It's About Perspective

Several months ago, the Celebration Baptist Church (CBC) crew fulfilled their commitment to the Arkansas Highway Department’s Adopt-A-Highway program. For those who may not be familiar with the program, groups like CBC volunteer to pick up trash for a one mile stretch of highway. CBC’s stretch included one mile of Interstate 30 near the Haskell exit.

While picking up trash, the group noticed a car pulled to the shoulder of the road with an apparent flat tire. There were three young men working to replace the flat tire with a spare. They didn’t need help, so the group continued the task of trash pick-up.

At one point, one volunteer turned to Mr. Dale, a retired public-school teacher and a patriarch of the congregation, and commented, “I am glad we are not changing a flat tire on the side of this busy highway!” To which Mr. Dale replied, “One of them is probably thinking ‘I am glad I’m not picking up trash on the side of the road doing mandatory community service.’”

Mr. Dale, always the teacher, reminded the group, yet again, of the importance of perspective. That caused me to begin thinking about the perspective of a Christ-follower.

• A Christian’s perspective on anything must be filtered through the Bible. The 

“assumptions we think and live by should be Biblical ones. We should build on these Biblical assumptions when approaching theology, politics, economic theory, medical science, emerging technologies, the arts, human behavior, literature, criminal justice, international relationships or anything else” — Charles Colson.  Everyone has a filter through which they view life and everything associated with it. A Christian’s filter is the Word of God.

• The Christian’s perspective must include the universal need for Jesus in all people. According to the Bible (see above), all people are broken by sin and cannot repair themselves. All people need Jesus to resolve their sin crisis.

• The Christian’s perspective must include hope. Biblical hope is not some “think so” or “wish so” positive thinking mindset. To degrade Biblical hope to those terms is tragic. Biblical hope is a confident assurance that God will do what He said He would do concerning all things, especially eternity.

The question remains, “So what?” By filtering everything through the Word of God, the understanding of man’s universal need for Jesus and the believer’s sure hope in Jesus, the Christ-follower should be compelled to live life with focus, purpose and assurance. We learn the what, why and how of life. We have the perspective necessary to see real life-change in those around us.