Look Around You – What Do You See?

When you look around you, what do you see?

Inside your home, you may see things of value to you and your family – furnishings, decorations, souvenirs, collections, pictures of family members, etc. Outside your home, you may see a yard, a garden, decorations or furnishings on a porch or deck – things that make your house a home.

When you look around you, sometimes you are surprised by things you have not seen before. Some things may have been there for a long time and you are just now noticing them – an empty bird nest, wild flowers in a back lot or behind the garage, a new plant that came up on its own. It is possible to look around you and see something new.

I have often heard people say, “what you see is what you get” – meaning there is no pretense – there is nothing hidden here.

That phrase or at least the acronym WYSIWYG has become well known in computer language – meaning what you see on the screen is the way it will be displayed in print.

The original phrase has been around since the 1940s when it was associated with straight forward advertising. The comedian Flip Wilson popularized the expression in Rowan and Martin’s Laugh In and the Flip Wilson show in the 1960s, so it was around long before it was adapted in computer language.

As a child of God, I know what I see with my eyes is not all there is. The spiritual blessings He gives are of much more value than the material things surrounding me. I appreciate those things He gives me in this world to enjoy and I thank Him for them, but because of His presence, I enjoy much more than the things I can see right now. In fact, those things I see now will be left far behind when it is time for God to take me home.

I am eager to look around me on that day and see the eternal blessings He has planned – to discover that something new.

So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal (2 Corinthians 4:18 HCSB). But as it is written: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9 NKJV).