What do you see when you look in the mirror?
That’s not a riddle - think about it; what do you see in the mirror?
When I look in the mirror, I see that my hair is coming loose, or that this skirt looks really good on me. I look for whether there’s still chocolate on my face, whether an outfit works… that sort of thing.
So when I look in a mirror, I see circumstances, not a person.
I recognize myself, yes, but I don’t see myself. I look for the things others might see.
Maybe you see something deeper in the mirror. Well and good. But I’m going to guess I’m not the only one who sees this way.
And I’m going to guess that many of us also see other people that way.
We recognize family, friends, relationships, but depending on what’s on our minds, we may look at friends and strangers and see skin, smiles, height, physical grace or awkwardness, a mood or cause for concern, really great shoes, spinach in the teeth…
That’s what eyes are for - to take in the physical world around us, to provide important information that helps us navigate, keeps us safe, gives us data for judgments.
Not all the data, of course. We judge the beauty of a sunset, a lake, a person, a city street not just by eyesight, but by experience, culture, sound and smell, and more.
But many of us would find it very hard to judge beauty or safety without sight.
In fact, we’d probably judge character, trustworthiness, even friendliness differently without sight. There are plenty of studies out there that show that tall people are treated differently than short people: make more money, are described as leaders, are believed to be happier. Other visible characteristics work the same way.
Might not be logical, or the way we’d like it to be, but that’s what we see,
and sometimes seeing is believing.
Until it fails us.
Judgements based on sight have failed me. They’ve probably failed you at least once in your life - whether it involved a scrape on your car door or a broken heart.
And that failure of sight and judgment echoes through all of our scripture today.
Jesus points out to his disciples that what you see isn’t necessarily what you get.
Mustard looks small and grows enormous; farmed grain sprouts and develops and grows without the farmer being able to see how all the transformation happens.
And Samuel has a vivid lesson on sight.
God sends him to anoint - to recognize and establish - the next king of Israel. Samuel needs a good candidate, one that others will support, since just by anointing another one he’ll be committing treason against King Saul, who is still in power and already mad at Samuel.
Samuel follows God’s directions to go to Bethlehem, where God says, “I have seen for myself” a king among the sons of Jesse. He prepares to anoint the eldest: the obvious leader, the one people will respect, the one who, frankly, looks like a king.
Nope. Not that one.
Against all logic and expectation, God’s not interested in the one who looks like a king in custom and culture and experience, as well as in physical appearance.
God whispers in Samuel’s ear:
“I don’t see the way you do. You see what’s visible, you see what your eyes give you. I see the heart.”
“I don’t see the way you do. You see what’s visible, you see what your eyes give you. I see the heart.”
One after another the hearts of Jesse’s sons fail to look like kings to God, until they run out of sons, and Samuel, baffled, asks, “Are you sure?”
And then - finally - the family thinks of David: the runt of the litter, left with the sheep because he’s not big enough for ritual and politics and important stuff.
And that’s The One.
It turns out that David’s also handsome - “good for seeing” - with beautiful eyes. But we’re supposed to be wary of that now - remember that even though he’s cute, his family didn’t think he was qualified - really, he just doesn’t look like a king. We can’t forget that what we see and what God sees don’t necessarily match.
And - if you read ahead a bit in the story, you might justifiably wonder just what God sees in David’s heart that looks like a king.
The man is arrogant, generous, selfish, disrespectful, uninhibited, sneaky, inconsistent, passionate — as king of Israel he’s a soap opera-worthy hot mess—
but every page of his story echoes with the fact that God loves him.
And maybe that’s it.
We’re never going to see what God sees, because God is looking not with eyes, but with love.
With an unpredictable, inhuman, vast and incomprehensible love that has nothing to do with whether David — or Caitlyn Jenner or Corey Crawford or Dennis Hastert or you or I — are inherently lovable.
God’s love sees a heart that’s different from all that we know.
We can look with love as well as eyes, and you probably already practice looking with our hearts when you look at the people you know best - at dear friends and family, but we still may not see the heart, because we are busy seeing our own experience of that person, seeing history and hopes and habits: looking with love, we see our hearts, not the other person’s.
So if Samuel could teach us just one thing today, it would probably be to believe our eyes, but not only our eyes. To believe that in every person, in every situation, in every beautiful place, in every ugly scene, God sees something that I don’t see. To remember with every blink and every unconscious judgment, that God sees not only what you see, but something else, too: something different, something more, something completely unknown.
Samuel or Jesus might encourage us to see the world with two sets of eyes: the ones in our body, and the eyes of our faith: see with our trust that God sees more, sees differently, sees what we will never understand.
That double vision makes a difference to how we live.
Paul tells the Corinthian church that the difference between human and divine points of view can change enemies and betrayers into trusted friends, and encourages us to live as though we already see things from that divine point of view - “by faith, not by sight.”
So practice that at home today.
Start in front of the mirror. See the collar that’s straight and the hair in place and the things you want others to see,
and then look, with both sets of eyes, at the mystery of what God sees in you, of what God sees differently, of what God loves, beyond reason or merit.
Then practice when you’re at work, on the streets, at the pool this summer. Practice seeing with the faith that knows you will never see it all - but that God sees hearts we’ll never know.
Practice that, and then, well,
we’ll see.
No comments:
Post a Comment