New Glasses, New Vision: A sermon based on 2 Corinthians 5:16

I got my first set of glasses when I was twenty nine years old.  It took me  quite a while to actually admit I needed glasses, but what finally pushed me over the edge was that I was going to Camden Yards in Baltimore to see the Red Sox play the Orioles. I knew if I went without glasses it just wasn’t going to be as much fun.  So a few days before I went to the doctor and finally got glasses.  I will remember the first time I put on those glasses—there was a clock across the room and as I slipped on the glasses and looked up at the clock—I could actually see the numbers on the face of the  clock— I had forgotten that I could see that far away. I could tell what time it was-- tell what time it was—I remember actually saying to Chrishelle with this amazement in my voice I see that clock- and she looked at me with that look that say syeah you idiot-I’ve been telling you for a long time that you need glasses.  

A whole new world emerged for me when I put on my glasses—no longer was life fuzzy –life was crisp, clear and in focus.  Blades of green grass where beautiful again.   The world seemed to sparkle and pop in crisp clarity.

Most of us have had those particular moments when our sight has become clear-maybe it was putting on your eyeglasses for the first time, maybe it a moment when the fog cleared on a hazy or the driving snow stopped and you could see with crisp clarity again.

Paul in the opening words of the Corinthians text today speaks about new sight, a new way of seeing that happens when one is in Christ –Paul says, “From now on,… we regard no one from a human point of view… we once knew Christ from human point of view… but no longer do we view him that way.

This passage in many ways is about seeing the world- the people around us, our neighbors, our enemies, our difficulties, not through our human eyes, not with a human perspective but seeing them as God sees them.    With divine sight.

Thomas Merton a monk who lived in Kentucky many years ago, talked about a moment in his life when he was walking on the streets of Louisville doing some errands and all of the sudden he saw the people around him glowing and he felt deep love and connection for all the folks he encountered that day—he described that vision as seeing as those people as God sees the.

Why is it important to see the world as God sees it, to see our neighbors as God sees them, to see our enemies as God sees them? To see our situations, as God sees them-- Why?

Why is it important—because sometime divine sight helps us to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes—sometime we begin to understand why someone is the way they are.

Why is it important In one way it helps us better bear the kingdom of God.  If I can understand better why that person in my life is an addict—I might better be able to look at him with love and compassion and  maybe give him something  maybe he can’t see or maybe he’s never really experienced or that he doesn’t think he is worthy of us.

Why is it important to begin to see what God sees—because maybe then we can look at our lives and at the world and at our situations—and not see death or tragedy—but see life emerging and sees where   God is at work in the midst of death..  We can look beyond sadness and begin to find joy.   We see beyond despair to find anchors of hope.

Why is it important to begin to see what God sees--- We begin to see the other as a beloved Child, to see the other as a person of dignity,  as worthy of my respect to see the other as worthy of my attention—then we might be better be agents of reconciliation-we might be better agents of cooperation.

Isn’t that the world we want where we can cooperate with one another, where we work to reconcile our differences—where we are able to say sorry and move on, where we are able to accept apologies and move on into a new fuller relationships.
Isn’t that the world we want?

I don’t know about you but I want to see what God sees, I want restored relationships in my life.  I want a world where folks can cooperate—where hurts can be healed.  Where there is less anger and more love.   I think God desires that for us—and it is a gift that God extends to us with us of our relationship with Christ.

I think divine sight all begins with prayer—Just about every week during prayers of the people—I pray for someone in my life who continues to hurt me—I don’t know if that person will ever change—and I  have worked toward setting appropriate boundaries that protect myself  from this person injuring me again and again, but I pray in many ways for this person to see him as God sees him—I pray that my heart might be transformed—so that maybe someday there can be full and complete reconciliation.

Paul makes the claim that part of the business of God is about transformation—that God is in the business of transforming each of us into new creations.  Paul says if anyone is in Christ—he is a new creation.  The old is gone and the new has come.  Part of the transformation that I think God does in us- is that he gives us divine glasses—he helps us to see what he sees.

I invite you today-when you get down on your knees to ask for a new set of glasses—to ask to see what God sees in that person that rubs you the wrong way, to see some of what God sees in that person who has inflicted some terrible pain in you—I invite you to ask God to help you to see life that in the midst of a difficult situation or to find joy where your heart might only know sadness.
May your prayer on this day be to have new sight- new eyes and new glasses?

AMEN