Tom has a really unique way of painting. He does all (or at least all of the work I've seen thus far) in a stained glass sort of style that presents an abstract image of something or someone recognizable. With his paintings, you can't really tell who or what is being painted until it's done.
Tom told us there is a trick to be able to see his paintings in a more obvious way. If you take a camera, and look at the painting through it's lens, the image becomes quite clear. Tim took his phone out, went to his camera application, and, what do you know, there we saw the baseball player (whose name I forget) staring back at us.
Life is so similar to Tom's paintings. Our lives are constructed with different pieces, different shapes, that all together form a singular image on a canvas. If you look at the canvas of your life it's easy to become disengaged, apathetic, and lost because the image is not always so clear. You see the shapes and colors, get lost in the details, and then, in your own way, lose sight of your bigger purposes in life. Yet if you use just a simple tool, a lens other than yourself, the image can become so clear.
This lens I believe to be Jesus. When you take him for who he is and what he says, he provides a lens that can beautifully draw a magnificent out of your life. Every random piece becomes purposeful; every color intentional.
To see you life as an adventure, you need to accurately view Jesus as he is meant to be viewed, and you need to accurately listen to Jesus as he is meant to be listened to. There is no perfect methodology to this, but digging through the scriptures to see the character of God is an easy place to start. Life becomes so much more adventurous when you realize how great and grand and big God is, and then choose to respond to it.
Our response is our putting our eye up to the looking glass. It's us choosing to take that lens and put it to use. There will only be something mysteriously beautiful on the other side.
The other day I was hanging out with a few of my Middle School students, drawing with chalk all over this old circular wooden picnic table. It was a really fun and relaxing time. When another church staff came over to check it out, I asked him to take a picture of all we had done so far. Then I asked him to text those photos to me (see my camera on my phone has been busted for a while, so I need to ask for help taking spontaneous photos sometimes).
As he was getting the text message ready, he muttered the words, "choose existing." He said it again with a little more awe and enthusiasm, "Choose Existing!" He showed his phone to me. He was at a sub-menu where he could decide to either "take a new photo" or "choose existing photo". He found the "choose existing" option quite profound and went on to sit and ponder those words. I did the same. It's amazing the secret ways God shares profound things through the world.
Choose Existing.
When we take the lens of Christ we are presented with the same challenge: CHOOSE TO EXIST. Choose to pursue grasping the bigger picture of your life. Choose to engage in the artful framework that makes up all you are. Choose to embark on the beautiful adventure that will lead to true existing.
It's way to easy for us to live muddled only existing biologically. I have plenty of friends and acquaintances that do this. They live in their own head without awe, without purpose, and put off the sense that they are hardly engaged in the grand work God is performing through the world. They are hardly aware of the fact God is constantly inviting them into something that actually gives eternal life.
I don't want to be another disengaged soul wandering the earth claiming to know Jesus! I want to be heavily saturated in the beauty of grace mercy and the coming kingdom. I want to take the lens to my own life and live the adventure it could truly be.
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