‘Skye! – Look at me!’ is a command we learnt recently in Skye’s puppy training class, we say it in a happy voice then when she’s worried or in danger, we can tell her to ‘look at me!’ and she will look to her owner and feel safe.
Heidi Baker wrote “Whenever I say ‘look at me, Lord’, He responds: ‘No, look at Me!’ …. I want to live in that secret place and look at Him. When we focus totally on Him, we stop worrying about me altogether.”
Its so easy to focus on God in the easy times but how many of us keep our focus on God at other times – in the challenging times? Do we look inward worrying and multiplying our own anxieties? Or do we look to our Heavenly Father who’s saying “Fiona! Look at me!” (You can put your own name here.)
The politics of our country is in an unprecedented state of unrest. The media, as usual, are catastrophizing, reporting media hype, exacerbating uncertainty, fear and anxiety, creating divisions. We have a choice: we either become embroiled in it and join the national press in panic mongering, a consequence of which will contribute to bringing our country into a major state of unrest influencing every aspect of society, or, we choose the alternative – the way of peace.
For those of us who are christians now is the time to look at Jesus – to focus on Him to receive His peace, grace and love. To trust Him for our future. To draw ourselves into that secret place, to be so focused on Him that we see how He wants us to help Him encourage our neighbours in our multicultural nation. We, as a faith, are called to look to the needs of others in our society – our families, our neighbours in our communities and our brother and sisters throughout the world – to reach out to them in peace, love and harmony. We know that the only way to do this is not in our own strength but by drawing strength from Jesus as He calls out to us “Look at me!”
‘Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in His wonderful face
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of Your glory and grace.’
Jesus called us to trust in Him and bring hope to the world – to whom will you bring light and hope today?