Growing In the Light of Perspective

If the past decade-plus has taught me anything, it’s that I must not shy from hard truths. It’s my actual state – the way God sees me and not the gospel according to Kelli anymore. The truth is God wanted to shed light on my life way before I realized it, but faith can only grow in the light of a heart that acknowledges truth. 

I had to consider that my thinking and understanding were far from God’s perspective. Sin and shame keep secrets, and its influence drove me deeper into my own “truth” – from far away from living in truth – the embodiment which is Jesus.  1 John 1:8 – NLT  

We can let all the hurts of this world enlighten our thinking or darken it. It’s a choice.

That’s what happened to me. The hard things of life took me to a dark place but when it got painful enough it led me to seek God to enlighten my perspective about myself, my relationship with others, and with Him. That’s why today, I can thank God for the suffering that’s happened in my life because I know on my own, I would have never have changed my way of thinking. 

I didn’t realize my perspective was dark. The “light” I was using was my own understanding based on conventional wisdom from the world, my emotions, and some false comfort in religious tradition.

I was reading Matthew 6:22-23 today. “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. So if the light within you is darkness – how deep is that darkness?”  Matthew 6:22-23 – NLT  The eye is an analogy for our mind and understanding here in this text. How misguided will our understanding or “light” be when we’ve decided for ourselves what that is? How dark can things get, and we don’t realize it?

I’m telling you, pretty dark.

When our “light” is dark, how upside-down will we see the rest of the world and our circumstances? How off track can our lives get? What kind of future are we setting up for our kids and grandkids? 

God tells us not to rely on our own understanding. Proverbs 3:5  

Healing can begin only with acknowledging facts about ourselves and how it impacts our relationship with God and others. Truth comes from no other source other than Jesus, the way, the truth, and the life where all wisdom and knowledge are hidden. John 14:6 – NLT  Colossians 2:3 – CSB