Bird’s Eye View
Dan Kunz
When I was in my twenties, I got the opportunity to fly in a small plane. My sister-in-law’s nephew had his pilot’s license and had rented a four-passenger plane to fly to eastern Wisconsin from the Minneapolis area. Four of us went on a thirty-minute flight south of Green Bay. We flew over the Lake Michigan shoreline, farm fields, rivers, towns, and woodlands. It was especially cool when we flew over areas that I knew like the back of my hand – the places where I hunted, fished, went to school, and played baseball. I believe the reason I was so captivated was because it gave me a totally different viewpoint than the one I had. Things looked a lot different from five thousand feet in the air.
Perhaps you’ve heard people talk about the “30,000-foot view”. Lecturers, preachers, and public speakers will often introduce a subject with an overall summary before getting into the details or doing a “deep dive”. It’s a helpful tool to see things in total and then focus on a particular aspect. I’ll give you an example. My wife and I own a fairly large piece of property in western Wisconsin. The property is bordered on one side by the Black River, which flows into the Mississippi River. While standing at the river’s edge on our property, the river is fairly wide, probably close to a hundred yards in places. Because our land is part of a big bend in the river, you really can’t see what’s around the corner in either direction. Trees may be blocking parts of the river. A dangerous waterfall or dam may lie ahead. A beautiful sandy beach could beckon a kayaker or boater. From the perspective of an airplane or an ultralight (which I’ve flown over our property), all of those would be easily visible, but not from our shoreline.
You and I also have a totally different viewpoint of the minutia of our lives than God has. While we may be paralyzed by a tragedy or challenge in our life, our Heavenly Father sees the “light at the end of the tunnel” or the blessing which lies right around the corner. We may be reveling in the joys of a new love, a healthy baby, or a long-awaited retirement, and God says, “You think that’s great, wait until you see what I have planned for the future!” It’s critical for us as Christians to know God sees things we don’t. More importantly, God can do things in our lives we never even thought of. It’s even more important to remember who God is and how he feels about us – our kind, loving Heavenly Father who always has our best interest in mind. Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
God could see from his viewpoint, we had no way to pay for our disobedience, no way to be with him for eternity, so he did something about it. By sending his own Son into the world, living a perfect life, dying a horrible death, and rising from the grave three days later, God took care of our sin when we couldn’t even see the mess we were in! Whenever we are tuned into the trouble or even the joy in our life, remember God’s perspective. The old saying, “God only knows…” is true, even if we don’t realize it!