I have a favourite story that I often use as a sermon illustration.
Years ago, my eight-year-old son received a gardening book – a book written for children. He was so excited about this new adventure and when the time was right, we headed to the green house to buy some plants to make a “pizza garden.” A garden shaped in a circle with triangle sections filled with different plants to resemble a pizza.
As we started planting the garden, I focused on the work; I lost sight of my son. I look around, wondered where he had disappeared to. I spot him bringing a lawn chair from the house and of course, with great curiosity and a little judgment as he was making me do all the work. My son starts moving the chair and looking at the horizon. Finally I ask, “What are you doing?” And the words he spoke are forever engrained in my memory. “Dad I am looking for the perfect spot to watch the sun set over my garden.”
There was a great message for me in this story. To stop and see the world through a child’s eyes, to stop and contemplate the beauty of God’s creation. Until that point, I had been looking at the world through my own lens of getting things done, concerned about what I was going to do next, maybe a bit of anger that my son was not helping.
Philosophers speak of two ways of seeing the world. One is through loving eyes and one through arrogant eyes. One is seeing and engaging with love for the benefit of others and the other is a self-absorbed “me first” mentality. Jesus taught about having “loving eyes.” He commanded two things: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” And secondly, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:30-31).
How do those commandments fit with the current polarization of people? Polarization lines are drawn in the sand around every aspect of our society, particularly in politics and ideologies. If you don’t agree with a point of view the responses are similar. A person/ group lashes out in anger, making false statements and writing points of view that have no concern for the other side’s point of view. There is no loving mention God, or loving mention of neighbour.
Where are the loving eyes? Where is the care of the other, or as Jesus preaches where is the love of neighbour? I would suggest that there is a lot of arrogant eyes in the world. Like my story of my son, we do not see the world as it should be. We do not place God front and centre, we do not see with loving eyes our neighbour, but many see with arrogant eyes.
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Ernie Naylor serves as minister at Atwood Presbyterian Church.
