HEARING GOD WITH SEEING EYES
Jeremiah 1:11 (ESV) And the word of the LORD came to me, saying, “Jeremiah, what do you see?” And I said, “I see an almond branch.”
God always makes good on His word. He had just told Jeremiah that He would give Him words, and now He is starting the process, not by speaking, but by showing. God is not just a God of words, He is a God of pictures as well - we call those visions, and their explanations we might call revelation. Those two words are scary to religious people, myself included, because they have been so misused and misrepresented. Yet God does speak through visions and revelation. He shows us things, maybe sometimes outright by giving us an open vision where we actually see with our eyes, but most of the time in less obvious ways, like through impressions and thoughts. If we don’t like the word “revelation,” we might be more comfortable with the word “illumination.” I do not believe God gives more revelation than what we have in the Bible and in the person of Jesus Christ, but I do believe God illumines our understanding to what He has already revealed. Any supposed understanding or revelation that is in contradiction with scripture should be dead on arrival.
Isn’t it interesting that the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah and the very first thing asked of Jeremiah is not concerning what he heard, but what he saw? I have never had what would be called an open vision, where something is played out before my natural eyes like a television screen; however, I have had times where the Lord has shown me something through my spiritual eyes, the eyes of my understanding. The Apostle Paul actually prays that the eyes of our understanding would be enlightened (illumined) that we would know... (Eph 1:18). Perhaps this is what Jesus is getting at when He says, “He who has ears, let him hear.” (Matt 13:43)
In our desire to grow in Christ we must not only listen, but we must also look. It is wonderful to listen to sermons and read the Bible, but we must also be looking with our spiritual eyes, lest we be prone to grow intellectually in our understanding of the Bible but not spiritually. The things of the Spirit are spiritually discerned, not merely intellectually understood; in fact, the intellectual (or natural mind) can be a big hindrance as it tends to close itself off to the spiritual. The Apostle Paul explains this when he tells us that the natural man actually cannot understand spiritual things “because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Cor 2:14). It would be a huge disappointment at the end of our lives if we merely know the Bible well, understanding its theological concepts and historical contexts, yet realize that, in spite of such knowledge, we do not know God Himself. Jesus says His words are spirit and LIFE. They are not merely concepts on which we build systems of doctrinal dogma. When you read your Bible and listen to sermons, are you looking as well as listening?
