Out of focus

   I have a vision which I call the 'aha moment'. It is the moment we die and see all that was previously unclear. Like we just came from the optician with a new pair of glasses. Things unknown to us will be known. All the things we wondered about while here on earth will be either clear or clear that those concerns were not really important. 

     It is pretty clear , no pun intended, that we do not see well in this plane. We can't really. We are not God even as we sometimes like to think we are. We act in ways that keep our focus on all the wrong things like a child preoccupied with toys. But God has tried and continues to try to refocus us on what is truly important. Sometimes it takes major events in our lives to help us refocus. Sometimes it happens with age and wisdom. For all the faults of organized religions, they do try to get us focused on the important stuff of life.

      I don't think I want to innumerate all those important things that begins with recognizing our God given goodness and fulfilling the legacy of love that Jesus showed us.  One could go on but no matter what journey one takes, no matter what religion one chooses or is raised into, the goal is better vision of this world which has a transcendental quality that mirrors our creator.  We are not simply physical beings, creations like a rock even though we share the same foundations. Remember man that you are dust, and so on.  

        We should at least try to train ourselves not to be like Peter in today's passage in which he focuses on the wrong thing, the easy, safe, worldly journey. We are all called to a higher plane of existence.

Matthew 16:21-28

From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, ‘God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.’ But he turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling-block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’

Then Jesus told his disciples, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?

‘For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done. Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.’