Seeing in Color
You have very likely seen one or more of the many viral videos of someone who is colorblind “seeing in color” for the first time when trying on special glasses designed to help distinguish between colors.
Full disclosure: Many of these videos are part of marketing campaigns by the manufacturers of these glasses, so they should be taken with a grain of salt. Even so, the moments remind us of a great spiritual truth worth meditating on today.
You were born to live abundantly! John 10:10—we’ve considered this promise before—says Jesus came to give you not just life, but life to the full! He came, He lived, He died, and He rose again not just so you would survive, but so you would be fully and abundantly alive!
To use our framing from this week, He came not so you could live in black and white, but in order for you to live in vibrant color! The will of your Savior is not one of trudging along. It is one marked with purpose and passion! It is a life that clearly distinguishes between good and evil, and which sets a course toward that which is True and beautiful (Philip. 4:8).
The only way to fervently follow this path, however, is to be wholly cognizant of the fact that Jesus is the only way to stay on that path. The premise into which the promise of John 10:10 is interjected is the reality that your enemy aims to rob you of that vibrant life. He aims to destroy you, and He begins by aiming for the hollowing out of your life’s fullness.
The enemy would have you see in dull grays, and he does so in order to rob you of the vibrancy required to resist him. His aim is your destruction, but his path is one of stealing your figurative ability to see in color!
So how can you deliberately choose to live in the full expression of color and vibrancy offered to you? It is really quite simple (which is distinct from easy—this is not always or even usually easy). If you want to live in full possession of what Jesus came to give, you must accept the path He gave you to walk. Your life—every facet—must be yielded and even surrendered to Him.
Surrender is a difficult thing for us humans. Our physical bodies are instinctively inclined to defend and protect everything for ourselves. We want to cling tightly to whatever we can get our hands on. It is no accident that the key to true and abundant life is in the relinquishing of that control.
Do you want trade your life of gray for one that sees in vibrant color? You can. Jesus has freely offered that life to you. But it requires total surrender. The life you lead in the flesh—the one you are instinctively inclined to preserve—must be relinquished. In its place will rise a life that sees in vibrant color!
“He must become greater; I must become less” (Jn. 3:30).
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full” (Jn. 10:10).
“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things” (Philip. 4:8).
The following article originally appeared in Thann’s “The Equipped” Weekly Newsletter. For more information on Thann’s weekly email, click here.