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| [Image by Toni Blay] |
Fiction:
Marcia's eyes were puffy the moment she came out of the womb. They were tightly closed, shutting out every penetration of light from the real world. Even when she screamed, fluttering her little arms and legs about, almost kicking the nurse as she was being given her first bath, her eyes still remained close.
Nevertheless, for the first time in fifteen hours, she blinked twice and opened her eyes. Andrew and Marian, the newest parents on the block, smiled and cooed at her as she lay bundled up in her mother's arms. They waved with excitement because their baby could now see them. "Hey, little one. This is mummy, and here's daddy," Marian said. The baby actually smiled like she understood. She kept staring at daddy, and he kept making funny gestures. It was a beautiful sight to watch, the first time her eyes were opened.
* * * * *
The first time a baby opens his or her eyes is truly a beautiful thing to watch. I'm sure you parents out there can testify to that. In fact, even more beautiful is the first moment the baby distinguishes who the mummy is and who the daddy is, and then forms a different kind of bond between parents and siblings.
But there's something even more amazing: the first time our spiritual eyes are opened to see the unseen things that are not visible in the physical world. Paul wrote to the Ephesians:
"Therefore...I do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of the inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe..." Ephesians 1:15-21
How can you see the sun if you don't open your eyes? How can you recognize the characteristics of a person's face if you haven't trained your eyes to recognize it? In just the same way that a baby's eyes are opened to see the world, we also need to open the eyes of our spiritual understanding, which are not unveiled on the day we are born but on the day we get "born again."
When we are born again, our eyes are opened to understand that the spiritual controls the physical, and that things happen first in the unseen before they translate into the physical. Battles are fought for you and I before we even wake up in the mornings. As I reflected on this on Friday, I began to realize that the Red sea was already separated in the unseen before Moses stretched out his rod to separate it, obeying God's command. I also perceived that Jesus was already sacrificed for the world long before He was led to the cross; the decision had already been made.
Therefore, we must never relegate the unseen to a level of irrelevance. It is highly important that we understand that when we pray in our closets, battles are being fought for us in the spiritual realm. So my prayer for you today is that you become sensitized to the Holy Spirit, so that He will show you secret things even before they get manifested in the physical world. So go beyond the physical to see God's handiwork in your life. Make yourself available for the Holy Spirit to teach you more about your purpose by spending more time in His presence, and by reading the word of God. Gradually, you will be able to identify how the unseen plays out in your physical world.
Question for the Day: Have you ever felt the Holy Spirit leading you to do something, and then you find out later why you had to do it? (although at the time you were being led to do it, you thought it was the most absurd thing ever?)
