Tunnel vision.
It’s when we’re so focused on something, that we can’t see anything else.
Imagine making an overnight trip in your car. You drive through the night to reach your destination. The highway is clear, just the red of taillights in the distance, and occasionally you notice something off to the side, the lights on a radio tower or a car on a sideroad, its headlights filtered by signs or shrubs.
You keep your eyes on the tarmac, the lines on the road flickering as they snap under your wheels, gone, gone, gone.
Then your headlights catch eyes on the side of the road, from a coyote, a raccoon, or another wild creature. Your focus shifts from the road, and everything changes in that moment. Your adrenaline pumps, your heart rate increases, and you feel more alive.
That’s how we are when Jesus comes on the scene. He appears in our darkness, and he jars us out of our focus, out of just getting through day after day after day.
Luke 2:8-9 gives us a glimpse of how it went 2,000 years ago:
“And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear.”
Does that wild creature at the side of the road fill us with fear? Sometimes but not usually. It wakes us up, pulls our attention from the repetitive drudgery of our days. Gets our heart pumping.
That’s why we love Christmas so much. The decorations, the songs, the gifts. It’s like we can step aside from life for a time, jarred into a focus on Jesus, and feel the enthusiasm of the season.
When God comes into our sight, he wants us to focus on him. Tunnel vision. Looking only at him.
God shines most brightly in the middle of our night.
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