February 19

Psalm 51:7

For behold, you look for truth deep within me, and will make me understand wisdom secretly.

When I was around 10 or 12 years old I saw my first autostereogram. Yes, an autostereogram. No, I didn’t know that’s what it was called until I looked it up to write this piece. I figure it’s better to use the real word instead of saying that poster thingamajig. Anyway, I was not yet a teenager, and I found myself staring at this poster thingamajig (ok, so it’s fun to say). It didn’t look like anything more than a splash of colors that were vaguely organized. It was hanging in a store somewhere, and a salesperson or another observer suggested I focus on a spot behind the poster to make sense of it. As I tried to do that I went from squinting to crossing my eyes, all the while not understanding what was supposed to happen. Finally, the flat poster sprang to life as an Indy Car appeared to be flying off the page at me. It was 3-D without the glasses – it was incredibly cool. I realized that not everyone could see the image even after trying, so I felt proud to have such special vision.

The verse from psalm 51 above is a reminder that God has this same special vision – whether God uses it to see really cool posters or not, I can’t say. But I do think God has the ability to see through us to our deepest most hidden parts. When we say God knows us from before birth, we acknowledge that God has a deep and thorough knowledge of our innermost parts. We acknowledge that there is no place to hide from God. In fact, I suspect God knows us better than we know ourselves. We have all sorts of innate and subconscious ways of seeing ourselves the way we want to, yet God isn’t hindered by all of that. God looks at us and sees the truth within us, the truth that is more real than our behaviors and our masks.

Even more interesting, the second half of this verse seems to say in that same process, God shows us God’s self in those deep and possibly hidden parts. At some level below the surface, we understand God’s wisdom and mystery – at a secret level, likely kept secret by the same innate and subconscious behaviors that block our self-vision. If it’s like looking at those poster thingamajigs, it may take some work for us to see what’s there – to focus beyond the surface to see what’s behind it. Through no small effort of spiritual squinting and eye-crossing, this Lenten journey of ours can help us find the truth of ourselves and the truth of God – beyond the surface, beyond the vaguely organized colors of our life.

The Rev. Tom Purdy