God and Me 10-Perspective

This week I've spent a lot of time thinking about perspective, specifically God's perspective. There are times when I honestly can't see the forest for the trees and get so consumed by my own perspective on a given situation that I just get lost in that. Today I was thinking a lot about kids and parents and how perspective works in that kind of a relationship. Kids are great at having one sided perspective because that's the way they're wired. Developmentally, kids are often not able to see something from someone else's view point. That's why kids say things like "Look at that!" rather than "Look at that squirrel in that tree!" They don't understand that you have no idea of what they are talking about unless they are more specific. It's also why kids must be taught how to empathize with their friends and family; it's not in their nature to recognize how saying "Wow! Your Grandma is so fat!" might be hurtful to Grandma and their friend. And when it comes down to being disciplined, kids often feel like they're being treated unfairly because they can only see their short sided view of things. It seems unfair to them that you won't let them develop certain habits like running everywhere they go or yelling at the top of their lungs because they can't see how those things could possible be harmful to them later on. Instead, kids can often view adult restrictions as only that: restrictive. And teenagers are especially good at this. When you add together this short sided, me centered attitude with the viewpoint of "My parents know nothing", you end up with teenagers who feel like their parent's rules are pointless and frustrating.

This week though I've thought a lot about how I might be a lot like a little kid or an belligerent teenager because I also have a perspective problem. I can't see things the same way God sees them. I've thought about God's perspective in terms of global poverty because of a web based movement called Living Faith Can End Poverty. I've wondered what the spiritual impact of ending poverty might be, ie does God think poverty is as terrible as we see it because He recognizes how faith is stirred in people who have nothing? I've thought about God's perspective in terms of writing short term mission support letters because a blog I read, Stuff Christians Like, published a satiral look at short term mission support letters and if they were appropriate. That post on the blog got a lot of feedback with many people loosing sight of the big picture and discussing how they would support someone who sent them a letter but only if the letter were worded in specific ways. I couldn't help but wonder what God thought of that performance based standard. On both issues, I would never pretend to know what God really thinks because I really don't know. (And on the poverty issue, don't think I'm advocating we all sell our stuff because the poor have a monopoly on faith or that I would support the idea that it really isn't that rotten to be poor because you get the chance to be really spiritually rich, because I don't believe either of those.)

And I also have spent time wondering what God thinks of Kenson and Conleigh's wait. That's something I always think about and, since the beginning, I have always tried to view the wait through God's eyes. For me, the wait has definitely gotten a lot more intense in the last two months. And that added intensity has made for a lot more tears and a lot more weakness on my part. It's interesting because always before when I talked with God about what He thought about the wait, the response I always seemed to get was more along the lines of "Keep the faith. Don't let the wait dishearten you. I will follow through on this." But today, it was different. Today, I heard "The wait makes me mad. It makes me hurt to know that the paperwork is done but the process is still not finished. But I promise to redeem the wait."

May my perspective in all things be Yours, O God. In my prayers, in my needs, in my confusion, in my hurts, may I see what You see and how You've already got a plan in place.