I believe it’s safe to say that we all care about how we look when we go public. How can we not? We live in a world where appearance seems to be everything.
To aid us in our self-evaluation; most, if not all of us, look in a mirror before we leave home. If the mirror shows a glaring defect, we tend to address it as much as we can.
But what about the spiritual mirror we need to look into daily? That would be the Word of God. What do you do when it reveals a glaring defect about you?
In the epistle of James, he talks about God’s Word as if it were a mirror. He specifically addresses those who hear the Word of God but do not obey what they hear. “He is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was” (James 1:23-24, KJV).
Note the word “straightway.” That means instantly; without any consideration. Sad but true, that’s how quickly some churchgoers dismiss what they read or hear being preached or taught from the Word of God.
The Spiritual Mirror Is More Important
We know God looks on the heart and not our outer appearance. When we look in our natural mirror and groom ourselves for a public appearance, that’s not for God. That’s for us and for other people.
But when we come to the house of God to hear the Word of God, He speaks to us through His Word. It is a time to look at ourselves in light of what the Bible reveals about God’s will for our life. We should be far more concerned with how we look in that spiritual mirror than we are about how we look in a natural mirror before leaving home.
The same thing is true about our personal Bible study at home. We don’t read the Word simply to try to complete our read-the-Bible-in-a-year plan. But we read and study it to hear from God. Moreover, we must not be hearers only but also doers of the Word. That means we must be willing to correct our life as required to obey God.
Have you ever tried a new hair style or tried on a new outfit only to look in the mirror and decide that you hate what you see? If you have, let me guess—you went and made some changes based on what you saw in the mirror.
That’s exactly what God wants you to do when you look into the spiritual mirror—the Word of God. Don’t dismiss what you see, but get in line with the Word.
Copyright © 2023 by Frank King. All rights reserved.