The key to achieving spiritual "focus" is peripheral vision.

A recent television commercial for a new generation of IBM personal computers featured an excited new owner lauding her machine by noting with awe: "I couldn't believe it. There I was, cruising on-line with the Internet while keeping my primary document on-screen and checking the office memos. And I was sending a fax at the same time!!!"

The frightening thing about this woman and her message is that this is considered to be good news. As our electronic sophistication continues to develop, and its ability to throw multiple levels of questions, answers, data and documents at us grows, those of us still trying to master the art of chewing gum and walking at the same time are in for a tough time.

The key to being able to do many things at once is not brilliance or electronic wizardry or even terrifying effic- iency the key to that ability is focus. And what is focus? The integration of peripheral vision. Lest you think I am playing word games or mind games with you, consider this example: What tied the movie Forrest Gump together? His jogging. And what do we learn from his jogging, or anyone's jogging? When the body is most in motion, the mind can be most at rest. My mind is never clearer or more focused than when my body is sweating and straining.

We are being taught this phenomenon of achieving focus through peripheral vision through the Magic Eye books. (It would be great if you could have color copies made of a page from one of these books and walk through how you see it. But beware: Some people simply can't see it. Or as Elizabeth Rennie, speaking for the latter, puts it defiantly, "There are two kinds of people in this world those who say they see it and those who admit there's nothing there to see.") In Japan, where the Magic Eye #1 book was first published in 1991, 750,000 Magic Eye books sold in eight months; 200,000 sold in Korea during the first month of publication. Magic Eye #1 and #2 are, at the time of this writing, both on the New York Times Best-Seller List, with Magic Eye #3 already published and climbing up the charts. There is now even a "Magic Eye" column on the last page of the comics section.

When you develop this depth perception, you begin to see meaning where there were only random dots before. Once you get used to this peripheral vision way of looking at life, highly focused three-dimensional images materialize out of abstract, seemingly chaotic fields of color and random lines. Once you "get it," a whole new world of experience opens to you. No matter what you think you're seeing or how well you think you're seeing, there is more to be revealed.

Jesus was a master at achieving the most amazing focus through peripheral vision. He brought into focus the smallest and the least alongside the cosmic and divine.

In the midst of serving an anxious, pressing crowd, he could feel the touch of the hemorrhaging woman and focus on her needs. In the midst of teaching his chosen disciples, he could connect with the tiny children running underfoot and focus on their needs. In the midst of preaching to and healing a huge throng of people, he could hear the hungry rumblings of empty stomachs and focus on that need.

The choice is ours. We can go through life looking at random dots and flat surfaces or three-dimensional images and magical realities. We can see with shallow perception or with the deep vision of faith in God. Jesus chose deep vision over shallow perception.

When the crowds shouted "hosanna" and when the crowds shouted "crucify him," Jesus chose deep vision.

When he was preaching before pressing multitudes and when he was praying in solitude in the wilderness, Jesus chose deep vision.

When he was responding to baitings by members of the religious establishment and when he was reaching out to heal a blind beggar, Jesus chose deep vision.

Whatever the circumstances, wherever he journeyed, Jesus demonstrated the ability to do many things at once in ways which brought into focus his mission of proclaiming the coming kingdom of God and teaching men and women how to be disciples of that coming kingdom.

In today's gospel lesson, Jesus reprimands Martha because she has chosen shallow perception over deep vision. She has become "distracted" (perispao literally "dragged around") by the random tasks she was attempting to complete as she conscientiously connected the dots of her role as hostess. As she was "dragged around" by all those chaotic chores, Martha was also dragged out of peripheral vision. Just as my Gramma sometimes was all there for me while she was rocking in her rocking chair, and sometimes was all there for me while she was lying beside me in my bed, so both Mary and Martha could have been all there with Jesus while working in the kitchen or sitting at Jesus' feet. It was not Martha's commitment to serving her guests that Jesus belittles it was her shallow perception at that moment.

Mary, sitting at Jesus' feet, recognized Jesus as her Logos and "Lord" ("kyrios"). She saw the magic of the moment and perceived through her peripheral vision that this was a God-moment like none other. Martha's distraction was not her busy-ness in the kitchen but her single vision about what she was doing and the singular importance of her frenetic serving activity. She did not bring the physical and spiritual into focus together but became cyclopean about the physical.

Martha's problem wasn't just that she was singly focused on providing physical things for her guests. She was also mistaken about her identity at that moment. Martha was not the hostess. Mary's rapt attention and peripheral vision at Jesus' feet reveal to her that Jesus is our true host.

A new world expanded right before Martha's very eyes when she trusted Jesus to bring the contradictions and brokenness of her life together. Will you do the same this morning? Will you move from shallow perception to deep vision? Will you let Christ become a three-dimensional figure and force in your life today?