Sight

Sight

I just started wearing glasses a couple years ago. My eyes used to be amazing, i could pick out tiny road signs in the distance. I was killer at the road sign game because i could see them before anybody else in the church van. Then they progressively got worse and worse, to where i couldn't even read a book without squinting at it. i wrote it all off as i got used to it, and lived with poor eyesight for a year. I started getting major headaches and migraines because of all of it. So i go to the doctor, and get some glasses. And man oh man, i walked outside, and i could see the individual leaves on the trees again! I could see the beauty of the world i lived in again. Totally awesome. My eyes, even with glasses, are not like they once were, that's just something that comes with age i guess.

Now for the analogy. Rather ironic that during this time in my life, when i went without glasses, i also went without any spiritual help. I stopped reading my bible, i stopped going to church, i stopped just following god. I did my own thing. The difference between light and dark in my life became so skewed that all i could see was darkness. When i moved back to cruces from Albuquerque, i moved in with 8 christian guys, and got back into reading my bible and spending time with God. I was given spiritual glasses, and started to discern the good and the bad in my life. I had to call things off with a girl i had been dating for 7 month because it was not a God focused relationship, and she was not willing to refocus it. So i went on for a year or so with these new found "spiritual glasses" and learned a lot about myself and about the world around me. I was able to see the beauty of this world so much deeper than i had before.

Then, because i am human, i fell. Not quite as far down as i had before, but i had gotten back into drinking and partying, and skipping church to sleep in and skipping bible study and quiet time for hanging out with non Christian friends. I had lost the ability to discern light again. I hadn't been to church in at least a year, and was relying on the campus ministry i was a part of to keep me in the light. Well, when everyone is a peer, we can't help out we are all blind to the outcome of our decisions. I went and worked at a Christian camp in Colorado, and this is where god finally slapped me upside the head and strapped the glassed to my head. I lived with 30+ other college age kids for the summer, in a community that was full of christians. I came back from that summer amped to live my life for god. I started church shopping to find a new home, and started going to aggress for christ. I joined a small group and went to church every Sunday. The light became so bright in my life. I could see details in my life that i had missed for so long, found out my faults and attempted to fix them.

Now there are times, maybe a week at most, where i take my glasses off. I stop reading or skip church or small group, and my life feels different. My ability to discern is clouded. But then i get back into the Word, start going to small group again, and makes me want to not miss those things again. Our ability to discern the light from the dark depends on where we are ourselves. If we are surrounded in darkness, everything may seem dark. If we are inside the light, then when the dark comes in, we will be able to see it and avoid it.

As c.s. Lewis said, "i believe in Christianity as i believe the sun is risen. Not only because i see it, but by it i see everything else" without the light in our lives, without our constant prayer and fellowship with other Christians, how can we see anything?