Quotes from 'Eyes Wide Open' by Tony Reinke (2)

The following quotes are taken from Steve DeWitt's outstanding book, Eyes Wide Open: Enjoying God in Everything (Credo House, 2012).

“The fall from created perfection to sinful imperfection has darkened our understanding and our thinking has become futile (Ephesians 4:17–18). The result is that we are confused about where to place the glory. Beauty still creates wonder, and wonder still searches for someone to give glory for the beauty. Without God, however, we are left to worship the artist or simply the beauty for its own sake. We worship created things rather than the Creator (Romans 1:25). Our wonder turns onto itself. We worship things, stuff, and matter. This is the bane and emptiness of materialism. Image-bearers designed for a life of meaning lived in relationship with God are emptied of significance by bowing to an ‘it.’ The only way an image-bearer of God could descend to such an inane level is for a lie to be mistaken for the truth (Romans 1:25). This is what has happened, and is happening, all over the world.” (92–93)

“Each election cycle creates fervor over the next perceived messianic politician. Mankind intuitively places their hopes and allegiance in a perceived great one. We want someone we can look up to, believe in, and identify with. Image-bearers need a hero. More specifically, fallen humanity needs a Savior. All the beauty longings of our heart scream for just one beauty that restores, fulfills, and endures. Christianity heralds just such a beautiful one: Jesus Christ.” (98)

“Jesus is the Beautiful One. His beauty is a tapestry of divine and human perfections harmonized in subtlety and majesty. This is one reason His beauty is missed; it is so different from anything we ever come across. Jesus’ beauty wasn’t His physical appearance. By human standards, He didn’t look like a Messiah. Isaiah 53:2 tells us that ‘he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.’ Significantly, the New Testament includes no description at all of Jesus’ physical appearance. . . . Scripture doesn’t put a face on the Lord so that His real beauty can shine through.” (102)

“Wonder can save us when it convinces us that nothing is more desirable or beautiful than Christ. Once we are spiritually awakened, we apprehend the beauty of Christ and wonder grips our soul. As we have seen, wonder leads to worship. Wonder at His beauty leads to worship of His glory. This is the death of the lie that something other than Christ can satisfy us — and the birth of new life in Christ. It is the restoration to what we were made for: wonder at and worship of the living Christ.” (106)

“Physical beauty is a shadow. Food is a shadow. The security of money is a shadow. Health is a shadow. Family is a shadow. We long for a relationship with someone greater than us, and we settle for cheap substitutes — race-car drivers and football players and movie stars admired from afar. But the real desirability is found in Christ. God made every created beauty in this world as an expression of Christ’s beauty and the beauty of the Father’s love for the Son. All beauty is a breadcrumb path that leads us to Christ.” (107)

“To give God honor is to agree with what the experience of beauty is intended for.” (117)

“Wonder-producing beauty is an opportunity for us as Christians to consider the glory of the one who created it in the first place. All beauty whispers to us in this way. This is a call to worship, to go from what I can see or hear or smell or taste or touch to what I cannot. My thoughts go from the visible to the invisible, from the created thing to the Creator. When my wonder gets me there, I esteem Him as glorious by giving Him honor for both the beauty and my enjoyment of it.” (118)

“When we experience a moment of beauty, we should turn wonder into worship by giving thanks to God for His goodness in providing it, for His creativity in making it, or simply for our pleasure in experiencing it.” (119)

“God gleams from every molecule and atom of this universe. He is the beauty within and beyond every wonder-creating sensory experience. As we delight in God, our senses search for opportunities to enjoy Him in the pleasurable sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures all around us.” (122)

“A Christian’s God-focused enjoyment of creation makes it taste better, look better, feel better, smell better, and sound better.” (129)

“Truth is beautiful, falsehood is ugly. If there was nothing beautiful there would be nothing ugly. The ultimate example of this is hell itself. Hell tells us what God is like, even as it breaks our hearts to consider it. Hell speaks the truth of God’s love and beauty by displaying how ugly its absence is. In this way, hell tells us what God is like. When art is anti-God, the Christian worldview stretches to see it for what it is — a lie — and to view the lie as an opportunity to glory in the beauty of truth. Ugliness helps make the good and beautiful more desirable.” (142)

“The unbeliever has nowhere to go with his experience and is left to crave it again. Go to another concert. Have another sexual encounter. Watch the same movie over and over. The Christian takes the wonder and uses it to animate praise to God. This consummates our joy in the beauty and glorifies God as the giver of beauty’s blessings. In this way we enjoy man-made artistic beauty for what God intended it to be — a wonder-producing, praise-inducing experience of His glory.” (145)

“Even in a fallen world, with fallen artists, man-made beauty creates powerful moments of wonder. Jammed concerts, packed theaters, and ultraexpensive paintings all speak to art’s power and appeal. Turning these experiences into 'God moments' is why God gave them — and the artist’s ability — to us.” (147–148)

“Art can be a powerful blessing to us as long as we interact with it from the Christian worldview. Unfortunately, too many Christians just listen to songs and read novels and watch movies without thinking critically about what they are seeing or hearing. We must think like theologians as we go to art studios, read books, watch TV, and surf the Web. How do we do that? By interacting with what we are seeing or hearing through the grid of God’s Big Story. Otherwise, reality as it’s not supposed to be will shape our values and our perspectives on life. Man-made beauty is that powerful, wonderful, and dangerous. Similar to God-made beauty, man-made beauty requires us to bring God into the enjoyable sensory experience by relating it to what we know about Him.” (153–154)

“Critique without enjoyment misses out on what God has made us for. Enjoyment without critical worldview thinking makes us susceptible to the negative value system often portrayed in a fallen world by fallen artists describing their perspective on reality. The former misses out on the fun, while the latter risks folly. God wants better for us.” (155)

“I should specifically ask myself, Am I able to turn this man-made expression into worship? If the answer is no, why would I endanger myself spiritually? There is no man-made beauty that is worth damaging my spiritual walk.” (164)

“The more we see, taste, hear, touch, or feel something, the less joy we derive from it. Buy that favorite song, and after hearing it a hundred times, it’s not our favorite anymore. Buy a giant chocolate chip cookie at the mall, and the last bite isn’t as good as the first. . . . We need a new world where beauty never fades and the wonder of it never goes away.” (171–172)

“This book’s purpose is to walk with you toward what you really want. Ultimately, that is not the experience of beautiful music or beautiful food or beautiful fragrances or beautiful stories or beautiful homes or beautiful bodies or perfect friendship or blissful marriage or any love or pleasure this world has to offer. We were made for a better place and for a better person, and all the beauties of this world whisper that to our soul. We crave Christ. He has made this restoration possible and offers Himself to mankind as Savior, Redeemer, and Restorer.” (180)