I wrote this on October 12th of last year, but the Lord had me hold it and think about it and pray about it. Now is the time, today is the day, and I answer, “Yes, Lord.” Head up, eyes front.
Wednesday 12 October 2022
I have just read a beautiful word from Wanda Alger about childlike faith, about the Lord Almighty speaking not to our adult selves, but to the child within us. This memory comes flooding back to me:
I am 14, playing in a high school basketball game in Tempe, Arizona. It’s late in the game and there’s a jump ball at midcourt. It’s very loud, everybody’s yelling, whistling and calling out in Spanish and English, guys are pushing and jostling for position. I’ve gotten around the circle so our basket is behind me, and in my peripheral vision I know my guy isn’t covering me closely. Everything begins to move in extreme slow motion, all sound seems to fade, and I make eye contact with our big guy who’s going for the jump ball.
His eyes make the slightest flick toward our hoop, and in that instant of time I know with exact confidence what’s going to happen. He’s going to get the ball and whip it to me, because I’m heading to the basket full speed. There are no words, no play we called, nothing we yelled out in the sideline huddle. Yet that eye contact and imperceptible movement said everything silently, and I heard it perfectly in silence.
The ref begins to toss the ball up and my feet are already moving. The ball comes in a beautiful arc, over my shoulder and perfectly timed to reach me in full stride. An easy, wide open layup to win the game. If it had been loud before it felt deafening then, in a swirl of players, coaches, students and parents. But I’m only looking at my big teammate on the other side of the crowd and make eye contact with him again to transmit some unspoken words: “I heard you, man! What a great pass!” and hear him in return “I knew you were open, and you wouldn’t miss it.”
Now is that time again, it feels chaotic and noisy and so many things seem to be hanging in the balance. We’re not in a basketball game but in a spiritual war, where the sides are very confused, calling out for attention in more ways than our ears and hearts can receive. It’s not clear who’s on what team, it’s not clear where the goal is, even as we know what the goal is: complete victory, complete Peace, complete wild joyful celebration of God’s rescue, of his Kingdom come to us on earth.
I don’t know or care how much time is on the clock or what the scoreboard says, I’m just looking for eye contact with Jesus because that’s all it takes to hear, see, know what the next play is, what he wants me to do. Am I on defense, Lord, guarding and blocking? Do you want me to have the ball, to dish it out? Do you want me to score? This is not a game where win or lose we all clean up afterwards and get ready to play another one. It’s a spiritual war against an enemy with no rules or constraints, an enemy for whom winning means killing us, destroying our nation, tearing our hearts and souls away from God. There’s no court or field we’re fighting on, no recognized boundaries, nothing is ‘out of bounds’ for this enemy. There are no observed ‘rules of engagement.’ Most of us have never been in such unrestricted warfare.
Lord, I know if we’re with you we’re winning because the victory is already yours. I know because it’s my 14-year-old boy who is making eye contact with you. I know it’s you who will silence the noise, direct your warriors, orchestrate the flow of battle. It’s only with your eye contact that we can keep fighting, in spite of the killing and destruction all around us. I know that all the words you have been pouring into me about seeing, looking, observing, eyesight, vision, perspective are all pointing to this fundamental battle-order: that we keep our eyes on you because that’s our spiritual communication channel. That’s the communication line that the enemy tries to do anything to break.
When you ask me,
What do you say my Kingdom looks like?
I know you are pointing me towards every piece of scripture that deals with blindness, deafness, lameness, of saltiness, of keeping every bit of our senses tuned and turned directly to you. That’s not just eye contact, Lord, that’s “I contact.”