When you reach a certain age, the conversation with contemporaries often veers to bones and organs.
In his latest email, a dear and famous friend of 50 years, also called George, describes his wonder in seeing again after cataract surgery…
like new eyes
And then he added…
but seeing my own face clearly was a bit of a shock.
Our friend George | Sourced from Google
As I listened, Dallas Willard’s words in a series about Spirituality on YouTube, Living at the Intersection of Two Worlds, thoughts of cataract surgery and the aging of our bodies joined the fresh insights pouring into my head.
He gave the original lecture when he was in his 70’s and since then he has died but when he examines the meaning of words written most probably in AD 55 (or CE 55) they grab my attention, fresh and new today….
Our present reality of increasing physical limitations and losses, is not limited to George and I and our contemporaries,
I think about many of our younger friends and the experiences of physical, emotional, and spiritual challenges they have shared.
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.
2 Corintians 4: 16-18
Look at things you can’t see…..
How to do that?
At the beginning of the day
Advice to a son:
First of all, my child, think magnificently of God.
Magnify His providence, adore His power;
pray to Him frequently and incessantly.
Bear Him always in your mind.
Teach your thoughts to reverence Him in every place
for there is no place where He is not.
Therefore my child, fear and worship and love God;
first and last, think magnificently of Him!
(Condensed by Dallas Willard from ch. 18 of William Law’s Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life.)