By Brenda Groves
The Post Newspaper Contributing Writer
We all have our personal grooming habits and items to help accomplish this daily task.
One of the tools I use is a handheld mirror to fix my hair. After applying layers of hair spray, I grab the little mirror for final inspection in the back area. And it seems to me I am mastering this hair style as these inspections lately look almost perfect.
“Yes! Ready to greet another day!” Or so I thought for a long while.
Yesterday, as I lifted the mirror to survey how my hair looked in the back, I happened to glance at the surface of the mirror, and discovered that it was filthy!
Layers of hair spray, I assumed, had distorted the reflection where all details of my face were just a blur (Hmmm, I kind of like this image, I didn’t look too bad. Lol!).
But it’s funny how I used this thing daily and just noticed the build-up.
As I was reflecting on this (pun intended), the Lord spoke to my heart and showed me something. He said this is how it is when we grow distant from the Lord.
Even though we may be reading our Bibles, going to church, even listening to teachings, if we don’t engage our hearts in knowing Him and/or spending time with Him, our spiritual truths will become dim.
We become unable to see things clearly and our lives become distorted. Suddenly, we can’t understand why things are not working out the way they used to, or how people are getting on our nerves more, or we have become anxious or frustrated over things that come our way when it was one time these things were not a big deal.
World views and focus can come upon a Christian slowly. Like the mirror, progressive layers of the cares of this life are building up in our hearts. We think all is well, as we take a quick glance at a scripture in the morning, or spend five minutes on a daily devotional then spend another 14 hours saturating in the doubt and unbelief of this world.
I am mainly speaking to myself right here, but I believe some of you reading this can also relate, and you are either experiencing or have experienced the same thing.
A dullness in your relationship with the Lord has become apparent, and now you are seeing that that once-vibrant clear view of His love for you has slowly diminished over time.
The Lord’s unfailing love for us will never leave nor abandon us, so there is no condemnation for us, but we can grow dull to His spiritual truths and forget.
As for my mirror, a quick spritz of cleaner wiped away the film and it now looks good as new.
But one Bible verse is not going to wipe away months or years of the fallout from living in a fallen world that has built up in our hearts and minds.
Praise Jesus, for “His mercies that are new every morning” and “of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace (Lamentations 3:22-24, John 1:16),” so that all we have to do is decide to make a course correction in our lives.
Sometimes it’s just minor ones, as we haven’t veered too far; other times it may call for major changes in our daily walk with the Lord in order to grow sensitive to the Holy Spirit once again.
But it is my testimony that once I stop, repent (change my mind) and come back to my first Love, He is more than willing to help me get back on track enjoying our relationship once again.
You know, I once heard a pastor state this truth: “It takes absolutely no effort for a dead fish to float downstream, on the other hand it takes great effort to go against the current and swim upstream.”
Which means, the world is flowing in one direction and trying to pull us with it. But even though we are “in this world, we are not of this world,” we must constantly go after the things of God or risk being swept downstream with the others.
The word of God is the mirror we look into in order to see who we really are: the spiritual reflection of the Lord Jesus who resides in every born again believer.
When we fix our eyes, (keep a steady gaze), on the image of God (Jesus), the things of this earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.
“But we all, with unveiled faces, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” 2 Cor. 3:18 NKJV
“For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.
“But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.” James 1:23-25 NKJV
“Now these are the ones (seeds) sown among thorns; they are the ones who hear the word, and the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things entering in choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.” Mark 4:18-19 NKJV (Parenthesis mine.)
“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.” John 15:4 NKJV
Contact Brenda Groves at: bkgroves1996@yahoo.com
