For whatever reason, pirates
are cool. I blame Johnny Depp. Something about searching for lost treasure,
walking planks, sword battles, and ships with skull flags appeals to our
inner Goonie. Who hasn't dressed up as a swashbuckling scallywag at some point in their life? You've got the do-rag, gaudy earrings, scraggly hair, peg leg, parrot on the shoulder and, of course, the eye patch.
Contrary to popular belief, pirate eye patches weren't used to cover up some hideous wound or a missing eyeball, although I'm sure
that was the purpose in some cases. They were actually an ingenious invention
that gave pirates a tactical advantage in ship-to-ship combat.
See, it takes the human eye 20-30
minutes to fully adjust to the dark. In a bright light, our pupils constrict to
a small dot to compensate for the abundance of photons entering our
retina. In darkness, our pupils dilate
in order to take in more light information and allow us to process what little
see. Put simply, when you wake up in the
morning and can't open your eyes because the sun is, well, doing its thing,
you're waiting on your pupils to shrink so you can stop fumbling around blindly
for your toothbrush.
To bring this back around, pirates
wearing an eye patch would therefore keep one eye adjusted to the light and one
eye adjusted to the dark. If they needed
to go below deck, where it was darker, they could just switch the patch to the
other eye and move about with ease instead of having to wait 20-30 minutes
before they can load a cannonball.
"What does this have to do with
Christianity?"
Ahh yes. So, light and dark is used
often in scripture as a metaphor for good and bad. John loved this one, and I
do too because it serves as an outstanding illustration for otherwise hard to
grasp concepts.
Like pirates wearing eye patches,
some of us keep our lives adjusted to light and dark at the same time. We attend church, hold ourselves to a moral
code, and try to be general do-gooders. But then the night rolls around and we
switch that eye patch over to the other eye and its as if we'd never been in
the light all day - we're out getting drunk, sleeping around, selling drugs,
indulging our fleshly desires.
The problem is, our eyes - our
lifestyle - should not be adjusted to the dark.
1
Thessalonians 5:5 (NKJV)
You are all
sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness.
"How do you avoid getting to
that point?"
If it takes 20-30 minutes for your eyes
to fully adjust to the dark, then maybe it takes 20-30 bad decisions for your life to
fully adjust to the gutter life. In reality, that number is probably more like 2-3 bad decisions. Nevertheless, it starts with one. Just one decision, one temptation.
Doesn't seem like much at the time, but when it comes back the next time, it's
that much easier to give in, until one day, it becomes your new normal. You're
eyes are fully adjusted to the dark.
John
8:12 (NKJV)
Then Jesus
spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have
the light of life."
We need to take the eye patch off
altogether and let the light of God permeate every part of our lives. Leave no
rock unturned. A life fully surrendered to the scrutiny of the cross. Set our
eyes on Jesus and let them fully adjust to His light so that any step into
darkness feels, as it should, wrong.
And when you are immersed in that
kind of light, you can't help but carry it with you. When Moses came down from
Mount Sinai after seeing literal glimpse of God, his face glowed. People thought something was wrong with
him. Something was right with him. I so
want to encounter God like that.
Set both eyes on Jesus, don't look to the
right or to the left, and watch miracles happen to you and through you.
Proverbs
4:25-27 (MSG)
Keep your eyes straight ahead;
ignore all sideshow distractions.
Watch your step,
and the road will stretch out smooth before you.
Look neither right nor left;
leave evil in the dust.
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