Getting Out of Focus to Get Into Focus

I invite you to click on the picture above and/or follow this link:  http://www.3dwonderstuff.com/gallery_pages/main_gallery.html   You also might try the animated 3Ds as well.  Very cool!

Position yourself about 12 inches away from the screen, then allow your body and eyes to relax.  I actually cross my eyes and focus on the center of the picture, then slowly allow my eyes to relax back to normal position.  As you do, you should be able to see a kind of layering affect, where 3-D image hollows out of the picture, and once it’s there, it will stay awhile and your eyes will adjust.

Years ago the rage was stereograms.  Remember when you first heard of and saw them?

I remember the first time I saw one.  It was both intriguing and frustrating at the same time.  I couldn’t see what everyone was talking about, and then when I did finally get it to work, I somehow thought that instead of seeing a hollowed out image, I’d see a full picture jump out at me, complete with different colors and details.  However, once I figured out how to look, I saw things from a different perspective, and a whole new world opened up.

I was thinking about stereograms, and I find it very interesting that in order to “see it,” one has to allow their sight...their world...to go out of focus.  In fact, we have to force ourselves to go to a place where things are fuzzy and different, then relax and trust the process.  It is only then that things come back into focus, only in a different way.  We see a different thing, and we are amazed at what we see.

How often in the wrestles of life have we had to do the same thing?  It’s so easy to do the same old, same old or read a passage in the same way with the same perspective or keep the same prejudices or ideas, yet when we dare to allow those ways and perspectives to “go out of focus,” we can often find ourselves seeing, learning, and growing in new ways.

Of course, to do so means we have to take a risk.  It means we have to dare to see differently or be different, and yet isn’t that what Christ calls us to do?  Isn’t that the way we are shaped and changed by the grace of God?  Isn’t that what we need...what our society needs...what our churches need?

In the midst of the wrestles of life (and when I’m stumped putting together a sermon) I can be stubborn and hard headed, or I can simply keep doing the same thing and never think to step away from the situation.  But if I step back, think or read differently, then new things pop out.  New perspectives are revealed, and I am changed.

If we step back, take risks and seek new perspectives, not only are we changed, but in our transformation, God just might be able to use us to change others.  Maybe even the world.