The Forest for the Trees
TCF Sermon
October 26, 2008
When Barb and I were on vacation in August, we took several hikes in the mountains of Colorado. And yes, this is a good excuse for me to show you some vacation pictures, but I hope it turns into more than that before this morning’s message is over.
One day, in Rocky Mountain National Park, we hiked up a trail toward Bierstadt Lake. Before we went on the hike, we read a guide which said that the hike was a little under 3 miles roundtrip. When we got to the trailhead, we looked up at a pretty steep mountain. But we were up for that hike, and wanted to get to the lake.
What we didn’t know was how much elevation we’d gain. One way to the lake was about a mile and a half, and it turned out that the last part of the hike was at the top on fairly level ground through a forest, and I’d guess maybe about half to ¾ of a mile. That meant the uphill part was about a little less than half of the hike. But how many feet we went up, we didn’t know.
What we learned quickly, as we began the trail, is that we had to stop to catch our breath several times on the way up. The hiking trail was switchbacks on the side of a mountain, and the view got more spectacular as we went up, but the trail got more and more challenging. Of course, we weren’t only hiking a flat surface, but we were going pretty close to a 45-50 degree angle upward, and since we started at almost 9,000 feet, the air was already pretty thin.
This was after several days at elevation, so we’d probably adjusted fairly well. Anyway, we get to the top and we’re way up there. These pictures don’t do it justice – don’t really give a good perspective of how high it felt. I said to Barb, after we got to the top, “I’ll bet we climbed at least 1,000 feet, maybe 1,500.” At least that’s how my legs and my lungs felt.
So we finish the hike to the lake, take some pictures, and hike back down rather quickly in advance of a thunderstorm coming over the mountain. Yes, it was much quicker and easier going down.
We get back to our room in Estes Park and I get online and look up the trail on a website. You know how many feet of elevation we gained? 556. From my perspective, we’d hiked up a lot higher than that. But in reality it was only 556 feet. I quickly realized that my ability to judge elevation wasn’t very good. In fact, I wasn’t even close to guessing the right amount we’d hiked up.
I got to thinking about how difficult it is to have a right perspective about some things. So much of how we view life depends completely on our perspective:
Here are some things that depend on your perspective:
Cloudy day vs sunny day – that depends on where you are. If you’re in Boston, it may be cloudy – in Tulsa it may be sunny on the same day.
Too hot – too cold – my wife and I still have different perspectives on that.
Too old – too young. When you’re 35, you’re young to most of the world, but you’re an old man if you play pro football.
How about the moon, the sun and the stars. We can’t go outside right now and see the stars, but that doesn’t mean they’re not there. The sunshine, the daylight, changes our perspective on the stars.
It’s nighttime right now where the Niles are. It’s daytime here. Your perspective of day vs night depends entirely on whether you’re in Japan or Tulsa.
How about the old adage: “Time flies when you’re having fun.” Hopefully this message isn’t already too long for you.
Those of you in college may remember the old “blue book” test. Often in these essays, we were asked to compare and contrast something. That’s a process that helps to give perspective. But sometimes perspective isn’t just a matter of where you are. Sometimes it’s just plain right or wrong, and we don’t have enough information, or perhaps we have wrongly interpreted what information we do have, and end up with a wrong perspective.
Our perspective is often skewed and inaccurate. We experience something, like fatigue and shortness of breath on a mountain hike, and think we’re climbing a lot higher than we really are.
What did it take to give me a correct perspective? I had to seek a source outside myself. I had to find a resource that presented a true picture, based on reality, based on fact.
I couldn’t rely on my admittedly subjective experience entirely, to learn the true perspective – in fact, it became clear that my perspective, judged entirely on my own, was way off from reality.
I see that a lot in our world today. Not just with myself. And not just with admittedly small, relatively unimportant things like how far uphill I’m hiking. In that instance, there was certainly no harm in my lack of a true perspective - in my very incorrect perspective of how high we hiked. To correct it was simple, once I learned a true perspective.
However, in some larger matters of life, an unclear, or a wrong perspective, can lead to other problems, including fear. We see it in the fear that a lot of people have about the economy. We see it in the fear that a lot of people have about the results of our upcoming national elections. We see it in the fear some have of everything from the next test at school, to the challenge at my job tomorrow, to almost anything and everything we face in our human existence.
Now, a wrong perspective just sometimes leads to confusion, not always to fear. But often, a wrong perspective, or a twisted perspective, does lead to fear, and fear can, at the very least, ruin our peace, or at the very worst, lead to other attitudes or behaviors that are destructive.
Think about the two biggest things in the news – they might seem like the only things in the news these days – our troubled economy, and our upcoming elections.
Here are some real headlines I collected in the past week or so. Words in these headlines like disaster, like gloom, like fear, express what we’re talking about this morning.
If your perspective is that Barack Obama is the best man for the job of president, you might fear a McCain presidency. You might think it would be a disaster. If your perspective is that John McCain is the right man to be our next president, then you might think that an Obama presidency is something to fear.
If you have any money invested in the stock market, you’ve no doubt lost a lot of money in the past few months – at least on paper. That can cause fear to rise in us.
Words like recession and depression are so loaded – they naturally lead to fear, but especially if you don’t have a Godly perspective on money, like we looked at a few weeks ago.
But, just as it took an outside source to bring me the perspective that I hadn’t climbed nearly as high as I’d thought I did on the hike up to Bierstadt Lake, for the follower of Christ, it takes a source outside ourselves to find a right perspective on all these issues and more in our lives.
Most often, a true, Godly perspective is learned and acquired from another source…outside ourselves. Even if it seems like it’s from inside ourselves, it’s often gained from experiences, or just learning, which is gained from seeking it outside of us, in the case of learning, or imposed on us from the outside of us, in the case of experience. And even if we were to say that the Holy Spirit resides in me and helps me find perspective on the important questions of life, we’d have to still recognize that even the Holy Spirit is given to us from outside ourselves –
Yes – as followers of Jesus we have the Holy Spirit living in us, but this is a gift from outside – from the third Person of the Trinity – from God. That’s why the Word speaks of us receiving the Holy Spirit.
This is the case with most kinds of perspective, whether they’re true or not. It’s hard to get a true perspective on our own – the information to acquire a correct perspective must come from outside us.
With that understanding, it begs the question – where do we get our perspective? Who or what shapes it? Where should we get our perspective – our perspective on all of life, our perspective on things very important, and maybe not so important?
First, let’s look at this idea of perspective. What is it? What does it mean? How does it impact our lives? We’re spending time on a concept that’s very clear in the Word of God, but the actual word perspective isn’t in the Bible, at least in any translation I could find. I did find it, however in a paraphrase, and perhaps the paraphrase, compared to a translation, will help us see the idea in scripture.
Here’s the paraphrase:
Colossians 3:2 (MSG) 2 Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ—that’s where the action is. See things from his perspective.
Now, here’s an actual translation:
Colossians 3:2 (NASB77) Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.
Here’s another one, again first the paraphrase:
Romans 11:28 (MSG) From your point of view as you hear and embrace the good news of the Message, it looks like the Jews are God’s enemies. But looked at from the long-range perspective of God’s overall purpose, they remain God’s oldest friends.
Romans 11:28 (NASB77) From the standpoint of the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but from the standpoint of God’s choice they are beloved for the sake of the fathers;
That’s about perspective, isn’t it? We can also see perspective addressed in other ways, and we’ll look at a few of those in a moment. But understanding our perspective, and how we get it, is important, because the reality is that, sometimes, what we spend our emotional energy on, is not as important in God’s plan, in His grand design, as our attitudes, our responses, our actions would suggest.
The world and its cares warps our perspective. Just like the climb up that hill warped the perspective Barb and I had on just how high we really climbed.
We sometimes place an extra urgency on things that aren’t that urgent. We often mistake or confuse the urgent – those things that are in our face and screaming for our attention – for the truly important. We sometimes add importance to things that, in the scheme of things, are really not so important.
As a result, because our perspective is skewed or just plain wrong, we have a messed up sense of priorities, and our lives and our attitudes reflect this.
It’s amazing how important things seem when we’re in the middle of something. It doesn’t have to be something bad, necessarily. Sometimes even good things can cause us to lose perspective. But when events and circumstances consume our thinking, we often cannot see the forest for the trees. That is, it’s as if we have blinders on – all we can see is this huge tree in front of us, and it’s easy to lose the perspective that this huge tree in front of us, is just one of hundreds if not thousands of other trees making up a huge forest.
We’ve all been there. Some of us are there now with something in our life. We’re in the midst of something that absolutely owns us – it owns our time, it owns our attention, our thinking, our energy. And these things aren’t always necessarily bad or something we should or can avoid – sometimes we’re supposed to be invested in a specific event or circumstance, at least for a few days, or for a season of our lives.
But even when we’re supposed to be involved almost exclusively in one thing, we can lose sight of the forest, because this big tree is the only thing in our view.
There’s the true story of a coach of Southern Cal’s football team years ago. His team had just lost to a rival by 40 points. After the game, he told his team that there are a billion Chinese who will never know or care about the score of this game.
That’s a perspective that came from outside themselves. The coach told them a truth that hopefully helped them see the forest of the rest of the season, and the rest of life, and not just the big sequoia of that 40-point loss, which stood before them at that moment.
It’s a fact that the largest part of an iceberg, up to 90%, is below the surface. We can’t even see it. Much of our lives are like that. There’s so much more to life than we can see, but we let that 10% that we can see shape our attitudes and our perspectives.
That’s why it’s critical that we never let too long a period of time go by without checking our perspective. Perspective is from Latin root words, and the literal meaning is “to look through.” Remember that as we continue today.
Because perspective is looking at things through some sort of lens. Of course, as believers in Jesus, we must look at things through the lens of God’s eyes. And we see through God’s eyes primarily as we look into the Word of God, but also as that Word shapes us, and our fellow followers of Christ, with whom we relate.
Perspective’s initial meaning in the dictionary is an art term. But, other meanings are related:
- the effect of distance on the appearance of objects.
- physical distance, distance in time.
The relative importance of facts or matters from any special point of view. The judgment of facts or circumstances with regard to their importance.
So, perspective is often the comparing and contrasting of two things. The familiar passage in Romans 12:2 is a key verse here:
Romans 12:2 (NIV) Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.
There’s a transformation of our lives, and that transformation of our lives includes our perspective, our thinking, when we renew our minds by the Word of God. I would say that God’s perspective on the world and its cares accomplishes several things in our lives, among them these:
1. it enlightens
2. it renews
3. it motivates
4. it comforts
5. it convicts, and helps bring repentance
The Bible is the most perspective-giving book ever written.
Hebrews 4:12 (NIV) For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Anything that penetrates so fully, so deeply, anything that can literally judge, or as the KJV says, discern our heart, surely must be able to shape our perspective.
The word translated “judge” here is kritikos. Does that sound like any English word you can think of? Yes – critical – as in critical thinking. Not critical in the sense of criticism – not necessarily finding fault – but critical in the sense of judging and discerning right and wrong.
"skilled in judging, as the surgeon has to be and able to decide on the instant what to do. So God’s word like his eye sees the secret lurking doubt and unbelief "of the thoughts and intents of the heart". The surgeon carries a bright and powerful light for every dark crevice and a sharp knife for the removal of all the pus revealed by the light. It is a powerful picture here drawn." — Word Pictures in the New Testament
Charles Hummel said:
Through prayerful meditation on God’s Word, we gain His perspective.
Now, clearly God uses other means to shape and inform our perspective. He uses fellow believers. He uses history. He uses His indwelling Holy Spirit, as we noted earlier. Yet, it must start and end with His Word. It should be the final arbiter of Godly perspective. Our perspective shapes our attitudes – it shapes our thoughts. So, the Word of God should shape our perspective, our way of thinking.
Unfortunately, we allow so many other things to shape our perspective. Our culture is the chief perspective-shaper these days. It’s a culture that’s reflected and promoted in TV, movies, music, books. Nothing wrong with these things in and of themselves, but I’m more and more convinced that one of the most important things we can learn, and one of the most important things we can teach our children, is this skill of critical thinking, the skill of discernment.
Culture might inform our perspective, and that’s OK. Other people inform our perspective, especially other believers. The Word of God says that in an abundance of counselors there is wisdom. We do need other people, because our hearts are deceitful. But these things alone – culture, other people – shouldn’t be the final arbiter of our perspective. That role should be reserved for the Word of God, as enlightened by the Holy Spirit.
The Word of God can and should be our primary perspective-shaper in all the issues of our lives.
1 Corinthians 2:12 (NIV) We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us.
We can learn, we can understand, God’s Word.
1 Corinthians 2:15-16 (NIV) The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man’s judgment: "For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.
What an incredible asset in the desire to have a Godly perspective on life. The very mind of Christ. His perspective. As we noted, we can also gain a Godly perspective from our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, assuming they’re rightly discerning the truth of scripture themselves.
We’re all sometimes fallible in our own personal interpretation of scripture. Yes, we can learn principles to help us do this better. But if we ever take a just me and Jesus approach, we’re on dangerous ground. If we ever become so ingrown in just our little group of friends, we’re on dangerous ground.
But if we are open to the wisdom of our brothers and sisters in Christ, we’re a lot less likely to misinterpret scripture, and end up with a wrong perspective on many areas of life. Here are a few key words that indicate a perspective-giving scripture. If you study the Word of God, I believe you’ll find verses with these words that give a sense of a Biblical perspective for us.
1. look
2. listen
3. remind
4. remember
5. meditate
6. first
7. consider
8. mind
9. attitude
Let’s just take one of those for a moment and look at it. One key to a right perspective is to remember. We lose perspective when we forget lessons we’ve learned. Even the world recognizes that. How about the famous quote by Santayana: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
That says to me that remembering is very important.
Psalms 105:4-5 (NIV) Look to the LORD and his strength; seek his face always.
Why, you might ask – why should we look to the Lord?:
5 Remember the wonders he has done, his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced,
Psalms 143:5 (NIV) I remember the days of long ago; I meditate on all your works and consider what your hands have done.
There it is again – remember, meditate, consider. These things are aids to give us perspective. Even thinking about where we began our look at perspective - remember we noted the fear of the future, the unknown, that seems to hold hostage many people these days?
That might apply to our loved ones. We might be fearful of our finances. How about the fear of the results of the upcoming elections? Here’s a passage of scripture that gives us perspective on that.
Daniel 2:19-22 (NIV) During the night the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision. Then Daniel praised the God of heaven and said: "Praise be to the name of God for ever and ever; wisdom and power are his. He changes times and seasons; he sets up kings and deposes them. (NAS says He removes kings and establishes kings); He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning. He reveals deep and hidden things; he knows what lies in darkness, and light dwells with him.
He removes kings and He establishes Kings. Yes, we as believers have a responsibility to vote. I’m not encouraging a que sera sera – whatever will be will be attitude. While it’s important for us to fulfill our responsibilities by casting a truly informed vote on election day, we must remember that, though God uses our votes, God is the One who ultimately removes kings and establishes kings.
That’s perspective. That should help us on election day, hether or not our favored candidates are elected.
We’ve just finished a week full of perspective-building experience, in which we had to return to the Word of God to tell us the truth in the midst of our emotions.
There’s nothing like the death of a loved one to force us to find a right perspective. As we’ve together grieved over the loss of one of our own, we’ve also remembered the perspective-giving truths in scripture. As we’ve grieved, we’ve had the perspective to grieve, but to grieve as those who have hope, not as those who have no hope. And again, the Word of God is our source for this perspective.
Hebrews 13:14 (NIV) For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.
Philippians 3:20-21 (NIV) But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.
Now, that’s perspective. It’s a perspective on life and death, certainly the most important perspective we can draw from God’s Word. This morning, whether it’s the economy that’s troubling you, the upcoming election, the death of a loved one, or just some of the other many trials of life, let’s seek together to find God’s perspective on these things.
Let’s remember that the Word of God is our primary source of perspective, and let’s not let people, circumstances, or our culture be the primary source of how we view this world we live in.
