What Do You See?

Life, and the world, isn't a petting zoo.  The paradox of beauty is out there to be experienced, but hopefully we can learn a bit of discernment from the animal kingdom.  I was playing golf one day, and as I went to hit a shot, one of those huge fox squirrels came up to my ball.  This thing was creepy!  It was big, unafraid, and I think it had a little smile on its face.  It was next to my ball, and it didn't seem to want to move.  I finally had to scoot it back with a golf club.  And the creepy thing just sat and watched.  I was happy to put some distance between me and that squirrel.  It was looking at me, not as a threat, but more like it would look at a meal.  Can I say again ... creepy!

We know the saying ... "all that glitters is not gold."  Paul reminds us that "all that is popular and possible, is not necessarily profitable (1 Corinthians 10:23)."  The Bible, and common thought, is full of references to seeing past beauty or ugliness and into the real nature of things.  Life is a paradox that calls us to become Biblically-discerning, and to process culture through a Biblical and Spiritual lens.  This is part of the toil of "working out our salvation with fear and trembling (Phillippians 2:12)."  Our faith walk requires effort and intentionality!

This paradox is played out in John 5.  Jesus is in Jerusalem for one of the Holy days, and it is the Sabbath.  Jesus, who Isaiah (53:2) describes as unattractive, is encountering an equally unattractive man who has been lame for 38 years.  They are at the pool of Bethesda, which means "house of kindness."  Jesus, with a word, tells the man to "pick up your mat and walk."  The man is healed, and here is where things get dicey.

One would think that this act would be applauded and embraced by everyone.  We have the miracle of healing, the sign of the Messiah, and a beautiful act of mercy.  Yet, the man is questioned by religious authorities and asked, "who did this illegal act of healing on the Sabbath?"  Jesus, ugly by the world's standards, performs this beautiful miracle, and the religious leaders, beautiful by the world's standards, stand in the way of the work of God.  It makes us all wonder, what is rightside-up here?

So Jesus, as is His custom, answers His critics harshly.  "You search the Scriptures because you think they give you eternal life.  But the Scriptures point to me!  Yet you refuse to come to Me to receive this eternal life! (John 5:39-40)."

The religion and Scriptures followed by the Jews were beautiful in their place ... but they pointed to an unattractive, direct, and often harsh man named Jesus.  When we truly accept who Jesus is, it is culturally popular to reject His message, just as it was in 30 AD.  Culture calls us to follow the popular, the "exciting," the glitter and those things we find "cute."  To find the beauty in John 5, you must go deep ... deep into the infirmity of a lame man who can now walk ... deep into the Father who gives Jesus authority over illness and shame.  The beauty here is counter-cultural and definitely not safe.  But, like Jesus, it is good.

So ... what are you looking for in life today?  Are you seeking cute?  Are you seeking what is attractive by the standards of our society?  Are you looking for the living among the dead (Luke 24:5)?  Have we welcomed those who "come in their own name (John 5:42)" but rejected the one who comes in the Father's name?