Missing the Obvious

Last week I started the business of packing up the Christmas decorations, beginning with the house's main floor.  They get stashed away in the basement, which means numerous trips up and down the stairs.  It felt good to get most of that done.  A couple of nights ago, we had dinner guests, friends from church.  And, just now, while coming out of the guest bathroom, I spied the 24" wreath hanging on the inside door which leads down to the basement.  How in the world could I have missed that?!

Do you have a talent for missing the obvious?  I certainly do, not just with Christmas decor either.  In fact, Ms. ObLIVious could be my middle name....and it's frustrating.

21My son, do not lose sight of these—
keep sound wisdom and discretion,
22and they will be life for your soul
and adornment for your neck.

Proverbs 3:21-23 (ESV)

I just love when God lets me "see" or "hear" something from His word, from His people.  One instance of that happened yesterday at church.  Hubster and I ended up sitting near a visiting couple, and the reason we ended up there was soon readily apparent.  I'm so glad not to have missed that!

In the same vein, I hate missing things that I should have seen, realized or done.  Some of this predicament is due to a lack of discernment, the spiritual gift of wisdom...situations in which I've lost sight of "the main thing".  In particular, I wonder how I am coming across to other people.  How do they view me? Is the light of Christ shining forth through me?  Or, is my own obtuseness keeping that light tamped down?  Am I hindering the gospel?

It is a gift from God to be able to see yourself as others see you, I believe.  (The English poet, Robert Burns, agreed.)  Sometimes, the picture is not too pretty; or, that is often the case with me.  It's like when someone posts a picture of you on Facebook and you look like the Michelin baby: fat, fat, fat! You look at that photo and think, "Is that how people truly see me?"  As it goes in the physical, so it goes in the spiritual...except that the stakes in the spiritual realm are so much higher.  The unbelieving world is so very often "turned off" to Jesus by what they see in our lives.  If that's not a sobering thought, I don't know what is.

Father, we often think that our "light" is obvious to others, when the exact opposite is the case. Other times, we are fully conscious that we are not representing you well, and we just don't care.  Both of these are sins - - the first of "omission" and the second "commission".  Oh Lord!  Please open our eyes, so that we do not miss the obvious. Give us wisdom and discernment to "adorn our necks", so that others will see You and Your wisdom as gorgeous gems when they are around us.   In Jesus' name, amen.