Just As He Sees It

Some days I sit back from my computer or my phone, or maybe after a meeting at home, and close my eyes, trying to set my gaze on what is lovely. It’s hard to unsee all the troubling news bombarding my view in this modern era of screens unending.

The circumstances that are oceans away, or even at our doorsteps, can be difficult to make sense of. And because of that, sometimes it’s hard to even carry the good when there is so much weight in our hands and on our minds.

Our thoughts shift toward those who wear grief like a cloak; perhaps, we ourselves are shrouded in it. We see tragedy on a personal level and suffering and terror raining down on the national level too. It’s hard to see. It’s often difficult to find a word to describe or define our emotions, not to mention dealing with what others say we should feel. And, in the meantime, we steward the community we dwell in, navigating the proximity to those around us who grapple with their own weights, unfairness, and injustices.

We can’t control it all, and surely we were not meant to, yet it pours out on us either way. Where is the justice? Where is the redemption? These are the questions we ask within the rising noise or perhaps, the deafening silence. There are no easy answers, yet we long for them.

I was recently listening to the story of Joseph on my Bible app. Listening and not reading because, in that moment, I didn’t feel like I had the capacity to run my eyes over the words. My eyes ached—weary and overstimulated. I felt like I had access to too much input that I couldn’t unsee or process clearly, so I let my hands loose in my kitchen sink and I listened.

As the words drifted over me, I wondered how Joseph must have felt throughout the circumstances of his young life. For the most part, he did what he thought to be right, operating with integrity even when he found himself in an unfair situation. Yet calamity upon calamity was added to the weights of abandonment and rejection he carried. Even in prison, he chose to use the gifts and talents, that had first gotten him in trouble, to help two prisoners interpret their dreams. In doing so, he received the assurance of remembrance, release, and justice, finally. But justice did not come that day or for many days after. It wasn’t until a king had a dream that suddenly the memory of Joseph was triggered.

Several things stood out for me as I listened to the story. The first and most significant was that God was with Joseph in every single place, even in the dark, dank prison cell. Joseph should’ve received justice immediately, at least that’s the way many of us see it. The interpretation of the dreams should have been an open door out of his suffering, but justice didn’t happen as he, or even we, thought it would. Nevertheless, God had a view that Joseph was not privy to.

God’s plan would be carried out as he saw that it should. A king had to close his eyes for the night to encounter the dream that helped him see. People needed to be prepared in times of abundance so they would one day have enough to eat. There is a vividness and clarity to God’s plan that we can’t comprehend with our often weakened and weary sight. Our vision doesn’t allow for a neatly wrapped package of understanding when there is suffering, war, terror, diagnoses, division, death, rejection and so much more—especially when that suffering feels undeserved and, sometimes, even after we make the right choices, like Joseph.

Justice does not happen when we think it should or when we desperately want it to, but the justice we all need happens according to God’s design. I don’t yet understand why, but I know that in the midst of the pressing darkness of injustice, God is there.

He is there, infiltrating the darkness with his light, lifting our chins when we close our eyes tight, drawing us closer to see with his ways, his eyes. Jesus, our Emmanuel, is coming to destroy every wicked work and lie and to wipe the tears from every eye.

Yes, Lord, we set our gaze on the view you’ve had from eternity. And as we pray for and sit among and walk with those whose eyes and hearts and hands are heavy, help us to partner with you in prayer, in surrender, in trust, in action, and in hope. Help us to set our gaze on you. For our families, for our children, for those we lead and serve and disciple and invite to the table, let justice come, not as we need it to be, but just as you see, as you have designed it to be.

What injustices do your eyes and heart ache over? How can you set your gaze on Christ today as you ponder and pray?