It was Saturday, and I couldn’t wait to get my day started. As I made my way to the car after dropping off a nice fat check to my CPA, I stopped in my tracks when I saw a beautiful magenta plant spread out against the backdrop of a bright gray sky.

How does one describe “magenta”? Some may say it’s reddish pink; others may say it’s purplish red. The truth is, magenta is actually an illusion created when our brains combine two colors on opposite ends of the color spectrum. So while we see magenta, the color itself doesn’t actually have a wavelength, thus not appearing in the visible spectrum of light. What’s actually between red and purple is the color green, but because the brain wants to make sense of the mixture, it sees it’s own hybrid of the colors which we all know as magenta.

Followers of Christ are called to love even those who have no visible love inside of them, but how do we do that? We learn to see them with love, through the lens of Christ. It starts with our vision—how we see and think of a person. We must learn to see the loveless person with love, compassion, and forgiveness just as our brains have learned to see the “nonexistent” magenta.

When we learn to see people the way God sees them—with love—our actions towards them will soon reflect that love. When the loveless person is shown love, they are shown a template, an example of how to become love and love others. It doesn’t always mean they will immediately (or ever) be inspired to follow suit, but by loving them right where they are, we are giving them the best gift we can give, a gift they can either choose to accept or reject.

When we learn to see people differently, we learn to see life itself differently. We start to realize our war is not against flesh and blood but against principalities—rulers of the dark world. (Ephesians 6:12) When we learn to see people with love, we not only give them the gift of love, but we set ourselves free from bitterness and strife. Seeing magenta even where magenta cannot be found is a bit of a superpower, isn’t it?