Look in the Mirror
“When I held my heart up to the mirror of God’s Word, I didn’t like what I saw. I didn’t like the distance it revealed. My lips paid service to the Lord, but my heart was so very far from Him.”
“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.” (James 1:22-25 ESV)
I woke up the morning after giving birth to my son feeling lighter. I mean, I was feeling good. I walked into the tiny bathroom in my hospital room and stood on tiptoe to get a view of myself in the mirror. It wasn’t a full-length mirror (and probably for very good reason to protect the fragile mental states of brand-new mamas). I was in shock. I couldn’t believe how much smaller I was overnight! I remember thinking, “These people that warned me about post-partum bodies…well, they were crazy! This isn’t too bad!”
Two days later, my husband and I took our squishy little bundle home. I almost immediately walked into my bedroom and stood in front of my full-length mirror. My. Jaw. Dropped. Who was this creature? I looked nothing like I imagined myself to look in the hospital mirror. I know that the mirror cut off a little below my chest, but still. This couldn’t be real!
We have probably all been there before- thinking we look one way, maybe even thinking we look pretty good, only to find that it just isn’t true! It’s humbling, right?! It knocks you down a few notches.
Sometimes we need a good, hard look in the mirror. In a spiritual sense, we desperately do. I have made the same mistake of thinking I was doing better than I was doing. It is easy to make a checklist of all the right things: going to church? Check. Reading the bible, rather inconsistently, though? Check. Listening to Christian music? Easy one- check. But while I could check off all the boxes, my heart was far from the Lord. I was simply going through the motions. My list originally stemmed from truly wanting to do the right things in order to keep me close to the Lord. But remaining near to Him was never about a list; it is about the condition of our hearts.
Jesus explains to the Pharisees (who are excellent list checkers, by the way) that they embody the words spoken by Isaiah: “‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men’” (Matthew 15:8-9 ESV).
We reflect what we worship. Our lives are mirrors, representing that to which our heart pledges its allegiance. We can fake it for a while, but a mirror doesn’t lie. It reveals truth, imperfection, every hair out of place. And if we will hold our lives up to the Word, it will reveal truth. It will point out the areas where we have only gone through the motions. The writer of Hebrews points out that “the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12 ESV). If our intention is to check items off a list or to simply look the part, then our motives are out of place. When I held my heart up to the mirror of God’s Word, I didn’t like what I saw. I didn’t like the distance it revealed. My lips paid service to the Lord, but my heart was so very far from Him.
I read in a commentary recently that “we share the destiny of that which we give our hearts.” Wow. If our hearts belong to a check list, or to the opinions of others, or to pride, or even to another person, we are in danger. All of these will wither away like the grass of the fields. What remains? The Lord and His Kingdom. He is the only One who will outlast anything else to which we could devote ourselves.
I can’t even recall the exact moment God revealed the distance in my heart. It was an accumulation of events. But here is what I know: I am so very grateful. I am grateful for truth and for His mercy drawing me back into communion with Him- communion that transcends a check list. Relationship. I am thankful that the desire to study His Word rose to the surface again after being buried for so long. I am thankful that He showed me I wasn’t seeking Him or loving Him as much as I did in the past. And I am thankful for a fresh start.
He'll do the same for you. Ask Him to reveal the condition of your heart. My guess is you already know. I did. I knew I was spiritually famished. But we serve a God who wants to know us. He even came here to dwell with us. And He still does. Look into the mirror, and then commit to seeing what God reveals. There is freedom there.