The View From Up High

“So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view.  Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”  2 Corinthians 5:16-17

Fall is one of my favorite times of the year.  A good cup of coffee tastes even better when it is enjoyed on a crisp morning.  It is nice to take a walk on a warm afternoon and feel the sun on my face a few more times before winter descends.  Fall is a time to get out my sweaters, find the flannel sheets for the bed, and rediscover my love of persimmons.  I will even admit that I like driving down a street with lots of fallen leaves on the ground, then looking in my rearview mirror to see them swirling in my wake.

By far the best part of fall is seeing all the trees turn beautiful colors.  There are maples turning red, oaks fading to ocher, and ginkgos becoming a lively yellow.  I like trees in fall colors so much that I have a picture hanging above my couch of Quaking Aspens in splendid autumn gold.  A few weeks ago I went to the mountains to take a walk through some Aspen groves and came home disappointed they were still mostly green.  If I could I would go every day just to watch the trees slowly fade from green to yellow to gold before finally falling to the ground.

A row of maple trees stands in front of my home.  During the summer the leaves are a wonderful shade of deep green.  Even now as I walk down the sidewalk to the mailbox, all I can see are green leaves everywhere above my head.  It seems the trees haven’t gotten the message yet that the days are shorter, the nights are cooler, and good trees should be turning colors for fall.  When I go upstairs to my bedroom though, I can see something more.  From my bedroom window I look down on the maple trees.  From that view I can see red leaves on the top of each tree.  You would never know it standing out on the sidewalk and looking up through the branches.  But nevertheless the red leaves are there on top even if they can only be seen from above.

I was looking down at the maple trees a couple of days ago when my thoughts started wandering to something else.  Sometimes I have days or weeks or even whole months when I feel like I am not making any progress at all in my spiritual life.  I may even start to feel like I am loosing the growth I had previously obtained.  It is easy for me to get discouraged if I don’t see regular progress.  I can even start to get self conscious and wonder if other people at church or at work can see what I sense inside, that my spiritual life is slipping.

Looking at those trees from high up at my bedroom window got me to thinking about what God sees when He looks down at me.  I realized that God doesn’t see me the way I look at other people or the way I look at myself in the mirror.  God looks at me from up high.  Is it possible that even when I don’t think my spiritual life is doing very well, that God looks down and doesn’t see that at all?  Maybe the only thing God chooses to see is the bit of growth I have managed to eek out.  The longer I do this spiritual life, the more I realize that I am my own worst enemy.  God loves me and He loves you too.  He sees the best that I am, and the even better person I am becoming through His grace.  Now I just need His help to let that idea change how I see myself.

[PhotoCredit:Unsharp Mask & jondejong & jpctalbot]