Tasting and Seeing

What defines a "bad day"? Physical comfort, emotion, circumstances, feelings, reputation, family? Perhaps we should try to answer this by taking another route: what defines a good day? What is goodness? Who defines it? How can some days be good and some days be bad?

Yesterday was a bad day for me. (I'll say that a bad day is when I look at myself or my situations and not at Jesus. A bad day is when I exchange God for something lesser). As I was attempting to stay busy at work at the office, it seems that I couldn't help but become a little discouraged. Why were my worries preventing me from seeing the joy in Christ? How could the joy of salvation be restored to me?

But something drastic happened: I began to look. After I popped a mint into my mouth, I was reminded what I read earlier in the day: "The earth, O LORD, is full of your steadfast love" (Ps. 119:64). Immediately I was amazed. As I continued to savor the mint, I became struck by the fact that I could taste. And not only could I taste, but I could feel the mint on my tongue. I could rub my fingers together, and I felt it. I then glanced around the room to be met by trillions of details; I could see! And as I walked back to my desk, I could hear my own footsteps on the floor.

This week God made a critical connection in my mind: my physical senses exist to glorify Him in leading me to my spiritual senses. My tongue exists so that I can understand, at least in part, what I means to taste the goodness of God (Ps. 34:8). My eyes have been designed in such an intricate way so as to see an infinite amount of information and beauty and colour so that I can understand that God's goodness is beautiful. I hear and learn to recognize decibels so that I can be reminded to learn what the spiritual voice of my Shepherd sounds like (John 10:27). The touch so intricately placed on the epidermis of my hands reminds me that I am held in the hand of someone greater (John 10:28). My smell of hot coffee, a burning candle, perfume, soap, a friend, washed clothes, or freshly baked bread reminds me of the fragrant aroma of Christ (Eph. 5:2).

God's love is everywhere, and until this week I didn't understand this aspect of seeing. I was once the blind man that cried out, "Son of David, have mercy on me!" He restored my sight. And yet to this day, I cry out the very same thing. And to this day - day by day - I am seeing more and more.