As an adjective, the word imperceptible means very slight, gradual or subtle. As a noun it means something not capable of being perceived by the senses. When you think about it, that is how we live our lives, we live it in the imperceptible. Typically today is the same as yesterday and tomorrow will be the same as today. And they form units, yesterday, today and tomorrow and then yesterdays today and tomorrow and so on and so forth. They connect to one another and the days and the weeks and the months often meld into one and the process quickens the older that you get. Seasons begin to fly past and then the years. Someone once said that the days are long but the years are short. It is very true.

What breaks this up is what I call the suddenly’s. Something that happens out of the blue, an incident or incidents without warning. Everyone of us will deal with these and they often change everything. Like earthquakes, they give no warning and then shake the very foundations of our lives. And all too often, when the shaking has stopped, when the storm has passed, when the immediate damage is dealt with, imperceptibility returns. It’s a new reality, but now our yesterdays have once again become our todays and our tomorrows will be the same as today and we begin all over again and the days are slow and years rush by.

The interesting thing is when you become aware of the imperceptible life that you are living. It is almost an oxymoron to say that you are aware of something that is not typically perceived by the senses. Yet, the life that we live in the Spirit breaks up the units of time that we typically find ourselves trapped in. The Spirit of God exists outside of time and space and He bids us to come to where He is. In Him every moment becomes part of the eternal. Walking in the Spirit is to be released from the hamsters cage and taken off the wheel. Living in the imperceptible. We become aware of God and His presence and time means nothing. It loses its grip on us, the chains of its reality are broken in the eternal now.

We are no longer slaves to the tyranny of our fantasies or desires or our wishes for the future. Good or bad, our expectations set up our parameters. They are in fact an artificial horizon of our own making. Walking in the Spirit is to be walking in a land where nothing impedes our spiritual view. We know that we are walking in the Spirit when the only thing that we can see is Jesus our Lord. When He becomes our horizon then time loses its grip upon us and we are set at liberty to walk towards Him.

Even holy things become corrupted when they displace Jesus. When our thoughts have been taken captive by anything other than Jesus then we have become ensnared in the world and its ways. Time, once again becomes our intoxicant. We get lost in the imperceptible. Blinded by its dim dullness. Lord, help us to live in the glory. Help us to live in the eternal moment of your presence where every horizon is a glorious sunrise, the Son of God rising in the hearts of His children. Help us to see the one who lays the beams of His chambers in the waters, who makes the cloud his chariot and who walks upon the wings of the wind (Psalm 104)