mirrors and truth

For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

1 Peter 2:25

Buckle up and get ready because we are looking in the wrong mirror when we aren’t actively looking at Christ throughout our days, weeks, and life moments. Our life mirror, our inner thoughts, that place we live in our minds, that place can either tear us down or lift us up. Our minds are the most intimate place we spend the most time, so what you hold up as your mirror or sounding board is exactly what you feed yourself on a daily basis. When you converse with yourself or problem solve, you have to ask what or who is the influence on how you draw conclusions, solve problems, or outwardly choose to go forward in your life. The greatest question for me lately has been, is it friends, family, clients, co-workers, or other outside influences? Who is holding up the inner mirror of your mind? Who is defining your deepest character of self? Who are you talking to when you are processing your life and where is your greatest influence coming from? Our answer should be that the Good Shepherd is our sounding board, our standard, the definer of us, the standard of Truth, and the complete totality of what we hold our lives up against to see the truest reflection of who we are. I fear that like me, you, and every other believer who has devoted their lives to Christ, have let another person or people hold the mirror up in front of them, and that is the identity they have believed and held as Truth. We are going to dive into who the Shepherd, mirror, and sounding board of our lives is and why He is SO WORTHY of being the One who we converse with and allow our image to be defined by. So we must let go of the mirror we allow to be held up as our standard of truth and see what our Father, and Creator of our hearts and souls truly intended.

Then Moses answered, “But behold, they will not believe me or listen to my voice, for they will say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you.’” The Lord said to him, “What is that in your hand?” He said, “A staff.” And he said, “Throw it on the ground.” So he threw it on the ground, and it became a serpent, and Moses ran from it. But the Lord said to Moses, “Put out your hand and catch it by the tail”—so he put out his hand and caught it, and it became a staff in his hand— “that they may believe that the Lord, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.”

Exodus 4:1-5

Jesus is our righteous Branch (Jeremiah 23:5), our staff of Truth (Psalm 23:4), and the Shepherd of our souls (John 10:7-11). Throughout the Old Testament God empowered, equipped, and gave authority to men to be the shepherd of His people, one example is Moses. We all know the story of Moses, but if we look at how God equipped him, He gave him a staff, this staff was representative of the power, authority, and presence of God to wield over His people in order to lead and guide them to greener pastures. We see the rich testimony of how God gives us imagery for the Truth this staff held in Moses’ hands to give Him authority over Satan in (Exodus 4:1-5). Sin is represented by the snake in this passage, God gives Moses authority over it to pick the snake (sin) up by its tail and turn it back into the Staff of Truth (our staff is the Holy Spirit). The scene here is very important, because with God being Moses’ standard (staff) of Truth, Moses was able to confront and face the sin of God’s people throughout his journey and abide in God. The staff of truth, the authority, power, and presence of God was who and what Moses held up before him as his mirror and standard for his life. Was Moses perfect, no, but did God equip him with all that he needed to live his life in a manner pleasing to God, yes. We see this parallel into the New Testament with the life and leadership of Christ, our great Shepherd, the overseer of all of God’s people.

Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

Mark 16:16-18

Christ came so that we could have the standard of God, His truth, nature, holiness, and His full embodiment, walk with us, and commission each of us to wield the staff of Truth (Holy Spirit). With Christ we can pick up the serpents of life by their tails and turn them back to truth just as Moses did. The staff of Truth is the embodiment of Christ, our bread of life, staff of life which we must hold up as our mirror in our lives. Our mirror should be the Shepherd of our souls, Jesus. Jesus empowers us and gives us authority of the heavens to work on His behalf, but how can we do that if we are operating out of a staff of self, our earthly bodies dead in sin, seeking the bread of self, the physical life in front of us? God gives us a lot of imagery in the Old Testament of people of His nation and many others who run around with their staff of self. We see this over thirty times in the Old Testament references of people wielding their own authority and self righteousness. God desires you to look at Him for the Truth, not anywhere else. Discerning daily where you seek affirmation, conviction, growth, and general pursuit of your life is very important. We can easily get caught up allowing others to hold up our mirror in our minds, and not our Shepherd. We see this illustrated in Hosea where the people have fallen from God, and are pursuing their own truth and righteousness and not allowing God into their walk.

My people inquire of a piece of wood, and their walking staff gives them oracles. For a spirit of whoredom has led them astray, and they have left their God to play the whore.

Hosea 4:12

I read this passage on what God thought of His people and I just about spit out my coffee. God equated His people to whores, because they lent their hearts and souls out to all of the passerby of life. His people created their own staff of truth, idols, relied on it, and were led astray. His people pimped themselves out to the opinions and pursuits of others, instead of steadfast dedication to Him, their Father and Creator, who knows the intimate details of their hearts because He created each on of them. The mirror His people were holding up in their hearts and minds were not of Him, but instead lead to a life without Him, without His goodness. They basically pimped themselves out to the world, and who does the world belong to, Satan, he became their truth. How many times in our lives have we allowed God’s standard of truth to be twisted unknowingly and allowed our identity in our one true Shepherd of our souls to go awry? Probably a lot. I’m sitting there, on this cliff of realization and revelation that God desires so much more for us than whatever convenient and/or fun mirror we are trying to hold up as our staff of truth. Those staffs will always rot and fade, worldly mirrors break, and do not lead to eternal joy, or an honest picture of who you are or where you should be going. Satan pulled a nice little magic trick and got you comfortable in believing that God resides in the fun, self fulfilling pursuits of life, oops. Have been there and will probably be again, but thank God for Jesus, and the ability to repent of all of these ways we whore ourselves out to the world. Seems harsh as a term, but that is the depth of God’s love, that He feels we are cheating on Him, when He isn’t our center, and someone else is. Jesus came so we could be able to experience the richness of fellowship with Him, the way God desired from the beginning. Jesus speaks of this in John 10, of how He came to Shepherd our hearts and souls.

I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. 

John 10:14-15

John 10 is a resonant chapter of the bible where Jesus teaches us exactly who He is, why He came, and what God has desired for us from the beginning. Jesus speaks of how each of us were created to come into His presence and be ministered to by Him. Us, the sheep, will go out, always following the teachings of Jesus, even into the unknown places, knowing we are able to come right back into His presence for His guidance. We hear His voice uniquely (John 5:25) because we were created to, and Jesus meets with each of us individually to uniquely minister to our hearts. We see this throughout His ministry in the New Testament of the unique knowledge, and intimacy of relationship He has with each person He encounters. That is the same for us, He calls us by name, and meet in the deepest parts of our souls daily if we allow Him. Then in this space He becomes our mirror, the definer, and refiner of our character, the Truth. We find security and liberty in Jesus and in that Truth we can operate in the power and authority of Christ. Because of Jesus, God has equipped us with our staff of Truth, our daily guide, the Holy Spirit, and with Him, we shall not want for anything.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Psalm 23

Psalm 23 is beautifully rich in God’s love for us, and we see again this theme of the Shepherd’s staff, the most important tool of a shepherd being what brings us comfort and guidance. Jesus left us with the great Comforter (John 14:15-31), our guiding staff, and our mirror to help us see God and seek Him each day with our whole heart, the Holy Spirit. Jesus is the reason we can access God’s presence daily and come in and out of the gates of Heaven on earth as we please. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit allows each of us access to the green pastures and restoration God desires for our resurrected spirits in our bodies. In this space, is where God does His best work as our Father, and where Jesus as our Shepherd is able to minister to our character, knowing us just as well as the Father. God’s generosity allows us to have His Spirit and Christ as our advocate daily before Him, so He can maintain a richness of fellowship that we were made for. Jesus desired for us to each understand and know that He is fully present, so we may be Shepherded by Him each day, through the indwelling of His Spirit.

Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.

Hebrews 13:20-21

If by now you have not come to the realization that your life as a believer was created by the God of the universe, and created for more than the earth and the things of it, then I pray that you come to know who our God is and how intimately He knows you. He desires to be your everything, from your foundation, to your highest achievements for His glory, and your lowest places. Do not allow people be your shepherd or any flesh of this earth, there is only One who stands in that place, and He is your King, Creator, and Lover of your soul. God spoke this over me yesterday while riding through the woods on my bike and this word is for the Church as a whole. “You are made for the Heavenlies, your heart and soul were made for Me, and only created to be satisfied by Me. Things of this earth always fade, but the Heavenly realm you were made for, Me, is eternal. I love you and know you because I made you and chose you. Stop desiring fulfillment in the world, because it will never satisfy, you forget who and where you were made for. It is not a dream, for that is not where I reside, live for Heaven on earth, I am here and I am present. I am your Good Shepherd, lover of your soul, and the redeemer of your life. Trust me, know me, and seek me, for I am with you. “