Recently, Kam and I celebrated our 18th wedding anniversary. It is hard to believe we are moving in on two decades of marriage. On our trip to the mountains, I captured a picture of Kam and I in the woods that perfectly depicted how different we are.
I was walking around marveling at the beauty of it all. My eyes were not focused on one item, but the entirety of what was before me. As I glanced behind me to find Kam, he had his professional camera and was capturing the detail of one leaf. He was in the moment. His eyes were drawn to the detail of the lighting, the angle, the color, and all of the things that made up how he saw that one leaf. When he noticed me noticing him, he offered me a look at what he saw. It was a beautiful picture of one simple leaf. The sun hit it just so and highlighted the leaf possibly for that one moment. Just five minutes later and the sun would no longer shine in that exact spot, on that leaf.
Interestingly enough, one of my favorite leaf pictures that Kam took on that trip was of a broken leaf. It has a clear imperfection and yet, the way Kam captured it in the sunlight is beautiful. There were literally thousands of leaves that were not broken and brown on the edge, but Kam captured the beauty in the brokenness. I would not have seen the leaf, and even more so, I would not have stopped to photograph the broken leaf. But he saw it and stopped.
God reminded me in the woods of something I learned in science. Do this exercise with me. Look straight ahead. Notice the placement of the items currently in our view. Then close your left eye. Now take notice of where those same items show up in your view. Now, close your right eye. Interesting, right? Same picture, but a much different view. This is the beauty of relationships. For me, I see it in my marriage, but it is not just in that relationship alone.
God uses our different perspectives to teach us. God is omniscient. He knows all. He sees all. When we truly engage in relationship, we allow someone to share their perspective with us. While I am sitting here typing, I also did the ‘eye exercise’. I currently have a table size black Christmas tree on my desk. While my left eye was closed, the tree was just barely in site to the left of my view. While my right eye was closed, the tree was in the middle of my view. This exercise can be taken one step further. Hold your hand with your thumb up out to the left of your body. With your left eye open, you can clearly see your thumb. With your left eye closed, your thumb seems to disappear. If you have had your hand out there for a few minutes and it is getting tired than you clearly know it is still out to the left, but based on the sight of your right eye only, you can’t see it. Yet, it is not gone.
Relationships help you see those things that you could not otherwise see. While I walked around and enjoyed the mountain views, Kam zoomed in on the details. He saw the intricacies that I did not see. He saw the pieces that made the whole view that I saw as breath taking. I am that friend you want to have over. I will never notice the dust bunnies in the corners or the random mounds of unopened mail. While it is a happy place where I reside, there is also value in the small, seemingly insignificant parts of the whole. Without those parts, there is no whole. It is something I continue to learn.
The enemy is also aware of our differences and how we see. He wants to use it to divide our relationships. He wants us to argue about whether or not that left thumb is there. He wants us to focus on who is right and who is wrong. With just my right eye open, it sure seemed as though my thumb had disappeared. I needed both eyes to see it.
Sometimes our perspective skews the truth of areas more important than whether or not our thumb is still there. Sometimes we question whether or not God is still there. Not to minimize him in anyway, but he is just like our thumb. He is there. He is right where he has always been even though we can’t see him. It sounds so simple and yet that limited perspective will shape our belief. We become limited to our perspective.
God’s plan is so complete. Only a God that knows the end from the beginning could create a plan so unique and so perfect. While we are focused on what we can see, he has given us people to help us see what we cannot. He knows our limitations. He knows our weaknesses. And better yet, he loves our weaknesses. Have you ever thought about that? Our weaknesses perfectly position us to need him. In His perfect knowledge He brings us ‘our’ people.
Proverbs 18:1 says, “Whoever isolates himself seeks his own desire; he breaks out against all sound judgment. A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion.”
The word ‘opinion’ in that passage could be interchanged with the word perspective. When we isolate ourselves, we are left with only our own perspective. God brings people to us to expand our understanding and therefore our perspective. There is beauty in connecting with others for the purpose of understanding.
Celebrate the differences found in your relationships. They are moments that push you to grow and to mature. See the beauty in the shared view of those in your life.
