Photo and Commentary ©2023 by Shelley Schurch
Sunday, July 23, 2023
It’s a familiar verse, in a well-beloved Bible chapter about love: 1 Corinthians 13:12:
For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.
Familiar as it was, it still snagged my attention during yesterday’s sermon. In the time in which Paul was writing to the Corinthians, glass mirrors had not yet appeared; mirrors were made of polished metal which did not give you a crisp, clear reflection of your face.
As we stood for the closing hymn, I was still turning this verse over in my mind. How did people know what they looked like? They could stretch out their arms and gaze at them, and at the rest of their bodies easily in view, but how could they ever get a good glimpse of their faces?
If they leaned over a pool of still water, they would find their eyes looking back at them. Did they do that often, searching their faces? Did it matter to them?
How would they view us, viewing ourselves in what would seem at best a preoccupied way, and at worst, obsessive?
We are surrounded by mirrors, and more. We become mirrors for ourselves and others as we comment on our appearances and behavior, and theirs. Social media has famously intensified the commentary, but it has always existed. A few days ago I talked to someone many miles away who described a childhood many years ago, blighted by classmates and teachers teasing and bullying her over her appearance.
I longed to crank back the years and have people unsay what they said, to give her a safe and happy childhood.
I suddenly remembered a comment that has haunted me since junior high, when a teacher blew her whistle during P.E. class to stop our activity, then shouted, “Shelley! Can’t you ever do anything right?”
I don’t know what happened next. I didn’t know what I had done wrong, and I don’t know if she then proceeded to tell me. My memory freezes with her comment, and the words “ever” and “anything” which pierced me as they told me that this wasn’t a one-time mistake on my part. I realized with a shock that in her eyes I was a constant failure.
Even now, when I feel I have failed at something, I often hear that echo from junior high: “Can’t you ever do anything right?”
When I told the Children’s Corner in church yesterday, I showed the children the sign above, posted on a neighbor’s backyard gate. Her property borders our neighborhood trail, and we love to pause every morning and watch the wildlife who love her backyard. They don’t know that it’s a certified Backyard Wildlife Sanctuary; they just know it has birdbaths and birdhouses and bird feeders and squirrel feeders and shade trees and apple trees and plum trees.
Do they sense the love that provides all that?
Sanctuary.
If I am a mirror for others, I want to reflect back to them the good I see in them. I want the Lord to polish me so that I don’t give them a distorted view of who they are, with any thoughtless, unkind comments.
I want to be a sanctuary. A safe place. A haven.
I wasn’t born this way, however. Born to brood, born to worry about myself rather than reach out in compassion to others.
But the good news is two-fold:
First, God is my Sanctuary. Yours, too. One of the many words He uses to describe Himself, so that we will know Him as He truly is, minus the devil’s distortions, is “refuge.”
One of my favorite “refuge” verses, out of many:
Trust in Him at all times, you people;
Pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us. (Psalm 62:8 NKJV)
One more:
He shall cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you shall take refuge; His truth shall be your shield and buckler. (Psalm 91:4 NKJV)
The second good news is that God will eagerly equip us to be sanctuaries for Him, to be safe people, to provide refuge.
As we step out into this brand-new week, may we see God for who He truly is, and ourselves as well. Beloved. Well-beloved. This week, live loved.