Thursday, August 15, 2013

An Accurate View


My dad has been living in heaven for the last 13 years, but I still find myself learning from him.  He was an optometrist, a vision specialist, so his life's work was to help people see as they should.  Some of my earliest memories are climbing up into his exam chair, feet dangling, head pressed up against that black piece of equipment, seeing all kinds of letters.   With the flip of switches, Dad would begin to check my vision.  I guess he was switching to different lenses, changing the view, so he could take me to the accurate view and determine the strength of the contacts and glasses I would need.

God has been flipping switches on us for years now,  giving us a different perspective.  The crazy faith walk we have been on of adopting an orphan, leaving church staff after 25 years and starting Orbie for Orphans has been inundated with God changing our view.  2 weeks ago we were in Haiti, and even though we had been there other times, a flip was switched.  We could see so much need in the orphans of Haiti.  We went into remote areas with no schools, no clean water, no sanitation.  We saw people just trying to survive. We visited 7 orphanages. We could see their tremendous physical needs, but even greater we could see their spiritual and emotional needs.  We will never be the same.  

Often people who go on mission trips talk about being "gloriously ruined".  It IS glorious to be able to really see God's view,  and it DOES ruin us from spending our time, energy and resources on things that really don't matter all that much.  Life is so short, the needs are so great...and the blessing to be able to see is really amazing!  God sees everything as it really is.  His is the accurate view.  If He works in your life as He has in ours, following "wherever He leads" means  a new perspective.   It's a view that will break your heart, challenge you to fly higher than you ever thought you could, and change you forever.