Several years ago I bought my first pair of prescription glasses. I disliked the idea of glasses (more than a bit of vanity perhaps), but I quickly discovered the benefits. I could actually read without squinting and holding my book at arms' length.
My glasses did wonders for my vision, but I learned something I hadn't thought about before. You need to clean them nearly every time you take them off and put them on. Often I would think I had a clear view of the world around me when I was actually looking at everything through dusty, smudged lenses. Without realizing it, I had adjusted to a distorted picture.
I find, these days, I need more than my physical glasses; I also need a good pair of spiritual "glasses" in order to see the world around me clearly. It isn't the blatant evils I need help seeing. It's the subtle lies which, over time, take on the appearance of truth.
Words like love and tolerance, when misapplied, can slowly blind me to what is real and true. Popular culture cannot be the lens through which I see truth. I must look at everything through the lens of God's word. Even the most well-meaning, loving people can have a distorted view of truth.
Never has there been a One who loves as Jesus loves. Yet He never separates that love from truth. It would have been devastating if He had. If we truly love, we want to do it the way He did. Withholding truth in the name of love is not love at all. Withholding love in the name of truth is not love at all. Both are distortions. I love you best when I tell you the truth - not my version of the truth or the current popular version of the truth - the truth found in the Word of God.
"Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church." Ephesian 4:14-15
Linda
