GREAT THINGS ENTERPRISE
CLAUDE BLACK
Mark 12:16
Looking Versus Seeing
I was searching the store shelves recently for an item, but to no avail. Finally, I asked a clerk standing in the aisle where the item might be, and she pointed to the shelf directly in front of me. I thanked her and said, “If I had only looked.”
When Judge Joseph Wapner presided over The People’s Court, a defendant backed his car into the plaintiff’s car. The defendant said that he didn’t see the plaintiff’s car. Judge Wapner said it was a case of “looking but not seeing.”
In St. Mark’s account of Jesus’ discussion with the Pharisees and Herodians, Jesus asked them to bring him a denarius. “And they brought it. And he said to them, ‘Whose image and inscription is this?’ And they said to him, ‘Caesar’s.’” (Mark 12:16)
As I thought about this incident, I had to look at whose inscription was on a $10 and $20 bill (Yeah, I actually had one of each—a rare occurrence!). How many times have I handled those pieces of paper without seeing the inscription? It may have been that these interlocutors had never looked at the inscription on the denarius they routinely used until Jesus called it to their attention.
Familiarity often contributes to negligence or oversight, closely related to what psychologists call “habituation.” Oh well, it is communion time again—we pass the cup and bread without savoring the actual significance. An airline pilot has completed the pre-flight checklist over 100 times, so he checks off the items nonchalantly. Proofreading one’s own work is difficult because a writer reads what he expects to see instead of what is actually on the page. Husbands get into “autopilot” and stop noticing their spouse’s needs, changes, desires, or frustrations.
“Father, open my eyes to see Your presence today.”
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