Imagine that during a windstorm the world could be convinced that trees are bending over by themselves and leaves are jumping off the ground and running around on their own. That seems ridiculous to those of us who understand the truth of wind, but it’s a good analogy of seeing with spiritual eyes versus fleshly ones: We see the same circumstances as those looking with natural eyes, but we also see beyond the circumstances to the One who is in control and causes things to move.
If we walk through life with only an earthly perspective, we only get a partial, vague, outline of the Truth – what we can perceive with our five senses. But when we ask God to let us see with spiritual vision, I believe God will show us His finished work – the reality that is already complete in His mind. I believe He wants us to understand and see – and ask Him for – what He intends to do on the earth and in our lives. This gives us hope and courage when things look dim from an earthly perspective.
Elisha saw what was around him with spiritual eyes, and God honored his prayer for his servant, that he would have his eyes opened to the unseen as well:
Then Elisha prayed and said, “O Lord, I pray, open his eyes that he may see.” And the Lord opened the servant’s eyes and he saw; and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. – 2 Kings 6:17 (NASB)
He Loves Who He Sees
God’s perspective of the people around us is much different than ours; He sees them with eyes of love and as the people He intends to make them into.
He knows their destinies and how He plans to bring them to pass. He knows what causes them to respond to the things around them as they do. And His heart is to draw them by His love into the fulfilling destiny He already sees them walking in.
When we ask Him to give us spiritual eyes to see people, it changes the way we respond to them, and enables us to walk in the love He desires that we walk in. It gives us the ability to overlook their shortcomings and have more patience, because we begin to see them as the people that He intends to make them into.
Rather than calling people down on the behavior we see with our natural eyes, having spiritual vision lets us call them up into the people that God intends them to be, and we can encourage them that He has a higher expectation for them that He is bringing to pass.
When the Darkness Falls
The daunting circumstances of life would look quite different to us if we saw the good that God intends to bring out of them, as He uses everything He allows in our lives to bring about the good purposes He has called us to.
Viewing our circumstances with natural vision is a lot like walking through a maze – we know the general direction we need to head, but we can’t see how to get there when the maze seems to send us the opposite way.
But God’s perspective is up above the maze, and it makes perfect sense to Him why we need to go left in order to ultimately end up going right. Things that don’t make sense in our natural minds make more sense when we adopt God’s perspective.
If we could see the end from the beginning, like He does, it would have a calming effect on us when the difficulties of life come upon us – and this is so necessary. Anxiety, worry, and fear cause the voice of God to be harder to hear, because they make it difficult for us to quiet our minds and our spirits, and they prevent us from seeing from His view.
Jesus’ words, “Do not let your heart be troubled” (John 14:1), are followed by the encouragement to trust in God and trust in Jesus.
And trust is the key component.
Though God desires to bless us with His view that shows us His intended end of goodness, He rarely reveals to us the step-by-step process it will take to get there. He wants us to trust Him. And we can’t trust Him if we don’t believe that what He is working in our lives is ultimately for our good (Romans 8:28). But trusting in that truth puts us in a place where we can see from His perspective. If the goodness of what He is bringing out of our dark circumstances is in the forefront of our minds, that helps us to trust:
We may not see how He is going to get us there,
but we know He WILL get us there.
And while we’re in those dark days, He wants us to rest in His goodness and the expectation of the good that He intends to bring.