Changing Your Outlook to an Uplook

At a metropolitan intersection a pollster sprang this question on twenty passersby: "Without looking up, tell me what the sky looks like right now." Not one could say. To most city people, the sky and its clouds are of little or no consequence.

To many of us, the heaven that awaits us "up there" is of little of no immediate consequence. We're content to wait until we get to heaven to get preoccupied with thoughts of it; we don't take time to "look up" from down here where earthly preoccupations compete for our attention.

Paul's imperative admonished us clearly against this tendency: "Set your hearts on things above....Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things" (Col 3:1-2). He then implies that this habitual "up-look" prepares us for the parousia: "When Christ...appears, then you also will appear with him in glory" (v.4). He thus affirms Jesus' injunction to "lift up your heads" to await his "coming in a cloud with power and great glory" (Lk 21:27-28).

Elsewhere Paul proposes that same eschatological motive for fostering a spiritual uplook: "I say, even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ....Their mind is on earthly things, but our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ" (Phil 3:18-20). His coming will make our earthly interests look like straw.

This excerpt is from the book One-Minute Meditations for Busy People, by John H. Hampsch, C.M.F., originally published by Servant Publications. It and other of Fr. Hampsch's books and audio/video recordings can be purchased from Claretian Teaching Ministry, 20610 Manhattan Pl, #120, Torrance, CA 90501-1863. Phone 1-310-782-6408 or www.Catholicbooks.net