What Do Your Eyes See?

Once upon a time, there was a powerful and rich leader. He was incredibly brilliant. He had an eye for beauty, as they say. He could perceive architecture, amazing structure, quality like none other, and he had the means to create it and to obtain it. He brilliantly developed his own houses into things that were amazing architectural wonders. He was able to plant vineyards. Vineyards that produced and looked really good produced lots and lots of good tasting wine, some of the best wine. He planted and crafted orchards that produced fruits, amazing fruits of many, many different types, everything that could amaze the eye and the palate at the same time. You know, water is something that intrigues mankind, and he developed water features, things that would inspire by looking at water. He created them. He created lakes. He created aquifers. Horses, beautiful horses, just the right size and shapes and colors, amazing to look at. He had many, many thoroughbred horses. Jewelry, wine jewelry, every type of jewelry. Jewelry that was created to shock, to beautify, to make one look better. He had many kinds of jewelry and art. He had a real eye for art and for the creation of art. And so he surrounded himself with artistic wonders that were so appealing to the eye. He had a virtual museum of musical instruments. You know, musical instruments come in many types and shapes, made by craftsmen, some old, some new. And then he also employed musicians to play instruments. So he had live performances of music that was inspiring, and this man knew music. He could write music himself. He came from a very musical family. And so he had the best of sight and sound and food, the best of everything.

He even had a good eye for ladies. And he was able, through his power and his money, to acquire some of the most beautiful women, not only from around where he was, but from even in other countries. And he sort of, as it were, traded in women to where they were influential women from other influential families, in some cases. This was quite an operation this leader had. He was rich. He was smart. He had everything that the eye could desire. Concerning all those things he wrote. He said, whatever my eyes desired, I did not keep from them. And he described everything I just told you in Ecclesiastes chapter 2. Whatever his eyes desired and saw and imagined, he did not keep from himself. There was a song in the 1970s that was written about what one's eyes sees in the world and in society. What is it that we let our eyes see and that we focus on and that we let register? This particular song was called, Doctor My Eyes. And one of the sets of words in it said, I have done all that I could to see the evil and the good. Doctor, my eyes, tell me what is wrong. Was I unwise to leave them open for so long? What is it about our eyes? And what do we do with those eyes? And what do we use our eyes to do with our eyes?

And when we see something, how do we process what we see? The title of the sermon is, What Do Your Eyes See? You might say, well, they see everything. Actually, they don't. Your eyes are actually linked to a brain that specifically are looking for some things. That's why people hit motorcycles all the time in cars and trucks. It's because they're looking for cars and trucks. The mind does not look for motorcycles. Therefore, you don't see them, and you tend to pull out and make a left turn in front of a motorcycle. That's the number one far away killer of motorcycle riders, is people in a traffic intersection making a turn as a motorcycle approaches right there in plain view, oftentimes with the light on, but the driver never sees him.

What is it that you and I see? What do we look for? What do we hope to see when we look out the window, when we look across the room, when we get up in the morning? What is it that we say, oh, I hope to...

What is it that we're looking for? We might ask it this way. What is your focus? What's focus about? Focus is about the eye. What is your life's focus? You know, you can see a lot of things, but what are you focused on? What is the focus of your life? So let's examine the concept today of what do your eyes see and what do my eyes see? The eye can be a metaphor for what we're thinking about, what's important to us, or what makes us feel a certain way. The eye is the entry point, as it were, for things that are visual. We also have sound and touch and feel and taste, but the the eye is really something that that we depend upon. Just to show you, as it showed me, the difference of what an eye sees is we were driving out of Yosemite National Park the other day, came along vertical walls, thousands of feet high, it seemed. I'm not sure the exact height, but these extremely high walls of granite that had been carved out by glaciers and left a valley floor that's full of grass and trees by these pronounced vertical walls of glaciers. And some of the old rivers that used to go across now just fall all the way into the valley, and they're quite dramatic and majestic. And so driving along, looking at these big mountains, my wife said, oh there's a painter over there in the field. Painter. Yeah, well, okay, let me see that painter. I had about this much time to glance back and see the painter. Now, before I glance back, you know how fast the mind is. You know what he was painting, right? Well, what do you think he was painting? Standing in the middle of the field, grassy field, beyond that's a forest of big tall ponderosa pines, beyond that is this dramatic upheaval of rock, sky above that. It's very majestic. I was kind of curious as to how he would get those mountains onto that canvas. And in an instant I glanced back, I saw the mountains, and I saw the forest, but that wasn't what he was painting. Those were just kind of wispy there. He was painting wildflowers. He was painting the vibrant colors that were popping out of the grass. And it was just a sea of color of orange and yellow and blue and purple that was popping out of the grass. I never saw wildflowers. In my mind, I cannot remember wildflowers. That person was painting wildflowers. I had scanned out the wildflowers. I told my wife seconds before, I hope we see elk. I was looking for elk. Didn't see elk. I also didn't see wildflowers. What is it that our eyes are seeing? Prejudiced eyes, real at the sight of another person of a different race, a different color, a different shape, a different age, different sex, whatever. That's what they're looking for. They're looking for something that's inferior, shouldn't be here, some competition. They're missing whatever else is there.

Covetous eyes, they're constantly scanning for what they wish they were or for what they wish they had. They're not seeing what they have and what God has given or provided as an environment. They're looking for what they don't have, what they could be if somebody else wasn't that.

Peter condemned some in the church whose eyes are filled with adultery.

Filled eyes filled with adultery. That must mean you're scanning for, you know, the sort of a lust of flesh. I want to see that flesh. I want to see that thing. I want to think about doing something that's not mine, has nothing to do with me, but that's what I want to do. That's what I want to be involved in. That's what I'm looking for. John warns in 1 John 2 16 not to have eyes for the things of this world. He says, for all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. It's not of the Father, that's of the world. And yet the pride, oh look at me, look what I can be, or the lust of the flesh, or the lust for flesh, the lusts of the things that aren't ours.

That's of this society, this cosmos. It's not of the Father. That's not why we're here. Remember, humans' eyes sift out those things that are important to them, the things that they want to focus in on. These eyes were drawn from God. Imagine that. Wouldn't you like to see God? Wouldn't you like to be around God? If you think about God, especially on the Sabbath and when you're praying, wouldn't it be great to encounter God personally? Her eyes weren't on God. Her eyes weren't on godliness or anything. Her eyes were on some fruit, some forbidden fruit that was said to be able to make her wise and to make her live forever and to open her eyes. So her eyes were scanning and she saw the fruit and the fruit was so desirable. That's all she could see. The fruit of the tree of life was there. She couldn't see that. She could only see that one thing, something that would improve her, it seemed. That's lust. That's lust for something that's forbidden. It's not yours. It's not commanded that that's someone else's.

I remember that Abram stood up on the plane and he said to Lot, Lot, look, look out there. Use your eyes and look. Wherever you choose, you go put your herds there. Here's Abram, obviously a very wealthy man. The Bible talks about him being a very wealthy and rich man. He was very influential. He was able to put together a private army when needed, to just be able to look at a large section of land where Sodom and Gomorrah were in the distance and say, hey, you can have that and I'll take the rest. Maybe that was deeded to him already. Maybe he had already bought all that land. But Lot, it said, Lot cast his eyes. He looked out. His eyes saw the plains of Shinar and he said, oh, this is well watered. That looks good for me. And that's where he went. Down there with Sodom and Gomorrah and the easily watered plains and the river.

After Hagar conceived, Serik had only seen Hagar through despised eyes because of jealousy. Whenever she saw Hagar, she would look for Hagar and when she saw her, the Bible says, she despised her. And that's what Serik could see in life. It was a terrible woman. Everything about her was terrible and she looked for anything that was terrible. Joseph was despised in his brother's eyes. They were so jealous of Joseph. Of course, he was a young guy. You know how teens are very self-focused and braggadocio and they don't care about anybody else typically. Well, that didn't go over well with his brothers and they despised him and whatever they saw him, they despised him. And yet in Egypt, when Pharaoh saw Joseph, he extolled and exalted him. Joseph was a fantastic young man through the eyes of Pharaoh, looking at the same individual but through a different lens, being able to see something on the one hand that is offensive and that's all you can see versus being able to see through the offense at something that's a real goldmine and appreciating that every day.

What do my eyes see? Really depends on what I look for. Same with you. What are we looking for? What lens do I see through? Is it the lens of self-promotion? How can I go out today and be all that I can be and use everything and everybody to make me better and me happier and me have more stuff and me have more self-esteem or whatever it is? So I'll go through the day and I'll look for all those opportunities to promote myself. That's sad because that's the way carnal human nature works and all those individuals end up not getting promoted or developed. So one thing in leadership training I've come to learn is everybody has so much potential that has been so squelched and so held down. They feel so defeated with little self-worth, low self-esteem.

Recently I was sitting with an individual who was a very fine teacher and he was teaching his heart out and doing a great job at it and afterward I said, do you serve back home in your church? Oh no, no, no, no, no. I can't do anything. What do you mean you can't do anything? Well, I just I don't have that kind of talent.

I said, you're a great teacher. You're teaching and teaching and teaching. I'm listening. I'm learning. You're a great teacher. Oh no, no, no, not me. No, no, I'm afraid of my shadow. See, we as individuals can discount abilities that even God can help us grow in because others are not seeing through eyes of loving, growing, promoting, assisting, encouraging one another, but rather get up in the morning. What can I do to embellish myself? So everybody around me will be stunted because all I can do is think of me. Now, if I start my day like that, what kind of a life will I have?

It's a childish view of life. You know, I mentioned teenage before and I'm not ragging on teenagers here. Point is, I was a teen and I was very selfish. I just didn't know it. I thought I was a great teen because people told me, what a great teen you are! And then when I got to be 19, God sent me through something called repentance.

And I took a look at myself and I said, what a selfish piece of trash! You're the most useless thing walking around. All you're interested in is what you look like and what you're able to do. Why don't you just go drop dead somewhere and let the world get on with it? Like, okay, I think I will drop dead in baptism. You know, and that's a great place to start, but I think you have to come through and grow up and come to the place where this maturity, emotional maturity, has to take place.

You have to shift. You have to get it off of yourself and whatever is about you and get it on to other people. See what they can be. Some people never grow up and go their whole life, just like they were in teens, still whining and trying to promote themselves. It's about them. Some teens get it a lot faster than I did, I'm embarrassed to say, and they mature emotionally while they're still young teens.

And their mind isn't on themselves. They're starting to serve others and carry about others, and it's not about them. It's a great example for all of us. Are you one whose eyes see the faults in others? You know, some people get up in their eyes. That's what they want to see today. I want to see faults in others. I want to see faults in the cat. I want to see faults in the birds. I want to see faults in everybody and everything, even on TV.

That's what I'm looking for. That's just how some people are. It's a criticism. They can't see anything else. Why? Because the eyes are trained. What my eyes will see is faults and deficiencies. That's what we're trained for. Talk to a lady who's an elderly lady, and from a young woman she got married and had children. And her husband could only see fault in her. Their entire married life, all he could see was fault. She wasn't good enough at this. She wasn't good enough at that.

She wasn't good enough at this. And he told her, I cannot show you affection until you change. Otherwise, it would encourage you to stay like you are. So during their married life, all he did was criticize her and withhold affection, letting her know that she was never good here and never good there and not quite good there and never good there. She tried. Oh, she tried. And along the way, and all that trying, she became quite an efficient, effective individual in all those things she was trying at. But she never was good enough for him to tell her, wow, now you've reached it.

I can be affectionate and I can show you praise and everything else. There's always something else. There's always deficiency. When that man died, the woman found herself a lonely widow.

And she said, hmm, I'm here all alone. And what a lousy person I am. I never made it to where I could get praised. And now, I'm old. I had an encounter with that woman recently and as she explained that, I said, you know, it's interesting. Your name gets brought up from time to time, here and there, actually, as I travel. And it's always unqualified praise and amazement for what a sterling lady you are and what a great example you set. And it's often from young people, middle-aged people, and old people at the same time.

And she said, I didn't know that. I said, you know, it really, and I said, I'm not smoking you here. This is the real deal. This is unqualified praise from leaders in the church in many places and just people who bump into you. I kind of hear this from time to time. Like, really? How sad it was that her husband went through life always seeing something that was deficient. Could have gone through life seeing something that was fabulous to be married to. Depends on what the eyes train for. And I think we can all see why we see through our eyes. We all see ourselves as deficient. If you're critical, it's because of something with you. And in that person's situation, the man received less praise than the woman did and was perhaps growing less than the woman was growing. And so there's a sometimes a counter for that, which is, I will attack. I will, you know, cut people off at the knees. I will criticize. I will find something that's wrong.

You know, Jesus in Matthew 7 verse 3 talks about this. Matthew chapter 7 verse 3, this is just one of the ways we can see out our eyes, but we all tend to do this to a degree.

Matthew chapter 7 verse 3 says, Why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye? You're using your eye and you're looking for defects in your brother's eye.

Why do you look for that? Why is that what you're looking for? Why don't you see your brother or your sister as a fine individual, praising what they do well, encouraging them, but you're looking for a speck here. You're scrutinizing here to find a speck, but you don't consider the plank in your own eye. Well, that's what human nature does. We would rather have a cacophony of issues that other people have and keep our mind busy with all that noise of all the problems and the defects all the time, everybody else, so we can't see the plank in our own eye. It keeps the obvious from our attention. Jesus brings this out. How can you say to your brother to remove, let me remove the speck from your eye and look a plank is in your own eye? You could use lots of examples of the individual always complaining about his wife, and men will do that. They'll belittle their wives because of their own deficiencies.

Instead of building them up, appreciating them, encouraging them, not just in marriage, but in life, on the job, in family, in the church. This is what true leadership is about. It's bringing out the best and encouraging the best performance and the best productivity in everyone, and there's a lot there. But if you get up with a critical eye, the world is broken. The company's broken. The church is broken. Everybody's broken, and nothing can be accomplished except yourself. That's not the way it really is.

Verse 5, hypocrite. First remove the plank from your own eye, then you'll be able to clearly see to remove the speck from your brother's eye. I tend to find in my own experience that if you ignore the speck in your brother's eye, God will take care of that. You know how God sometimes shows you your shortcomings and me my shortcomings? A lot of that just gets taken care of. It's through the encouragement and the growth. Sometimes we feel a lot freer to look and ask God for correction. It seems, according to what Christ is saying here, the person with the greatest flaws is the first to find fault in others, to create that steady distraction, to kind of camouflage their own disappointments in life. It's like the woman who was caught in sin. Remember that event? Why was that woman caught in sin? Some busybody was watching that woman.

That was something done somewhere in secret. Somebody was lying in wait. Somebody was studying her. Somebody was trying to get ready to pounce, and there was a gotcha moment. Jesus Christ scratched something greater, evidently, about each of the accusers.

Definitely there was a speck in her eye, but he seemed to be describing some planks. And when he was done, her mistake seemed much smaller than the mistakes of the accusers. We can have selfish eyes, lying eyes, lusty eyes, evil eyes. All kinds of eyes are described as what humans have. Those are the lenses that we can use if we're not careful.

Proverbs 28, 22 speaks of a man with an evil eye hurries after riches. Hurries after riches. You can see where that kind of selfish evil, lack of righteousness, lack of loving God and loving man is hastening after personal riches. That's an evil eye.

2 Peter 2 and verse 14 contains some interesting things. I referred to this one just a minute ago, but let's look at 2 Peter 2 and verse 14.

He talks about individuals in the church here.

It says, having eyes full of adultery.

Or as the margin says, an adulterous. It can go either way, you see. Something about, I want something there that's not mine, but I'm passionate because it's going to be about me. Eyes full of this kind of thing, whether it's religious, spiritual adultery, physical adultery, etc. Something here is very self-focused. Now, going on, verse 14, they cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable lives. They have a heart trained in covetous practices and are a cursed children. Several words are good to point out. Just meditating on this. First, let's start with the word children. Children, it's about them, and children don't really care. Give them a plastic baseball. I've seen this happen with my own grandkids. Give them a plastic baseball bat. What do you think they're going to do? Knock somebody's head with it. You know what? They're going to feel just fine about that. When the kid's screaming, they'll just walk around and find something else to hit with it. You've got to stop the kid and say, what did you just do? I don't know. What was wrong with that? Well, how'd you like that hit on your head? Well, I hadn't thought about that. Let's hit the cat. You know, that's kids. So they're kids. They're self-centered and, like all of us were, and still are to a degree. We go on here in verse 14, backing up covetous practices. So the eyes you see are coveting. Oh, I want that. I want her. I want this. I want that. I want to do this. I want that experience. I want that thing for me. I want that... whatever. You turn into a little Solomon. As your riches and wisdom will allow or permit, you know, you turn into this little childish vacuum cleaner that wants everything for you. And going back up cannot cease from sin. The thing that really gets to us, you know, is this thing about sin. And what is it? Eyes full of something that's not godly, gets us to sin. Our eye is a problem. Jesus said, if your eye causes you to offend me, what should you do to it? Plug it out. Now, he's saying that metaphorically, because it's not your eye that's the problem. Being blind isn't going to take away carnality. It'd make you perfect. But metaphorically, that which is the scanner, that's which the thing that you've trained so well needs to go. Imagine childlike eyes that simply see. They don't have a lens yet. It's a book called Metaphors on Vision. And here's a sentence from it. Imagine an eye unruled by man-made laws of perspective, the lenses that we humans create. Just imagine an eye that's unprejudiced by compositional logic, an eye which does not respond to the name of everything, but which must know each object encountered in life through an adventure of perception, simply because it's there. What is it, you know, that eye that gets up in the morning and just simply sees everything, without prejudice, without a lens, without some sort of a tactic involved, without a presupposed composition that has to be there, just to see? What do your eyes see? I ask myself, what do you scan for with the eyes? Eye candy, attention, or fault? Perhaps at times we have eyes for that much more. There's a play called Man from La Mancha, and that play is about a 16th century back in the 1500s, a group of convicts who were in prison awaiting the Spanish Inquisition trial. How would you like to be that group of men? A bunch of guys who were rounded up because of what they had perceivably stolen from the church, and the Spanish Inquisition has you in jail, and you have a trial. That's a desperate situation.

The story was about a madman, and it wasn't about the Inquisition at all, but it was kind of an escape from reality, and he had this madman roaming about. Through his eyes, he saw things differently than everybody else saw them, and everybody knew he was crazy, and he was. But everything he saw was so uniquely, bizarrely, different than the way the humans in society saw it, including he came to an inn where the innkeeper, typically a prostitute, named Oldonza, was serving in more ways than one. And this crazy man came in, and she was being used and abused, and she was in a horrible situation, ill-treated and totally disrespected. And he saw her as a queen, an amazing queen. Dolce and Nea, will unite me, he asked. Will unite me? Make me a knight in your court. She thought he was crazy, too. Everybody thought he was crazy. The story went on, and life went on, and Dolce and Nea was treated horribly, horribly. In the play, the theme song was, To Dream the Impossible Dream. Now think about this. You and I live in a world that's imperfect, and we all feel bad about ourselves. And then, To Dream the Impossible Dream. When I was a kid, when this play came out, this was done by the ambassador Corral. I think it might have been done as special music in Pasadena once. I mean, everybody's so enthralled and inspired by this song. It just grips you, you know? Here are the words to it. To dream the impossible dream, to fight the unbeatable foe, to bear with unbearable sorrow, to run where the brave dare not go, to right the unrightable wrong, to love pure and chaste from afar, to try, when your arms are too weary, to reach the unreachable star. This is my quest, to follow that star, no matter how hopeless, no matter how far. To fight for the right without question or pause, to be willing to march into hell for a heavenly cause. And I know if I'll only be true to this glorious quest, that my heart will lie peaceful and calm when I'm laid to my rest. And the world will be better for this, that one man scorned and covered with scars, still strove with his last ounce of courage to reach the unreachable star. Now those lyrics raise spirits. They're encouraging. They lift people who hear them, and they want to sing the song. And it makes people want to rise, to do better in their life, to aspire to something and keep going. It was the same with the prostitute, Al-Dansa. The closing line of men from Lamancha, you may remember, she states to the men who call her Al-Dansa, kind of call her over, you know, she says, no, my name is Dulcinea. She decided she was going to make a change, even though the man was crazy. She's from now on the queen. That's what she's going to be. She's going to change. Okay, so everybody wants a new canvas to paint every day of their life on. And that's a wonderful thing. We can pray and we can be forgiven. But the reality of it is, if we don't change what our eyes are seeing, we're not going to be there to encourage and lift everybody up. You know, we can say, oh yes, I'll reach for the stars, like the song says. But there's another saying that goes something like this. It's hard to soar with the eagles when you're surrounded by a bunch of turkeys. We need to quit being the turkeys for each other. We do. You know, we're called as brothers and sisters in the household of God to build and edify the body, to build up the body through the agape love with each part doing its share.

And we can't do this on our own. This is not a, oh, this is about me, or a self-promotion, self-help message at all. No, this is about God. It's about the family of God. It's amazing how people develop skills when they're encouraged and praised.

I've never met a person yet that was so deficient that they didn't take off like a rocket when they received some praise and encouragement, some thanks. And God sees you that way. We need to see each other that way. What is God's eye focused on? We want to have the eyes like God and see what God does. What are His eyes focused on? Notice in John 3, 17. Here's what Jesus said.

For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world. He didn't show up with critical eyes. He didn't show up to take from anybody, lusty eyes. He didn't show up with covetous eyes. He just showed up with godly eyes.

He didn't come to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. The focus of God's eyes is saving humans, elevating humans, bringing them up, forgiving them, forgetting, bringing them up into God beings and His family.

It says in Proverbs 17, 9, He who covers a transgression seeks love.

Who covers your transgressions and mine? And what is He seeking? Jesus Christ and God the Father cover transgressions. They seek agape love. That's what we're to be about. And we, as we cover transgressions, sometimes with concern and sometimes we have to get things assisted and helped and on track, but not through critical eyes or condemning eyes. We're covering a transgression. We're seeking a relationship.

Jesus Christ gave us that daily model prayer outline, which includes these words. Number one, your kingdom come. There's the stars, as it were.

And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. That's the view of God. Come on up. Come up to the spirit realm. Come up in your character. Come up. Grow up in the stature and the fullness of Christ. Raise. Don't go down. Raise. And by the way, let's forgive one another as we make progress.

God's family view through their eyes is the kingdom building up, encouraging, and growth. And what exactly is in God's eye? What is he, as it were, get up and wake up to every morning to see? David says in Psalm 17, verses 6-8, it's us. He's looking for children developing. He's excited, as it were, get up every day and look and see how the crop is doing. As the farmer patiently awaits the fantastic crop that he's worked for. Psalm 17, verses 6-8, David begins this way, I have called upon you, for you will hear me, O God. How sad that is. How sad that is. We each get on our knees and we call to the only one who will hear, because everyone else's eyes are too judgmental, too covetous, too looking for self-interest, etc., etc., and we have to call upon God. We should not be like David had to be. We should definitely call upon God, but we should call upon each other, knowing that I have called upon you, the church, my family, my friends, my relatives in the Lord. But David could only call upon God, for he alone would hear him. Encline your ear and hear my speech. Show your marvelous loving-kindness by your right hand.

It shouldn't just be God's loving-kindness, it should be my loving-kindness, your loving-kindness, because we're extensions of God in this new covenant. Verse 8, Keep me as the apple of your eye. That's what we are to God. The apple of his eye.

What does God want in your eye? Well, you and I are not God. We're not perfect yet. So one of the lessons Jesus gave us was over in Revelation 3, verse 18, where he says, Anoint your eyes with eyesave. Go to the doctor and say, Doctor, my eyes. I need some salve. I need to change the way I'm looking through these peepers. I need to see something different. I've had them open too long to the wrong things. Anoint your eyes with eyesave so that you can see. And the context here was about righteousness, about pure gold, about righteous deeds and righteous acts of love and concern for others. That's what we need to wake up and see. What good can I see? Jesus said in Matthew 6, 22, The lamp of the body is the eye.

Whatever it is you're having your eyes look for is the quality of the view inside.

If your eye is good, your whole body is full of light. If you're looking for the right things with the righteous agape concept of helping and serving and moving this family of God forward, you're full of light. He says. Verse 23, But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If you're looking for lust and greed and criticism and you're looking for covetousness and self-exaltation and you're looking for all the things that can embellish your life and make it exciting, well, it's full of darkness. How great is that darkness? That's why he says if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Get rid of that lens. Don't see like that anymore. Wash your eyes. Ephesians 4 verse 31 tells us the view that we should see. Ephesians 4, 31, and 32 says, Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. We're not going to look through those lenses. Those cataracts were taken out.

With the cataracts gone, things get all bright and colorful, and we start staring again.

Wow, I didn't know that was like that. I forgot that had color. I forgot what sunsets used to look like. And blue sky, and water, and butterflies. This is like a new world.

And that world, verse 32, is being kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God and Christ forgave you. We're there to promote one another. Look out for the interests of others. Promote them. Help them. Yes, we all want to reach higher. We want to become better, more God-like. Do better. We want to grow up more into the stature of Jesus Christ. But in order to do that, believe it or not, we can't do it in a vacuum. We need each other. That's why the whole body grows, Ephesians 4, 16, by the part which every part does its share, in agape love. So in conclusion, what do your eyes see? Well, they see what you focus on. What is it that you want to focus on? We need the dock to anoint our eyes so that we can see as the God family sees. Let's turn to Philippians 4, verse 8, and read words that were inspired so that we can see as the God family sees. Philippians 4, verse 8.

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are noble, about other individuals, about other people. Whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, there's any virtue, there's anything—notice, if there is anything praiseworthy—focus your peepers on that and meditate on these things.