A Fresh Perspective

Last year at this time, I had just returned from Australia, where I had experienced a fresh perspective on life. It was my first overseas trip, and Brisbane is so similar and yet so different to Durban that you see the similarities and differences in everything. In England, you only see the differences. I found the experience of seeing differently quite lifegiving.

I think that from time to time, we need to give ourselves to the process of revisualising our lives. What would we think and do if we saw things differently. This is no easy task. We struggle to understand what we are familiar with, and taking the effort to embrace a new way of seeing is a really difficult thing to do.

In the scriptures, we read how Jesus restores peoples sight or heals people who were born blind. We seldom stop to think about how traumatic that must have been for them. Imagine everything looking different to how you remembered or perceived it to be. As Christians on a journey of discovery, we need to be prepared to have that experience for ourselves. Allowing Jesus to change our outlook, our perspective, and transform our lives will come with the shock of seeing things differently. So much of the Gospel narrative is Jesus telling the followers of God, to see differently.

My prayer is that God will open our eyes to a new perspective of life.

I hope you have a memory or a dream that can help you to contemplate on this renewed vision. May God give us fresh insight into the calling on our lives.

Rector

Venerable Andrew Manning

Feast of St Augustine of Hippo