Ever since I was a child, first standing by the sea and marvelling at the horizon, I have been intrigued by perspective. I know I often use it in illustrations and sermons, but I make no apology for returning to it today. What we see from a distance can be very different from the detail we notice close at hand. The picture I have shared shows St Michael’s Church in Framlingham from more than a mile away and then close up.
The distant scene is beautifully pastoral, with the fields and the backdrop of the town and church tower. But it is not until we look at the close-up of the building that we realise the complexity of the architecture, and the sheer scale of it against the sky. What a difference there can be between two different views of the same thing.
In today’s reading, John 3:25–30, John the Baptist tells those listening that the time has come for him to step back, and for Jesus to come into the foreground. On another level, the same journey is expressed in Theodore Monod’s hymn, O the Bitter Shame and Sorrow. Its progression moves from “none of you and all of me”, through “some of you and some of me”, then “more of you and less of me”, until it reaches the place of total commitment: “all of you and none of me”.
I wonder where most of us are on our journey of faith. Are we close enough to God to see the detail of our relationship with him, and what he wants us to become? Or are we still far enough away that the picture remains vague, shaped more by what we think than by what he requires?
Indeed, many of us may find it uncomfortable that God is more interested in the detail of our lives than he is in the overall, more distant scene of what we look like against the backdrop of everyone else. Our faith is about a God who cares for, and loves, the detail of every single individual. I find that comforting, but that is not necessarily how all of us will feel about our relationship with God.
Prayer
Loving God, we know that sometimes it can feel disconcerting to realise that you see into every part of our lives in detail. We thank you for your great love for us, which is concerned at so detailed a level, and we pray that we may have the grace to revel in it and not be frightened of it; for Jesus’ sake. Amen.