What you see is not always what you get. What your eyes
tell you is not always the whole truth. Sometimes there is
more going on than you can see.
Have you ever been tricked by an optical illusion? An optical
illusion is something that, when you first see it, you think you
know exactly what it is, but when you look again, you
discover it was something else. If someone holds up a big
red sign, six-sides, with the white letters SPOT in the middle
of it, you will immediately think it says, “Stop”. That’s what
you expected it to say; that’s what you think you saw.
Except that it said “Spot” instead of “Stop”. What your eyes
tell you is not always the whole truth. And sometimes there
is more going on than you can see.
I was reading just the other day about a young man I knew
years ago when he was a student at American University.
He is now a performance artist, who can, with deftness of
hand, make things appear where they are not supposed to
be and make other things disappear without a trace. He
recently helped produce a movie in which he made actor Will
Smith just suddenly appear in the middle of Times Square.
Nobody quite knows how he did that. What your eyes tell
you is not always the whole truth. There is more going on
than you can see.
There is more going on inside people than what you can see,
too. There is a whole lot more than first impressions. I told
the children of the church a story the other day about two
men who showed up at the door of the school, looking for
children. One of them was in raggedy clothes, in need of a
shave, looking like last week’s leftovers, so they called the
security guard to deal with him. The other was dressed in
the latest fashions, driving a sleek car, looking cool, and they
smiled at him. But after a while they found out that the first
man was somebody’s daddy, who looked the way he did
because he had worked all day and all night, and the second
man was a drug dealer looking to recruit kids! You cannot
always tell who a person is just by looking. There is more
going on than meets the eye. The Bible says it, “[Men] look
on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the
heart.”
Over these several months, as we visited Henry Allen’s
hospital bed and made our way to his nursing home room,
what we saw was not the whole story. What our eyes told us
was not the whole truth. There was more going on than we
could see. We thought we saw a man in decline; but we
were actually seeing a man in the making. Our eyes looked
at a man turning his face toward the wall, and we thought,
“He is depressed, he has given up, he is dying.” But I
suggest this morning that what was really happening was a
man was gathering his spirit, looking for new hope, and
finding the source of new life. More going on than we could
see.
And when we shrunk back from the array of tubes, lines,
cords, and hoses that Henry had to endure, we did not see
all of that as a gift from God. We did not understand that
God was transfusing Henry with new life, transfusing him not
with saline solution or glucose or blood plasma, but with the
redeeming blood of Christ. Something was going on, far
more than we could see at the time.
From our Scripture, I could imagine the apostle Paul walking
in to Henry’s hospital room, and seeing more than what we
saw. I can imagine Paul saying to Henry:
Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is
being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is
preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure.
What did we think we saw? An “outer nature wasting away”.
But what was really going on? An “inner nature being
renewed day by day.” The apostle was able to see beyond
what ordinary eyes see. He saw that all this suffering was
preparation for an “eternal weight of glory”, an inner nature
being renewed.
There is one basic thing that every one of us wants to do
before we die, and that is to reconcile. To settle accounts.
To say what has not been said and to finish what has not
been finished. We want to die in peace, and we cannot do
that unless we are reconciled. I believe that God in Jesus
Christ gave Henry Allen time enough in which to reconcile; I
believe that God transfused new life into Henry, so that he
could accomplish what every one of us wants to accomplish:
reconciliation.
I
For example, we want to reconcile with ourselves. We want
to be at peace in our own minds about who we are and how
we have lived. I am not suggesting that we expect to die
with smiles on our faces or that we will not be happy unless
our laundry list of tasks is completed. Not at all. To
reconcile with ourselves means that we want to understand
what we have done with our lives. We want to know that we
meant something. We want to know that we had value. A
friend of mine wrote a book entitled, “Will It Matter That I
Was?”. Will it make any difference that we took up space on
this planet for a while? We want to reconcile with ourselves.
Henry lived his life somewhat alone. True, there were the
neighbors and the postal patrons, and true, there is the
coffeeklatch crowd. But Henry lived to a great degree in his
own private world. Cooking, fishing, gardening – this is
private stuff. You might have thought that what you saw was
a man who did not know how to reach out, or who thought he
did not need others. But what your eyes see is not always all
that there is. Something more was going on. It was
preparation for this “eternal weight of glory” into which Henry
has entered.
In these weeks and months of Mr. Allen’s illness, when we
look back, we saw him struggling with himself. We saw him
seeking to understand the significance of his life. Some of
us heard him, feeble though he was, asking questions about
what he had done with his time on earth. This morning we
have heard appreciations from some whose lives he
touched; we have discovered in your witness that in him
there was character and integrity. I believe Henry used
these last weeks to discover that in himself. We saw him
receiving, like a transfusion from the Spirit of God, a settled
spirit, reconciliation. We saw him coming to peace with
himself.
When God extends a life beyond what we might expect, it is
God’s gift so that we might learn who we are, we might come
to terms with what we have been about, we might be
reconciled with ourselves.
Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is
being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is
preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure.
II
But then, we not only want to reconcile with ourselves. We
also want to reconcile with those whom God has put into our
lives. We want to be sure of our family and our friends. We
want to connect with those whose lives are bound up with
our own. We want to reconcile with those we love.
Sometimes that is very clear, as when someone begs
another to forgive him of past wrongs. Sometimes it is quite
open, as when someone writes a last will and testament and
bridges old gaps and heals old wounds. But sometimes you
can’t see it. Sometimes you think it isn’t there. But
remember, there is always more going on than what you can
see.
We want to reconcile with those we love and those who have
loved us. Friends, have you noticed how all of us get
crossways of one another? Have you noticed that our
biggest problems are with those that are close to us? It’s
always been that way, and presumably always will be. Adam
and Eve got crossways of one another in the Garden -- “I just
did what she told me to, Lord, it’s not my fault”. And before
they got over that issue, their two boys got into a colossal
fight and somebody had to leave home. We just do get our
relationships out of order.
And yet we cannot live forever without reconciliation. We
cannot live and we certainly cannot die without reconciliation.
We really need to know that the connections that have made
so much difference in our lives are firm and strong at the
end. Wilma, you painted for me a beautiful picture of one of
your very last times with Henry: how he called for you, how
he told you that you had been a good mother and a caring
wife. I personally shall cherish, as I know you will, that
picture of a shaking hand, reaching out to find your hand, to
connect. To reconcile. To come home. That arm,
transfused so often with the life-sustaining liquids of
medicine, now became the arm transfused with the spiritual
power of Christ, who in His sacrificing love teaches us to
come home to one another.
Oh, don’t you see it?
Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is
being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is
preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure.
Had you been with Wilma and Henry at that moment, you
might have seen nothing but a weary hand floundering for a
bit of steadiness. But something more much more, was
going on!
III
But it is not only that we want to reconcile with ourselves;
and it is not only that we want to reconcile with the significant
people in our lives. In the final analysis, we want to reconcile
with God. We know that it is from God that we came and
that it is to God we must go. We have to reconcile with our
God.
Henry Allen was not a church-goer. He was not invested in
institutional religion. But that is not what I am talking about.
Being a church member does not guarantee that you are
reconciled with God. I sometimes like to say to our folks that
just because a cat is born in a garage, that does not make it
a Cadillac! It’s not just a question of religious formalities. It’s
not just a matter of getting baptized or having your name on
a church roll. These things are important; but they are not
what we mean when we speak of being reconciled with God.
No, to be reconciled with God means that you discover, often
very suddenly and very quietly, that God loves you. You see
what you never saw before: that God loves you beyond your
ability to receive His love. You feel what you never felt
before: that God loves you far more than you have a right to
deserve. Reconciliation with God means that you wake up
and know that nothing you have done has driven Him away.
Nothing you have failed to do has dimmed His care for you.
Nothing you have said has turned God’s heart away.
Reconciliation with God means, as one theologian put it, that
you accept your acceptance! You wake up to the knowledge
that the love of God is deeper far than tongue or pen can
ever tell; it reaches to the deepest depths and plunges to the
lowest hell. And when that happens, there is peace. There
is complete and perfect peace, for you know that you are
going to receive something you could never have earned,
nor could you ever purchase it. You are going to receive a
place in the heart of Almighty God, and nothing can ever
take that away from you. That is what it is to be reconciled
with God. Oh, “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that
saved [even] a wretch like me; I once was lost, but now am
found, was blind, but now I see.”
Henry Allen found God’s grace. Better, God’s grace found
him. He was not able to say much; he could not fully
express what was in his heart. But several of us saw
enough and heard enough to know that he did trust Christ,
he did respond to God’s grace, and he did find, at the last,
peace, reconciliation.
There was so much more to Henry Allen’s last weeks and
months than what the eye could see. The Lord transfused
him and extended his time so that he could be reconciled.
Henry’s heart gave out, yes, but listen to the promise of
God’s word:
So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has
passed away; see, everything has become new!
Henry’s life ended, yes, but hear God’s gift:
Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is
being renewed day by day.
Henry’s days here are over, yes, but know what God is
giving him:
For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have
a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the
heavens
The Henry Allen we saw is no more. But then we did not see
all that was happening anyway. We saw Henry transfused
with tubes and lines, cords and hoses. We now see Henry
transfused with new life by the blood of Jesus Christ:
For [God has] made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him
we might become the righteousness of God.
There was a whole lot more going on than met the eye.
Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is
being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is
preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure.
