I have been going through the book Don't Wast Your Life by John Piper with a small group of high school guys . In one chapter, Piper brought up this idea of the differences between magnification by microscopes and telescopes. I pointed this out to the guys, and we discussed it a little bit. Then, I moved on. However, today, a friend of mine was giving a talk to junior high and high school kids. I was there leading worship, and I was convicted when he began explaining this principle.
You see, there are two ways to magnify something. One way involves a microscope and the other involves a telescope. Both use lenses to magnify images for our eyes to see. The difference is really simple though. A microscope takes something ever so small (like a bacterium) and makes it much larger, thus enabling us to see this miniscule object. A telescope, on the other hand, takes something that is great and enormous (like a distant glaxy) and gives us a smaller, easier to view glimpse of it.
I often find that I live my life like a microscope. In relation to the grand scheme of the universe, I take some very tiny things and attempt to make them look bigger.
For example, my co-workers often laugh at the music playing in my van when I return from my mail route. They listen to very bad music--like Aerosmith, Toby Keith, and Puff Daddy. I often find it my civic duty to explain good music to these people. Often, I find myself arguing the reasons that Death Cab for Cutie and Wilco and Radiohead are the greatest bands in the world. I often argue why The Flaming Lips are creative and take an intelligent listener to understand and appreciate. Basically, I'm taking things that are very small (like musicians) and magnifying them as much as I possibly can to my co-workers.
A second example anyone? Very often, I find myself magnifying something very miniscule--myself. I want people to recognize what I have done. I want people to know about Famous in May. I want people to like my music. I want people to like poems I have written. Sometimes, I even find myself craving attention for the ways I have helped out and served (insert_"gasp"_here). In short, I am selfish and tiny. Therefore, I try to magnify myself as much as I can.
This isn't how we are meant live. We're not meant to live to argue good music. We're not meant to live to magnify our own accomplishments. We're not meant to live for a lot of the things we live and die and eat and sleep and breath and don't breathe for. Wilco and Death Cab and Radiohead are tiny specks on a tiny speck of a planet in a solar system at the very edge of just one galaxy. We are tiny specks just the same. We're meant to live for something bigger.
God created us to be telescopes. There's this distant and enormous thing--God's greatness and God's grandness. We're supposed to take that thing and make it visible to those around us. Don't believe me? That's what Jesus did. He took an abstract thing like God's love, and he showed us a visible picture of it--His death on the cross. We're to live like that.
How do we magnify God like a telescope? How do we show people the greatness and grandness of God in a visible display? We live it out. Our actions show them. When people see us live and die and eat and sleep and breathe and don't breathe for God's glory and not our glory or some other thiny thing's glory--they see God. They see God in the way we hope in the salvation that Jesus has given us. They see God in the way we serve without expecting so much as a thank you or even an acknowledgement of our deed.
I'm not saying it's wrong to love music. In fact, I love music very much. I am very glad that I went and saw Wilco and Death Cab in the past month. I am very proud of the music that I get to make with Famous in May. Unfortunately, there are days (too many days) where I am more concerned about magnifying these things than I am about magnifying the One True God, the Creator, the Savior. That is a tragedy in the making.
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