What is Your Lens?
We all have a lens through which we see.....
A common definition of a lens is an object that attaches to a camera body to filter images into the camera in a certain way, depending on the specific lens in use. We also use what we call glasses or contact lenses to enhance images in our eyes when our eyes struggle to decipher images naturally.
To our natural eyes, the lens we choose filters the image into our brains from our eyes and processes the image as it is registered. If you use a magnifying glass for example to enhance the image, the brain will register the image as it is transmitted, not the original image.
This is really important to grasp.
The visual messages sent to your brain are affected by the filter through which the image is transmitted.
As we grow from childhood to adulthood, the genes of our father and mother play a major role in forming our personality lens. We then add to this lens experiences from our family, school, and culture to become a finished filter for the worldview we adopt. This adopted worldview becomes the foundational lens of our natural reaction mechanism to events that are the kaleidoscope of daily experience.
Every one of us holds memories of our formative years; the little sayings of our family, the tragic experiences, the wonderful holidays, the way we were loved or not loved, the way our friends treated us, the way we treated our friends. This seemingly random series of experiences forming our worldview lens occurs without us paying any real attention to it. The environment and culture of our youth form who we are.
All of our experiences are what make us who we are today……in the physical realm.
But who is the ruler of the physical realm?
Luke 4:5-7 ESV And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, (6) and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. (7) If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.”
Please try to follow my spirit here…
The above verse shows the nature of the spiritual world most of us ignore, Christian or not.
Our spirits are binary……
Satan rules the physical world….Yahweh does not.
Yahweh only rules those people in the physical realm that yield their spiritual will to Him. Satan’s job is to kill your spiritual lens, to produce in you spiritual blindness. Attending church, while it may help, will not cure spiritual blindness. Only spiritual brokenness can do that.
In other words, there are only two lenses in the spiritual world; the lens of light and the lens of darkness.
Matthew 6:19-24 KJV Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: (20) But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: (21) For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. (22) The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. (23) But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness! (24) No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
On the surface, we all know that in the above verses Jesus is talking about money and whether your worship of what money can buy is acceptable to God. But there is a deeper spiritual meaning of these verses…..
The eye is the lens to your soul….
If your eye (your lens) is single-sighted to the things of God (the Tree of Life), your soul will be full of the light of God. However, if your eye (your lens) is ambiguous and doubtful (the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil), your soul will be full of darkness and ruled by the enemy of God.
Spiritual brokenness is the only way to the light….
Dark souls place their personal experiences (the flesh) throughout life as a higher priority than their spiritual experience.
Dark souls find it hard to leave the past behind, always shaping their present and future from the paradigm (lens) of past failure. This is the work of Satan, not God.
Sanctified souls (the Tree of Life) view the present and future through the light of His glorious grace, worshiping God in spirit and truth. Sanctified souls have discernment.
Here is the paradox of our spiritual journey once more.
The more we hang onto ourselves, the less of God we will know.
The more of God we know, the less we shape our future through our past.
My Christian walk has primarily been as a justified believer looking back at the cross and the sacrifice of Jesus for the repayment of my debt (my sin). Five years ago, this paradigm (lens) changed for me, not by anything I could muster in my own strength, but by the sovereign will of God. I was at the time of my refreshment in a state of holy discontent, knowing there was more to God than my 25 years as a churchgoer.
God used the below video one afternoon in my lounge room to bring me to spiritual brokenness:
Andrea Bocelli and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir
The experience of the Holy Spirit bringing me to my knees that afternoon will live with me till the day I pass to glory.
My spiritual eyes were opened finally, and I started to ingest the Word of God with a passion I had never experienced. I can say with all authority that I am now an Ambassador of Christ, appealing as if God Himself is appealing to people through me to be reconciled to God.
The time is now…
We are fast approaching the time when God calls time….
Are you ready?
Your indwelt spiritual slave to Jesus (Gal 2:20KJV)