan, the land God promised them. But they came back with varying reports. One report was that the people in that land were too powerful to overtake and could not be beat. 

Caleb's report was, "No, we can beat them and possess the land." 

They responded, "That land devours people living in it and its inhabitants are tall like giants. We see ourselves as grasshoppers. And they themselves look at us as grasshoppers." 

Why two different reports? 

Listen, these people came from a place of captivity and abuse. That is all they knew. Despite being delivered from this place, the trauma of this place confiscated their perspective, so when they went into this new land, the people reminded them immediately of where they came from. They saw the people and their stature. Not the fruit, the milk, nor the honey.

The book of Numbers, is a book most famous for holding the census records of the tribes of Israel. No surprise that the 12 spies were named, as well as their fathers, and the tribes they belonged to. I wholeheartedly believe not only did their origin of captivity and abuse mold their perspective, but also who their fathers were and the jurisdictions of their tribe. I truly believe these components influenced their perspectives as well. 

Goes to show, that family heritage can have a direct impact on the way you see things. Meaning, how you were raised, what was passed down to you, and what you were brought up in. 

We must be so willing to challenge and reconcile all experiences of our adulthood AND our childhood. We must also understand that unhealthy perspectives sometimes don't come off as unhealthy until they can be readily linked, to toxic cycles riddled with lack, stagnation, chaos, etc.

Twisted perspectives will never allow you to see a half cup of water as half full, but half empty. 

And they will most certainly shelter fears that need to be abolished! God did not give us a spirit fear which means if your current perspective revolves around anything close to rejecting movements that can potentially put you in a better position than you are in now, 

it is NOT a God perspective. 

Any perspective that magnifies light and momentary troubles and camouflages the glory that is to proceed them, is not a great perspective at all especially when we serve a great and mighty God.

Hence, why Paul in 2 Corinthians 4, felt the need to remind the people to correct their perspectives by taking their eyes off of what they see and fixing it onto what they don't see. 

You can do the same. It's going to take some deliberate shifting of your eyes and the intentional enactment of faith to correct how you view things. 

Once you do though, you'll suddenly without fail recognize that YOU are an unstoppable giant in God. Bet!