Looking In the Mirror

Most people spend a fair amount of time in front of a mirror each day, especially in the morning. Unless you’re a spy or an automotive mechanic who’s trying to peer around corners, you typically look in a mirror to examine yourself. You are front and center. Some of us also spend time in front of the mirror in the spiritual sense while reading our Bibles. This, too, is a good morning habit. The mirror, then, has great utility in both the literal and figurative senses.

The Bible speaks often about the value of self-examination; hence, the mirror analogy in teaching myriad holy doctrines. For example:

On the topic of the Lord’s Supper:

But a man must examine himself, and in so doing he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly.
On the topic of salvation:

Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you — unless indeed you fail the test?
On the topic of self-deception:

For if anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But each one must examine his own work, and then he will have reason for boasting in regard to himself alone, and not in regard to another.
On the topic of seeing what God sees in us:

For our exhortation does not come from error or impurity or by way of deceit; But just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who examines our hearts.
On the topic of purpose:

But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good.
The Bible certainly prescribes “looking in the mirror” as the means of examining ourselves, with the intention of being sanctified experientially by grace through faith by the power of the Holy Spirit. We must stand in front of said mirror with humility. “GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE” (1 Peter 5:5). There’s a primitive snag to this good work, though.

It’s easy for us to become preoccupied with the person in the mirror. Fair enough? As is often the case with a literal mirror, we become distracted by our own beauty (however one defines it for themselves), even though we had no part in putting it there. We stare at our faces, our hair, our bodies, our clothing, etc. Why? We’re always looking for reasons to idolize ourselves. We don’t always do this, of course, but we do it enough that it becomes an area of weakness, a pitfall of sorts. The Bible refers to this kind of self-adulation as vanity. It’s obvious in the literal sense, but it takes a little digging to identify our vanity in the figurative sense.

We see all the good work that God has accomplished in us, just as He has promised, “For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6), and we inevitably fall into the pit. Ugh. The pattern we see in the literal sense becomes the one we realize in the figurative/spiritual sense.

We tend to focus too long on ourselves. We are vain, by nature.

The Bible instructs us to the contrary.

Therefore if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.
The purpose of “looking in the mirror” is to examine ourselves (more accurately, to allow the Word of God to reveal to us the truth about ourselves) for the sake of sanctification, admiring all that God has done in us. If we look at the image in the mirror with the intent of seeing Christ, we are blessed. If we’re in an idolatrous mood, we focus on ourselves too long, at the expense of clear Biblical instruction to “regard one another as more important than [ourselves]” (v3). God is not glorified by this behavior.

So here’s my suggestion, and I’ll do my best to put it into visual form. Imagine looking into the mirror and, instead of focusing solely on yourself the whole time, you look over your shoulder, where the rest of the people are. If the mirror is God’s perspective (what God sees when He looks at you and your life), then there are a lot of other people He sees in your periphery - others that you, too, could see if you stopped focusing so much on yourself. Are any of them sad or in need? How would you know if all you ever see in the mirror is yourself? Is it possible that your preoccupation with your own beauty has distracted you from your servitude towards others? Has God sanctified you for the purpose of your own adoration or for the purpose of loving others? “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

So then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who are of the household of the faith.
But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
When we look in a mirror, we see what God sees. The stumbling block for us is that when we hold it up, we are, by default, front and center. Might we do well to consistently tilt the mirror so that we are no longer in frame, transitioning our focus on what we see in ourselves to what God sees in others? Is it possible that in doing so your perspective becomes His? Isn’t this the whole point of living for others...that we do so in accordance with God’s will?

We are quite often our own worst distraction. When asked to think about a mirror, even in a figurative sense, we habitually think about beauty and presentation, attributes that often hardly stretch beyond mere superficialities. We can learn an awful lot from a mirror; however, humility is the key to unlocking our education.

Love in Christ,

Ed Collins