paradigms

I was reading some C.S. Lewis yesterday. I came across a passage that I totally disagreed with. I thought. I thought, how odd, that I would disagree with one of the most well known, well respected Christian authors and thinkers of our time. There must be something wrong with me. Maybe my paradigm is wrong.

Webster offers up this definition of paradigm: a philosophical and theoretical framework of a scientific school or discipline within which theories, laws, and generalizations and the experiments performed in support of them are formulated; broadly : a philosophical or theoretical framework of any kind.

I think the best way for me to explain the word paradigm is to remind myself of the "rose colored" glasses that I am wearing. Everyone sees the world through a certain set of lenses. No one sees it clearly. Brave people wake up one day and realize that they really are wearing glasses. They really do not see the world as it is, but as they perceive that it is. They begin to ask the question.......what is my paradigm like? Soon follows the deeper question, how can my life view begin to change?

The essence of the Christian faith invites all of us to "see" the self-centeredness in our paradigm and to begin to work on replacing the self with love. There is a familiar statement around here, "it is a beautiful day in God's world, be sure to see the good." This statement invites all who read it to leave the world where they are unhappy. To leave the world where it is all about them. To leave the world of negativity and to choose to see the good. An invitation to a paradigm shift.

Do you know that even you have a particular paradigm, a particular way of seeing the world? Did you know that you put on glasses every morning? What things in your way of seeing the world may need to change? Just asking the question is so invigorating to me!

It's a beautiful day in God's world, be sure to see the good.