God’s Mirror
Most of you are familiar with surfing the internet and following random links not knowing the place where you will stop and finally say, “It is enough.” The links I follow almost always touch theology and are too irresistible to ignore. Occasionally, I discover a golden nugget that plants an idea in my head, but it might be far away from the intent of the article. Last week I clicked and landed on the title Mirror, Mirror on the Wall.
This time, I want to stick closely to the article’s theme and regard its usefulness to describe a similar problem. This is the mistake of looking in a spiritual mirror and seeing something much different than God sees. This original paragraph sets the tone: “Most people consider themselves basically good… When they look in the mirror, they see a good person. Not a perfect person by any stretch, but a person with a generally good heart. This natural idealistic self-perception is problematic and prevents people from coming to grips with who they really are, who Christ is, and how much they need Christ.”
The title of the article comes from a fairy tale but there is nothing fanciful or unreal about the comparison it makes. The mirror that reflects who we truly are is the word of God. It reveals all the blemishes and no matter how much we try to convince ourselves otherwise, we need not think the reflection is better than what God sees. He sees nothing other than a fully accurate image. There is a mold called the image of God which He expects our spiritual features to match. These features are the spiritual characteristics of Jesus Christ. If we desire what Christ Himself does not desire, we are fooling ourselves if we think we look good enough, God is happy with us and does not want to fix us. “Is there any way Christ could personally be what I am?” This will tell you how God sees you. You argue to your peril to pretend deviation from the character of Christ is not sin.
Too often we throw a cover over the biblical mirror with contentment found in personal feelings and assessments that are not the Holy Spirit’s interpretation of the image He wants us to see. We obscure the image and go on believing there are no serious flaws. Worse than this is to use a different mirror, one that has always proved distorted. This is to take the likewise deeply flawed and let them be the image and interpreters of how we should appear. The feedback is always, “Nothing is wrong. You are the fairest in the land. You are courageous. You do you.” Thus, we come full circle…this naturalistic self-perception is problematic and prevents people from coming to grips with who they really are…
Paul’s encouragement with his personal witness before the Corinthian believers is also helpful. He held up a mirror for them, a place to look to gauge their spiritual progress: “Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ.” Paul asked for imitation because he was copying Christ. What if your desires were the desires of all Christians? If there is one desire that is not good for all, it is a desire that is good for none. The Christian life has one over-arching image for each of us to be. Whatever falls short of it is the flaw we must eliminate. Play act all you want. This natural idealistic self-perception is problematic and prevents people from coming to grips with who they really are, who Christ is, and how much they need Christ.”
Pastor V. Mark Smith