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"Mirror, Mirror on the Wall!"
“Mirror, Mirror on the Wall!”
“For if any one is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror: for he beholdeth himself, and goeth away, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was” - James 1:23,24 -
The mirror the wicked witch in the movie Snow White had was a self-esteem booster or an ego deflator. The wicked witch liked it when the mirror told her she was the fairest of them all. When it told her she was not, she got very angry and very jealous.
The good thing about mirrors is they always tell us the truth. You can always trust it to give you a true picture, whether you like it or not, of what you look like. If you do not like what we see, it is not the mirror’s fault. There is no defect in the mirror, it is showing you reality, not make believe. It is a reflection from which you will make changes or leave everything as it is.
Some people have their parents as their mirror. Many of us become like our parents because this is the mirror through which we live, because they lived a certain way before us. We often refuse to question what it looks like, because they are our parents. Would the image they cast be faulty? Our parents may be a reflection of what they received from their parents. Notice what the mirror of God says about our parents, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord for this is right” (Ephesians 6:1). Think about reflecting in your life what is right, not an attitude or action just because your parents did.
Friends can also become a mirror. We are with our friends at school, church, teams, or shopping. If not with them somewhere, we are talking to them on the phone or through a social media of some kind. We enjoy friends off which we “bounce” ideas. Their words we repeat, style of clothes, what they love, like, hate, buy, hear, or taste, we imitate as well. We may never check on whether their reflection is right or not. We just enjoy doing things with them. We need to pay attention to the values they are leading us to duplicate. The mirror of God says “Be not deceived, evil companionships corrupt good morals” (1 Corinthians 15:33).
God and His word is the superior mirror. This mirror is the earnest petition made by God to duplicate what we hear, see, and read from Him. 1 Peter 1:16 says, “Ye shall be holy; for I am holy”. God insists we be hearers and doers of the word. Our understanding of His word leads us to know of His goodness, justice, truth, and righteousness. As a result, this will be a mirror of the type people He wants us to be. When we understand who we are (Romans 3:23), we will know changes will need to be made. God desires we admit what we see as who we are in His word. He does not want us to go away. God desires all men repent and be saved (1 Timothy 2:4; 2 Peter 3:9). Let us look in the mirror and dress ourselves to be the new man He created “in righteousness and holiness of truth” (Ephesians 4:24).
