Macro

You have searched me, Lord,

    and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise;

    you perceive my thoughts from afar.

You discern my going out and my lying down;

    you are familiar with all my ways.

Before a word is on my tongue

    you, Lord, know it completely.

You hem me in behind and before,

    and you lay your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,

    too lofty for me to attain. (Psalms 139:1-6)

Today's word is "macro," and I had to look it up. And I learned that a macro lens is a special camera lens for taking photos at extremely close distances. I apparently have a pretty good macro lens on my iPhone 11. Here's a picture I recently took of my cat, Ruthie:

I love this picture! I particularly love those little black specks on her nose. Seriously, I adore those black specks! It's part of what makes her unique. It's part of what makes her Ruthie, and not some other cat.

I was thinking about the word "macro," the up-closeness we can achieve with a macro lens, and how this macro idea works itself out in relationships. Ruthie trusts me, so she allowed me to get this close to her. If we're going to let someone else have that kind of "macro" view of who we are, we need to trust them. And that can be hard.

And then I was thinking of how God has the most macro view of all because he knows our very thoughts. He knows when we sit and rise; he's everywhere we are. He knows what we're going to say, even before we say it. He knew us--he formed us--in the womb.

But then, how often do we fail to experience this closeness? How often does it feel that God is far away, or that he's not even there at all? Maybe he meets us for a short prayer before dinner, or maybe we get a glimpse of him in a Bible verse someone posts online ... but how often do we feel that closeness?

For the past couple of weeks, I've been sleeping late. I'm not sure why; it might be the glass of wine at night, or the fact that my kid is resisting sleep more than usual, with school being near its end, and no real motivation to get up early. Whatever the reason, my 5:00 a.m. prayer and meditation time has not been happening. I've been getting up at 7:00--just enough to read my Bible (though I admit that I check my phone between chapters, and sometimes during chapters).

And guess what? That awesome nearness with God? That intimacy? The seriousness of what quiet time I do have? Not happening.

This grieves me, so I'm going to be making some changes. I think prayer is key to developing that macro focus--on God, on my needs, on the needs of others. And without regular, focused prayer, everything's become a little fuzzy.

So, tomorrow. Actually, tonight. The macro lens of the spirit begins to come into focus again.