Focus

“The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great [is] that darkness!” (Mt 6:22-23 AV)

Very interesting passage.  Information comes by our senses.  We learn by what we experience.  We smell, touch, hear, taste, and see.  The most influential of all senses is sight.  We learn more by what we see than any other sense.  In fact, what we hear, smell, touch and taste is defined by what we see.  More than one sense is involved in order to comprehend what has just been experienced.  Sort of like triangulating.  In order to come to a fuller understanding, there needs to be more than one point of reference.  Therefore, when the LORD tells us that sight is the light of the body, He is being far more scientific and accurate that we might at first realize.  Having said all this, the implications of what we observe matters much.  The LORD is preaching a singularity of observation and focus.  This does not mean we cannot scan or take in more points of view.  Rather, what we observe must be seen through a single lens.  That lens is the Biblical world view which Jesus is trying to show those assembled for his sermon.

I grew up with photography as a hobby.  I graduated from a single focus lens in 110mm to an SLR using 35mm.  Digital photography had just dawned by the time I put my camera aside.  The thrill of an SLR is a single point of focus.  The single focus lens took the picture we a single depth of field.  Everything was in focus, regardless of how far the subject was to the lens.  Something miles away was just as focused as the person in the foreground.  When SLR came out, the photographer could focus on his subject, which caused foreground and background to blur.  What a revolution!  This opened a world of photography that had not existed before.  Now, we could take all the information available but focus on that which drew our attention. The subject became the primary concern and all other information was secondary or complimentary.  With the advancement of digital photography, 3D is not available.  This enhanced depth of field takes SLR focus to a new level.  Now, the subject is even more in focus.  All other information may or may not be pertinent.  It may enhance or detract from the subject depending on the photographer’s intent.  Secondary information is often unavoidable.  It can be edited out later, but at the time of the photo, it is there nonetheless.  One thing is for certain.  When the photographer is taking his or her picture, he or she has in mind what is the center of the photo and what is unimportant.

This is the point of the passage above.  We cannot control everything we see.  One trip to the grocery store will verify that.  One cannot avoid immodesty.  Not completely.  Unless we live in a remote area with no other human beings, we will see things that are unfortunate.  What we can do is define what we see with the single lens of God’s holiness.  If we see wickedness, we can interpret these unfortunate sights by the lens of God’s justice and mercy.  We can use our eyes to complement the point of God’s righteousness, or we can consume what we see upon our own lusts.  The choice is ours.  Jesus is not saying we need to close our eyes and only open them when we are guaranteed nothing will offend.  Rather, Jesus is telling us to put on the single lens of purity, righteousness, virtue, or praise.  How we chose to observe the world is just as important as what we choose to observe.