Some Things Are Not As They Appear

When the eye is placed between the luminous body and the objects illuminated by it, these objects will be seen without any shadow. ~Leonardo DiVinci 

My grandfather grew the world’s best tomatoes.  I ate them warm, right off the vine. As a child, my mother carried a salt shaker to his tomato patch. These were good tomatoes. He’s gone to heaven, his field is now grass, and I don’t eat tomatoes anymore. They are all lies, all poor substitutes for Pop Pop’s true tomatoes. Those poor souls who enjoy pale, waxy tomatoes…

I listened to Beethoven in the womb as my mother practiced endless hours for a recital just inches away from my awakening ears. One day only recently I said to her, “I love Beethoven. His music just settles right down into my soul, making perfect sense. It’s like a balm to me.” She smiled and told me why. How would I recognize a lousy tomato and where would my ears find rest above the cacophony, if I had never before been placed in the midst of perfection?

To recognize God’s light and to see all things as His light reveals them, I must place myself in His presence and in His word. To know Him is to know what is good. Only then can I recognize His light from that which aims to obscure it, from that which might seem otherwise to be adequate. And only then can I taste His truth and hear His perfection.  Like the sun, He is luminous; and like the moon, those in His light will be illuminated.

“Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.” Matthew 7:15