2 Corinthians 3:18 NASB

"But we all, with unveiled faces, looking as in a mirror at the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit."

I recently purchased the new Christine Caine book, “The Faith to Flourish.”

It’s an incredible book. I have always appreciated her zeal for the Lord and love for the lost and broken.

If you are not familiar with her, I encourage you to read up on her and check her out on her social media. She has an incredible ministry and an incredible testimony of God‘s saving grace.

Since we are all in this together I wanted to share this excerpt in hopes to encourage you as this life brings with it hardships and suffering.

During our hard days life can begin to feel hopless, like the world is closing in on us. Every day feels dark and gloomy and hope is hard to find.

My prayer for you is that on those days that it feels like staying in bed and not having to face another day is the best option that this excerpt of "The Faith to Flourish," by Christine Cain would help remind you of the scriptures that tell us to,

Colossians 3:2 NLV

"Keep your minds thinking about things in heaven. Do not think about things on the earth."

Turn Your Gaze Toward God -

"As much as I love gazing at the beauty of God’s creation, I have to admit that ...

there is nothing more beautiful than gazing at the beauty of the actual Creator Himself.

David expressed this sentiment in Psalm 27:4-6 when he wrote, 

“I have asked one thing from the Lord, it is what I desire: to dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, gazing on the beauty of the Lord and seeking him in his temple.”6

When David penned these words, he was fleeing from his son Absalom, who was conspiring to take his throne. In the midst of the chaos, 

David took time to gaze upon the beauty of God.

The word gaze comes from the Hebrew word chazah, which means

“to see, perceive, to contemplate with pleasure; to look, to behold.”7

Therefore, gazing is not glancing -

It’s not casually looking -

It’s not stealing a glimpse -

It’s being fully focused on beholding the transcendent beauty of God. 

It’s steadily and intently admiring God. 8

That’s what David did. 

Have you ever caught yourself gazing at something beautiful?

Perhaps you love gazing at the stars, or at a beautiful painting or an eagle soaring. I know it’s no surprise, but for me, it is likely to be the waves on an ocean, the view from a mountaintop, or a sunset. 

Gazing at the beauty of creation or art is something we can readily understand because we can physically see those things with our natural eyes, but gazing upon the beauty of an invisible God can seem impossible to comprehend—precisely because we cannot see Him.

Of course, when Jesus walked on the earth, He was the image of the invisible God, Colossians 1:15 but even when He did, the Scriptures make clear that, physically speaking, He looked like a typical, ordinary person: “He did not have an impressive form or majesty that we should look at Him, no appearance that we should desire Him.”10 Isaiah 53:2

We live in a world where we tend equate beauty with whatever we consider to be attractive physical features. We have been conditioned by culture and the media alike to look at people’s external attributes to determine whether or not they are beautiful. There are entire industries that foster this perspective, and in the process, inadvertently skew ours. When we scroll through social media or peruse a fashion magazine, we can see the world has clearly established who is deemed to be one of the “beautiful people” and who is not.

But when David gazed upon the beauty of God, he wasn’t looking at any physical features because the Hebrew word used for beauty means the ...

“kindness, pleasantness or delightfulness” of God.11

True beauty really is below the surface, not observed with physical eyes, but perceived with spiritual eyes or the eyes of the heart.

The beauty of the Lord is seen in His attributes. In His holiness, majesty and glory.

In his sovereignty, power and might.  

When we take the time to turn our gaze toward God, to linger in our gazing, we see His beauty.

When we comprehend clearly how all the good that God has done for us ...

—every single thing—

has been an act of mercy and grace that is undue and undeserved—it changes us.

And when we see His beauty ...

— we are transformed —12

When we remember how He has faithfully acted out of who He is in our lives—loving us, forgiving us, redeeming us, transforming us, and tending to our broken hearts.

When we reflect on the times when He graciously has pulled us out of situations that we got ourselves into;

When He has mercifully forgiven us for the same sin we committed yesterday and the day before and the day before that;

When He has lovingly accepted us in the midst of others rejecting us. 

When we comprehend clearly how all the good that God has done for us—every single thing—has been an act of mercy and grace that is undue and undeserved—it changes us.

And when we are transformed then we can reflect God’s beauty

—His kindness, pleasantness and delightfulness to our world."

Romans 15:13

'May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit."