DEVOTION//#thedress

Our perceptions can be wrong.

#thedress

Do you remember the "dress that broke the internet"?

In 2015, Caitlin McNeill used Tumblr to post a photo of a dress worn by the mother of a bride whom McNeill knew. "Is this dress white and gold or blue and black?" she asked.

Her post exploded across social media. Angry arguments marred debates about the dress' colors.

Fifty-eight percent (58%) of Facebook users said "The Dress" was white and gold. The remainder insisted it was black and blue.

Those in the majority of that poll were wrong.  (Find out more about those faulty perceptions here. The Science of That Dress)

Faulty perceptions

One of the drawbacks of being human is we can't always rely on our perceptions to give us an accurate understanding of reality. Our senses can mislead us.

Worse, our spiritual perceptions always mislead us.  

The reason? Our spiritual perceptions are not only unreliable, they are ruined. That comes with being spiritually dead, enemies of God, spiritually foolish, and spiritually senseless.

That explains Old Testament Israel's love affair with Baal and other false gods. That explains the Pharisees' commitment to keeping laws rather than trusting grace. That explains why people choose alcohol, power, or fame as their gods. That explains why we Christians also frequently struggle to overcome pet sins. 

True perceptions

And that explains why we desperately need God's Word to tell us what reality is. The Bible can never give us a skewed view of reality (Psalm 119:3). The God of truth speaks to us there (John 17:17). The Spirit guides us "into all truth" there (John 16:13). We meet our Savior there (John 5:39). 

Since "all Scripture is God-breathed," it is the only source of truth that "is useful for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, and for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, well equipped for every good work" (2 Timothy 3:16,17).

God communicates with us through the Bible. It is the only source of reliable truth. Seek it out. Let it transform your view of reality. Depend on it to convince you the important things in life are black and blue, not white and gold.