Photographing birds is not easy . . . they move around very quickly. Often times we hear them but don't see them. So I bought a book about bird photography and one suggestion was to put up a feeder in your own yard and learn to photograph backyard birds first. Bird photography takes patience. It involves waiting. So I refilled the hummingbird feeder and bought a new little feeder for the trees in my backyard and sat down on my screened in porch to wait. It is much cooler there with the ceiling fans and there are no bugs. I took a test shot through the screen and was surprised that I didn't really see the screen. So I decided to just sit inside my comfortable screened in porch and wait.
It didn't take too long for a hummingbird to fly in. They zip around quickly. It took several tries to even get the hummingbird in the frame and when I got it, on the back of my camera it looked OK. When I put the image in my computer I got this image. When you look at the small image it is OK, but click on the link to enlarge it and you will see what I saw, a rather blurry image. The blur isn't due to camera shake, the shutter speed is high enough to hand hold. It is the screen that made the image blurry. It threw out the focus of the lens.
As I thought about this I kept hearing the words of 1 Corinthians 13:12 in the King James Version:" For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face:now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." You can see the bird in the picture, but you can't see it clearly. Christ sees us not as a blurry image, but as the complete person he made us to be. This is a wonderful promise. One day seeing Christ will be like taking the perfect image at f/22+++ without a screen in between. It will be clear and full of detail. We will see him and none of the "whys" will matter.
So on earth we will have times when we see through a glass darkly. Sometimes the image is clearer then others, but only when we see Christ face to face will everything be clear. I think I will use this picture to remind me when I go through times in which the glass is very dark, that Christ is still there and one day the glass will be clear.