At the MSU museum tonight . . .

A little boy near us: Look at those dinosaur bones!!!

Jemma (puzzled): Who killed the dinosaur?

Me: (laughing to hard to respond) . . .

I love my little girl so much. My 5 year old Jemma tends to be the first one to find the other angle, the fresh perspective. One of my goals is to constantly and more quickly see the fresh perspective. When others see an undiagnosed illness, I want to see an opportunity for God to do what only He can. When my country sees communist China, I challenge you to see 200 million underground believers and a church that’s exploding despite persecution. When you see a neighbor who is cranky, what if you saw a beautiful person for whom Jesus died.

Seeing a fresh perspective means that I won’t stop changing the channel on my perspective until I land on something that thinks like God. It means that when I get to God’s perspective I won’t change the channel no matter what flashy new thing comes into view. For instance, when people you love get sick, change the channel from fear and doubt as many times as it takes to land on faith again and again. Then stay there. Hold the ground. See God’s desire to heal, or God’s desire to restore, or the good that God can do through that annoying person, or the beauty that’s possible when that broken relationship gets restored.

Someone killed that dinosaur Jemma. You are so brilliant. You can still see that dinosaur alive, can’t you? Maybe it wasn’t as terrifying as it sounds in our stories, maybe it would have made a nice pet. What’s the fresh perspective you need to see today?