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I just can't get used to these new sunglasses. You know, the kind where you look at the person and all you see is yourself reflected in their glasses! I like to look people in the eyes when I speak to them. Eye contact is important to me, and the last thing I want to see when I look at someone else is me!! In these sunglasses, you can see your mussed hair, wrinkled shirt, and the piece of spinach in your teeth. ( Well, OK, that might be a good thing.) But, who wants to talk to their own image in the place where the eyes of the person you are talking to are supposed to be? It is simply unnerving. To see ourselves in someone else's eyes can be very revealing of our own inadequacies.

There is someone, however, who delights and even desires to see His own image when He looks into our eyes. That person is our Creator, God. He wants to see Himself when He looks into the eyes of each of His children. God wants to see eyes of mercy, instead of judgment when He looks at us (James 2:13). He longs to see in His children eyes of compassion instead of indifference (Matthew 9:13), eyes of love rather than selfishness (see ! Corinthians 13), and eyes that are able to see past a tough and prickly exterior, to a vulnerable and needy soul. God wants to see a reflection of Himself, when He looks at us. Oh, He doesn't want to see a lot of cookie cutter people that are all exactly the same. He has more facets to His personality and being than that, and He created His children with the same multi-facets that are His. ( Just think of all of the various species of fish, for example, or the various shades of red, or blue, or green, or any other color.) There are, however, some basic qualities and characteristics that should be common among His people. The differences are evident in the way each unique person expresses these qualities and characteristics.

So, how should we look? How about loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, gentle (calm) and self controlled? All of these basic qualities of God,( And these are just for starters-- you can study the Bible and find many more qualities and characteristics of God. He details them, so we will know what we are supposed to look like.) can be expressed quite effectively in and through a myriad of different personalities and types of people. The Bible says that the world will know that we are Christians by our love. Some people are really mushy, touchy-feely types of lovers. Others are not, and still others fall somewhere in between. The point is for our Heavenly Father to be able to look at us and see Himself within our personality.

For, you see, God looks into our eyes, and yes, even past our eyes into our very heart and soul. We may be able to hide our eyes from others behind those sunglasses (reflective or not). But, we can not hide our heart from God. He sees it all. He knows us thoroughly. He knows if it is His reflection He is seeing in us or not. The good news is that God knows that we are a work in progress. He sees parts of His own image in us that are clear, and other parts that are pretty fuzzy, if there at all. Yet, He does not give up on us. He keeps shaping that image, and we have the promise that "He who began a good work in you will complete it"- Philippians 1:6.