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WHAT YOU SEE
"I will set before my eyes no vile thing....Men of perverse heart shall be far from me; I
will have nothing to do with evil." (Psalm 101:3-4, NIV)
I'll be brutally honest. I can't watch some of you swing.
I'm not just talking about the literal or technological distance that separates us. I'm talking about
the fact that your bad swing may be contagious!
Of course, I hope you're wearing a smile on your face as I am wearing on mine. But I do believe it is
possible for one golfer to learn some pretty bad habits from another just by repeatedly watching at a swing that is not quite right.
When David looked down from his palace window and saw Bathsheba unclothed before his eyes, however,
he apparently did not understand this principle. He kept looking at his downfall. He did not turn his eyes away.
We have no way of placing the timing of the writing of Psalm 101, a psalm of David. In it, he bluntly
decried glances upon evil. Bathsheba herself was not evil, but in her bathing state she was a source of wicked attraction for David. And yet he did not turn his eyes away.
If he wrote Psalm 101 prior to this incident, he was wise in his words and foolish in his actions. He
let down his guard, grew lazy in his righteousness.
If he wrote Psalm 101 after this incident, he may have done so out of contrition, but in terms of
consequences, he did so far too late.
By letting his eyes wander and then fix on the object of his lust, his unrighteousness was conceived.
It was only a simple step into his crippling sin.
There is another way. When I was young and playing golf frequently, I spent many hours on the driving
range. Some of the best days were when an especially good player was also there. I would stand and watch for minutes on end. Others might have learned from the mechanics of this good player's swing. I
learned his tempo. Either way, the gain from watching excellence was great.
It's no accident, then, that Scripture chooses the Most Excellent One in telling us who the object of
our gaze should be. We are to fix our eyes on Christ, the author and finisher of our faith.
Interesting, isn't it? Fixed eyes, when fixed in the wrong place, can be the beginning of our sin.
But fixed eyes, when fixed on our Savior, can lead to the finishing of our faith.
--
Jeff Hopper
October 31, 2007
Copyright 2007 Links Players International
The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.
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