“No one lights a lamp, then hides it in a drawer. It’s put on a lamp stand so those entering the room have light to see where they’re going. If you live wide-eyed in wonder and belief, your body fills up with light. If you live squinty-eyed in greed and distrust, your body is a dank cellar. Keep your eyes open, your lamp burning, so you don’t get musty and murky. Keep your life as well-lighted as your best-lighted room.”
Luke 11:33 (The Message)
The larger grocery stores in Bonn, West Germany always seemed busy and especially so in the late afternoon when working women crowded the aisles, filling their carts with products necessary for supper preparations. But now, in early 1990, it was more and more common to see people slowly wandering the aisles, looking in awe at row upon row of everything from toothpaste to laundry soap to every variety of canned soup. Freezer compartments held ready-to-heat meals. Produce shelves overflowed with oranges from Israel and bananas from Chile.
The Berlin Wall had fallen only weeks before and throngs of people walked over the wall’s rubble to gaze upon and perhaps buy what had formerly been only a desire. They frequently walked in speechless amazement. They truly wandered in wonder.
In his book The Singer, a novel based on the life of Christ, Calvin Miller heads one chapter with a syllogism (a form of reasoning):
Major Premise: God is a custom.
Minor Premise: A custom is an old, old habit.
Conclusion: Therefore, God is an old, old habit.
It is sadly easy to get musty and murky in our spiritual lives. God becomes an old, old habit and our lamps no longer attract people to the Savior. We have become blase, no longer gazing in wonder at the beauty of Christ, God’s amazing grace and His incredible promises. Constantly must be our prayer, Open my eyes that I may see glimpses of truth thou hast for me. Jesus healed blind people and they then gazed at him in wonder. We need His touch.
It’s not easy to look at you with fresh eyes, Father. Sometimes I’m afraid of what I might see. But you are a healing, loving God and long for me gaze upon you with wonder.
QUESTIONS:
1. How does God become an old, old habit?
2. What new aspects of God’s character have you discovered by gazing in wonder upon Him?
By: Marilyn Ehle
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