DEVOTION / Don't let your senses lie to you
Which ring segment in this graphic is longer?
A trick question
Yes, it's a trick question. It's an example of the Jastrow illusion. Our eyes tell us the top segment is shorter because our eyes want to compare the inside of the circle segment on the top to the outside of the circle on the bottom. But they are both the same size.
True confession: I didn't believe they were the same size. So I copied the graphic into Photoshop where I laid one ring segment on the other. They are the same size.
Surrounded by trick questions
Our senses don't always lead us to the truth. Mirages in the desert only exist in one's imagination. Studies have proven eyewitness testimony is frightfully inaccurate. Our sense of the movement of time often doesn't match the movement of the hands of a clock.
Worse: our sense of who we are spiritually is always inaccurate. For instance,
Most humans think they are reasonably moral. God says, All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6).
Most humans believe they have a reasonable sense of right and wrong. Our creator says, The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure (Jeremiah 17:9).
Most humans are sure that their lives have been filled with sufficient goodness to offset their failures. The perfect God says, Whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it (James 2:10).
No more than we can trust our eyes to measure the Sketchplanations' ring segments can we trust our senses to accurately describe who we are spiritually. We can't trust our senses to lead us to the right relationship with our creator.
The truth is available
Fortunately, we have access to the truth. And this truth is more accurate than Photoshop.
Jesus promises, The Spirit of truth … will guide you into all the truth (John 16:13).
God's Spirit shares truth with us whenever we listen to his Word. Every word of the Bible comes from him: All Scripture is God-breathed. Spirit-breathed.
And because it comes from the Spirit of God, every word of the Bible is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
There's only one way to avoid being tricked into believing lies about ourselves and God. We fill ourselves with God's truth. The Spirit of truth [through his Word] … will guide you into all the truth.