A lens inside out

While attending a meeting several years ago, I struggled all morning with my right eye twitching.  It felt like something had landed on my contact lens, a particle of dust perhaps, or a fiber.  But no matter what I did, my eye became increasingly irritated.   As the morning progressed, it became much worse.   And my vision became blurry in that affected eye, preventing me from reading signs and recognizing people that I knew.  And after a while, I developed a headache from trying to view everything through my "good" eye.

I twitched and squinted and teared up and rubbed my eyes.  It was just the way it was going to be.  Get used to it.  There was nothing I could do about it.

A friend walked up to me after the meeting we were attending.  I tried my best to look normal, but I could still feel my eye trying to self-correct.  My friend took one look at me and said, "Your contact lens is inside out."

"What?  How do you know?"

"Because it has happened to me.  I know exactly how it feels."

I dismissed myself and went into the women's room.  I washed my hands and took out my contact.  There was no dust on the lens nor any fibers.  I held the tiny plastic orb up to the light.  When my contact is rightside up, there are three little numbers 123 that appear on the edge.  Sure enough, they read 321.

I couldn't see right because my lens was wrongside out.  And it didn't have to be that way.

Our relationship with God is much the same.  When we are living right with God, we actually see things differently because He changes our vision and changes our hearts.  And when the wrong worldview is put into place -- when everything is focused on myself or a homemade idol of sorts, or when I am believing what is not true, or when I don't want it to be true -- it always causes me to try to self-correct.  Something is not right and I am futilely trying to make up for it.

Just as with my rebellious contact lens, it is evident to me when something is not right in my heart.  I am distracted by everything around me.  But what recalibrates my mindset and my heartset is God's Word.  God turns everything rightside up.  I just need to listen to Him.

When the reality of the Gospel is at the core of who I am, it does not just increase my capacity to love God more.  It radically enlarges how I love others.

I see the world differently.

One thing I do know,
that though I was blind,
           now I see.

                   John 9.25