Colouring the World In Truth

How do you see your world? How we see our worlds determines how we feel—our attitudes—and how we act—our behaviours. How we see our worlds relates to the colour of our lens.

It would be fairer to say it depends on how we feel as to how we see our world. Most of us have more than enough chameleon going on within—not the colour of our skin changing, but the colour of our outlook and approach reflecting our reactions.

Are We Wearing Rose Coloured or Blackened Glasses?

Weakness becomes us either way.

If we find ourselves seeing things in overly simplistic ways, or we allow the positives to sway us too far in joy, we fall for the falsity of an exuberance that cannot be sustained. Too soon we are disappointed. Likewise, sometimes our situations are overly darkened and we can’t muster any enthusiasm as much as we try.

Neither of these situations-of-outlook prospers us. What we need is to see truly.

Seeing Truly

The Holy Spirit helps us, in no better way, than by the inspiration, and thereby revelation, of truth. The truth, whilst it’s not always initially welcome, sets us free (John 8:32).

In overly positive circumstances the truth threatens to despoil our sense of joy. In depressing circumstances the truth comes to our rescue, in encouragement to explore faith. In both situations—the inflated and deflated—the truth right-sizes the colour of our perception, and the presence of wisdom isn’t beyond us at these times.

Wisdom cannot abide in untruths; much less, is that process (venturing in untruth) taking us to maturity.

Seeing truly negates the emotions that prove to be burdensome. It’s about becoming aware of the bridling emotion as it climbs within our psyche and combating it by installing truth to the witness stand.

For a moment we are threatened, but only a moment. After we’ve arranged a fair hearing, in our right minds at last, we accept the truth, however reluctantly. There is wisdom.

***

We can’t help see the world by different colours of the kaleidoscope: the instinctive emotions. The temptation can be defeated, however, when we suspect the colour might be wrong; the lens perhaps informing us incorrectly.

Re-colouring the world is about suspecting our initial emotions as prone to leading us in error. This is keeping a close self-account.

We don’t always see correctly. The more we can check our initial take on things—how we have coloured our world—the wiser and more reliable to the truth we become. So much better to keep good self-account than to be corrected by others.

The truth of recoloured sight holds us aloft to freedom; such a height is not dizzying, however, but liberating, by the means of our faith to adhere to truth.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.