Illumination
“God is not the thing that you see, God is the light that allows you to see. Instead of thinking of God as an illuminated object, think of God as the illumination that brings objects into vision.”
- Pete Rollins
If you’ve spent any time in this blog or around me for that matter, you might have picked up on the fact that I really like movies. Let me restate that: I love the story of restoration (because it is our intellectual property as believers) and it is found in every great story. The movie producers, directors, and screenwriters of our day, just happen to be the great storytellers of our time.
Peter Rollins was talking recently about the immensity of God. How God isn’t just the thing, but the thing that brings meaning and light and perspective to all things. He also said that we encounter God and his creation like watching a film at a theatre one inch from the screen.
While I have gotten stuck in the front row when we’ve arrived too late to a new screening, I’ve never watched a movie from quite that close.
I bet it is hard to figure out what is going on.
I bet it is hard to put the small portion in the larger context.
I bet it is really easy to misinterpret what you are seeing.
It isn’t that the whole screen isn’t filled up or that there is a whole, complete, and larger story unfolding. It is just that I would be focusing on such a small fragment, that I would miss the “big picture” of what is really happening.
The analogy is obvious. There is way more going on around us than we know. The Kingdom is advancing and a much bigger story is unfolding around us in ways that we can’t possibly see or interpret. There are some things that will make more sense when we see them in the rearview mirror and even some that won’t be completely clear on this side of eternity.
As coaches, we help illuminate the real issues, bring clarity, and help others craft solutions to get them to a more inspired future. Usually, as a trained outsider, we can see things way more clearly than our clients can. Sometimes, because we aren’t one inch from the screen like they are, we can see a whole picture that they aren’t able to see.
Ironically, even though we are very trained and experienced in doing this for others, it can be pretty difficult to do the same thing for ourselves. We all need someone to help us illuminate and interpret the things we cannot see or are too close to put into proper context.
We are all too close to the screen.
That is why we need God and need others to help us see what is really going on, interpret what we are seeing, and mark our path forward.
- How close are you to the movie screen?
- Are you allowing God to illuminate the largeness of his creation?
- Are you able to set what you are focused on in the context of the larger story…for your family, for your company, for your life?
- Who is helping guide you forward in the journey?