There's a hymn called "Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus" that we used to sing when I was younger. I haven't sung it for years--this morning it was used in our worship service. The refrain goes like this:Turn your eyes upon JesusThere's another much more upbeat hymn that goes like this:
Look full in His wonderful face
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of His glory and grace.
This world's not my homeBoth of these songs convey the same message.
I'm just passing through
My treasures and my hopes
Somewhere beyond the blue
Many friends and kindred
Have gone on before
And I can't feel at home
In this world anymore
Oh Lord you know
I have no friend like you
If heaven's not my home
Then Lord what will I do
The angels beckon me
To heaven's open door
And I can't feel at home
In this world anymore
That this world isn't for us, that we don't belong here, that we should look beyond the present for what God is really preparing for us later. That life after death will be something else entirely.
Everything I write is somehow informed by my own background, and this sentiment was central to understanding this life for so long. I am just now working this out of my system, so what I'm saying may be very foreign to your own experience.
We were taught in so many ways that everything about this life was temporary and somehow bad--its pleasures, experiences, everything. That enjoyment itself and all the other positive feelings we are capable of were bad. That pleasure itself wasn't to be trusted.
I don't see a lot of justification for this. When I look around with the eyes of my heart, I don't see the things of earth becoming "strangely dim." I see the things of earth becoming strangely lovely.
Strangely intriguing. Striking. Inviting even.
Interestingly, in my faith tradition we rarely talked about the Kingdom. Unfortunately for us, because Jesus spent a lot of time talking about it.
For now, let me observe that we were made for this kind of life. As creatures of this universe, we're designed for a world of gravity, rain, moderate temperatures, alternating days and nights, and four seasons (unless you're from Texas, then you only get one).
This dirt, this grass, these trees, this oxygen. Don't you love it all? Don't you feel like getting out in it? Basking, soaking, absorbing? God made this whole thing, pretty much in the way we find it.
Most of the damage we see on the planet has come at the hands of man. The calamities being suffered in Sudan are nearly completely man-made. (What would physically happen on the earth if all peoples lived in peace for just twenty years? Just one generation.)
I'm not suggesting that this is utopia, or that it will be any time soon--I completely understand that we're dealing with this fallen-ness. There is sickness, and sorrow, and death, and separation, and heaviness of heart.
But there is also this residual longing for things to be the way they were, before the colossal fall. Before we chose to write our own rules, to try to control our own destiny, to strive to be something other than what we were created to be.
The heavens declare the glory of God,(Psalm 19)
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
May we embrace the longings and the pleasures and the foretastes that God gives us in this life. May we learn from them, and may we follow them.
Here's a Psalm that sees God all through a thunderstorm:
Psalm 29
Ascribe to the LORD, O mighty ones, ascribe to the LORD glory and strength.May we see what this world teaches us about the very pleasures and glories of God. Let's look for the face of Jesus in all things.
Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name; worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness.
The voice of the LORD is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the LORD thunders over the mighty waters.
The voice of the LORD is powerful.
The voice of the LORD is majestic.
The voice of the LORD breaks the cedars; the LORD breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon. He makes Lebanon skip like a calf, Sirion like a young wild ox.
The voice of the LORD strikes with flashes of lightning.
The voice of the LORD shakes the desert; the LORD shakes the Desert of Kadesh.
The voice of the LORD twists the oaks and strips the forests bare. And in his temple all cry, "Glory!"
The LORD sits enthroned over the flood;
the LORD is enthroned as King forever.
The LORD gives strength to his people;
the LORD blesses his people with peace.
Makes me think of how much I love trees. I've thought sometimes of giving one a big hug. Strange, a? To me they are like a personal, and very touching, gift from God.
ReplyDeleteYep! This is a beautiful world He made for us. jp
I'm listening to "Your Name", by Phillips, Craig, and Dean. He talks about gloriying "Your Name". I love it. We have the incredible privilege of lifting up His name unabashedly. I'd say that is an incredible piece of what we will experience in heaven. Unabashed praise, glory, and honor lifted to our King of Kings. And I like what you said that we were made for this kind of life. He did put us here. He does give us glimpses of heaven right now, as you said in the trees, oxygen, gorgeous things from the natural world and each other, and the stories of Scripture and his workings with all those patriarchs. If that isn't part of heaven, I don't know what is. And we can go to him, sing, and let Him work on us and we see it all the time, especially in our brokeness. That's something that is kind of special right now on this earth, while we are in our fallen state, our eyes can see him in a way like none other, when we are desparately in need of comfort or encouragement or a spiritual refreshment. I like that he gives us glimpses of Himself. Do you think he does this now so that we don't drop dead of a heart attack because of his awesomeness when we do see Him?
ReplyDeleteLee,
ReplyDeleteI had to chuckle at your comment about "dropping dead of a heart attack" ....in heaven! Ha! I appreciate your imagery :-) .
I hope I do that, "look for Jesus in all things".
ReplyDeleteYou're a beautiful man, Jon.
ReplyDeleteThis is one of the deepest truths ever revealed. When we turn our eyes to Jesus we begin to see Jesus in all. He's not the competition of Creation. He's the glory of it.
Maybe we could remix the lyrics to the song and turn it completely upside down:
Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in his wonderful face
And the things of earth
will grow strangely bright
In the light of His glory and grace
But we would probably have to explore what it means to truly turn your eyes upon Jesus…
"Open the eyes of my heart" might just be the only prayer that is always answered--
ReplyDeleteyes, here I am.
See I always take this song to mean our preoccupations, not necessarily creation. God said it was good so, I'm gonna go with that. But when I hear this song it is a deep comfort to me because it reminds me to look at Jesus in those times when I get hung up on problems, etc.
ReplyDeleteI don't think you can hate this world so much that you miss the splendor of the Lord. But I don't think you should love it so much that you cling desperately to it. Eastern spirituality talks of balance so much more than we do. I think of Jesus as the ultimate balance. I think nature speaks to this because the ecosystem is very balanced(the way it was created anyway) and our interruptions of it, likewise speak of us...our desire to control and master and then the terrible reprocussions of that desire.
Hmm. Like what kind of things do you get hung up on? People? Trees? Water? Wind? Sunshine? Flowers? Wildlife? Music?
ReplyDeleteProbably things like... deadlines, human judgment, jobs, commercials, consumerism, problems, worry,... All things that are a part of this world that I wouldn't mind dimming out of my consciousness.
ReplyDeleteI can see where you're coming from, MJ. The complete song goes like this:
ReplyDeleteO soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There's light for a look at the Savior
And life more abundant and free!
Thro' death into life everlasting
He passed, and we follow Him there;
Over us sin no more hath dominion-
For more than conq'rors we are!
His word shall not fail you-He promised;
Believe him, and all will be well;
Then go to a world that is dying,
His perfect salvation to tell!
Chorus: Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of his glory and grace.
Last Sunday we sang it in church, but only the chorus, and whether it was the songs before it or the words being spoken, it came across exactly as I remember the "you don't belong here" sentiment from my youth.
As a young boy, I would watch people sing this song with their eyes closed and know they were dreaming of being somewhere and even someone else.
But these days, now that I am learning to look around with different eyes, I wonder if Jesus can be seen even in the heavy things in life--sorrow, conflict, disagreement, strife, loss. Everything.
I wonder if we can see the face and hear the voice of Truth in everything, even though there is fallen-ness.
I don't want it to turn into a scientific discussion, but is it even possible for a person to turn the eyes of their heart away from one thing and toward Jesus?
Another way to ask it is, is there anything in this world--any kind of human experience, whether in nature or in human interaction--where Jesus isn't there?
Human activities and ways of relating are just as glorious as trees and water and seasons and the full moon. Even if every bit of it is tainted by the fall.
Sorrow is a feeling that God experiences.
I guess when I get hung up on stuff it's really sin that is bothering me. My sin bothers me and the widespread sin that infects this world like a cancer.
ReplyDeleteSince we are talking about creation, look at the environment, for example. I took a class on it this past semester and the only thing that kept resonating in my head is that all the things we are doing to the Earth have it's roots in greed and sloth. It is everywhere.
But it takes effort to actually not destroy creation, effort few people make. Maybe it's that mentality in church, "fallen world" etc. How much will someone attempt to maintain a tent, as opposed to a mansion, right?
But you know, I only have two Christian friends that are very active about the environment. But, really, when has the church made a real effort to address our percieved need for plastic bs and our penchant for SUV's and how our stewardship of the Earth speaks to our love for our Lord. I would love to see people getting taught about living sacrificially in regards to that. But that is not a topic the church often addresses. What does that say about us to the rest of the world, I wonder?
Yeah, that's the reason I asked about the kinds of things you get hung up on, the kinds of things you want dim.
ReplyDeleteIs that really the message you have believed about worldliness and about sin? That Jesus makes them dimmer? Are sin and godlessness dimmer to God when He looks at Jesus? Is it dimmer to me? Is that the way it works? If so, then it would make sense that we fix our eyes on Jesus and escape from this place. But it would be hard to make sense of why Jesus came, in his own words "to seek and to save what was lost". If God turned His eyes to Jesus that way, we would be dimmer and dimmer and dimmer until we were utterly lost to Him. But in truth, Jesus is not the way we are lost to God, but the way He finds us. I mean, it's not like there were some of us found and the others lost, and Christ came to separate us one group from the other. I rather think that through Jesus the beauty and truth of all things becomes brighter so it can be found and quickened.
What I am getting at is this. There's all this stuff in the world around me, stuff I think I can see. But I can't really see it. I see what is being cunningly presented to me. And the me others see is the me I cunningly present to them. But when I turn my eyes to Jesus, meaning when I look to Him for the truth of how the world is and the truth of who I am, then I can finally see the world not as it is presented to me, but as it really is. And I am able to offer the me I really am, not the me I would present to others because of what sin and worldliness has done to me.
The way things really are is glorious but oppressed. It is in Christ that it is liberated and unveiled.
And thus, Christ sends us to the world just as the Father sent Him, to continue the "Christing". We lay down our lives for our brothers as Christ laid down His for us.
There is something to this dimming, though, that I imagine everyone who has experienced Christ has experienced, how things that were so important to us somehow begin to pale when we first turn to Christ.
Maybe the truth of the dimming is something like this: When we turn our eyes to Jesus, all the things that bother us become dim so we can continue to approach and reclaim and restore all that is becoming more and more glorious in the light of Christ.
I have my own observations of the following, but I'll ask you Jon.
ReplyDeleteWhere is Jesus in child sexual molestation?
Where is Jesus in a restaurant manager getting stabbed 105 times to the point they are nothing but a globbish pile of human tissue and blood?
That's one of the things I've pondered about this mythic outlook in reading it over the months, that it seems to heavily lean toward the "isn't everything wonderful and beautiful", PMA-ish end of the spectrum.
I know my view of these numbing, rotten things mentioned at the top, and I know we each have our own experiences with pain, hardship or evil in various forms, yet I haven't seen (or maybe it's I can't recall) how real-world despicable evil is addressed by the mythic paradigm.
You're right that He doesn't always make it plain. I'd go so far as to say, we rarely get an "up periscope" moment of clarity. A moment when we say, "Now, I understand why it happened this way."
ReplyDeleteReading the last chapter of Ruth, we get one of those:
"...Then Naomi took the child, laid him in her lap and cared for him. The women living there said, "Naomi has a son." And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David.
This, then, is the family line of Perez:
Perez was the father of Hezron,
Hezron the father of Ram,
Ram the father of Amminadab,
Amminadab the father of Nahshon,
Nahshon the father of Salmon,
Salmon the father of Boaz,
Boaz the father of Obed,
Obed the father of Jesse,
and Jesse the father of David."
All of Naomi's life, including the pain, the sorrow, the poverty, everything had been leading up to her taking her place in the royal lineage.
She died without knowing.
I believe it's like that for us nearly all the time. We don't really get to see the "why" all that often.
We are left to wonder. And that takes--no, that creates faith.