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Spiritual Formation

Are You Blind Or Lacking Vision?

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Reading time: 2 minutes

I can see and hear well for the most part. But I was wondering recently what it must be like to be blind. What is it like to walk across a room without being able to see?

Actually, I know firsthand what this is like because I’ve bumped into many things walking in my bedroom at night (with the lights out so I don’t disturb my wife).

Would walking be easier if I could see a little, or not see at all? My first thought is seeing something is better than nothing. But then I would be more tempted to rely on my efforts. I could be so focused on what I can see, that I’d forget to consider God.

Does God want you to trust Him more like a completely blind person? If you can’t see clearly, God certainly doesn’t want you to squint and guess. When you can see, you should use all that God has given you to make a decision. But sometimes you really can’t see much of anything even when you see a lot. What you see isn’t helpful or it’s irrelevant. It’s noise.

Maybe it’s okay that God asks you to walk by faith. Maybe you can blindly trust Him when you have no clue what He is doing. And maybe it’s better that way.

God is always with you. He is always present, but you might need to walk a path that doesn’t make sense–like Abraham had to do when God asked him to sacrifice his son.

Walking while blind (physically) might actually provide the most opportunity to put your full and purest trust in God. Can you acknowledge that you’re completely dependent upon God? When you can’t see anything with your physical eyes, you will have no choice but to rely on your spiritual eyes.

Depending on how you look at it, that might sound uncomfortably vulnerable, or it might sound blissfully peaceful. What does it sound like to you?

Here are some scriptures to consider: 2 Corinthians 5:7, Proverbs 3:5-6, Hebrews 11:1, John 20:29, 2 Corinthians 4:4, 4:18, Mark 4:12. I recently wrote an answer on Quora about looking but not really seeing (Matthew 13:10–13).

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Hope When All Seems Hopeless

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Reading time: 2 minutes

When you feel discouraged, where do you turn? Hoping in hope is empty. Positive thinking won’t last long unless it’s based upon the reality that comes from God. I want to hope in something real. That’s what truly inspired me when I first became a Christian.

When I became a Christian, my whole understanding of life crossed over from complete meaninglessness to an ordered plan. At times I lose the sense that the details of life are ordered. When bad things happen, life doesn’t make much sense. But this doesn’t change the ultimate truth that God is real.

When all seems hopeless, there is always still hope for a believer in Jesus Christ. You might have had the worst luck or just received the worst news. You might have nothing left, but if you’re breathing… If you’re alive, then you have a purpose for being here. If everything is failing, but you are alive, then God still has a purpose for you being here.

You can be experiencing nothing much happening that is meaningful, but still know that life has meaning and purpose.

You can despair of this life and the difficulties and pain it brings, yet burn inside because the flame of God’s hope will never go out.

When you hit bottom, you’re ready to give up hope in everything else. God’s message of hope shines all the brighter.

Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

2 Corinthians 4:16-18

I encourage you to ponder what your life might look like if you hold onto God, and move in the direction that God is leaving open to you. Is God closing doors? That’s God pruning you, so you will grow in another direction.

God doesn’t want you to give up; He wants you to try something new – something you haven’t tried yet.

With God there are infinite possibilities, but only a finite number of closed doors. Share on X

What dream is in your heart? What other ways can you pursue your dream beyond closed doors? Leave me a comment or send me an email about your dream so I can pray over you and your dream.

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Hope Has 3 Essential Ingredients

Hope Has 3 Essential Ingredients

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Reading time: 4 minutes

Could hope be one of the most underrated virtues? Hope makes the list of God’s top three virtues along with love and faith (1 Corinthians 13:13).

The greatest virtue is love. But where would love be without faith or hope? Love would have nothing to deliver; it would be an empty promise–much like worldly love. Fortunately, love always hopes.

A believer can hope for something, but God-given faith makes it a reality in the heart. If you hope for a hamburger, faith makes it so real you can taste it before you ever take a bite.

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Hebrews 11:1 ESV

Hope is an energizing longing for something good. Faith strengthens you with confidence that it is yours. Love makes faith and hope possible because of God’s goodness.

Hope focuses on God’s amazing promises–specifically the ones that we can’t see come to fruition immediately. As Christians, we hope in God’s promise of eternal life. By faith, we possess eternal life and yet we continue to experience death and suffering for a time.

God is the source of everything good, but what else must be present to live with more hope? For you to thrive, hope’s recipe needs at least these three ingredients:

  1. An Attitude of Freedom
  2. An Attitude of Surrender
  3. An Attitude of Trust

Hope Requires An Attitude of Freedom

A slave with no chance of being free one day can’t begin to hope. Thankfully, you are no longer a slave. Christ has set you free.

So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law.

Galatians 5:1 NLT

Freedom brings peace to hope. To fear is to live in the reality of a hopeless slave. You can’t be peaceful and fearful at the same time. As you recognize you are free, you should experience more peace. You are not a slave, so you can stop thinking like one.

In what ways are you still acting like a slave? Your cage door is open. Are you living as though you are trapped inside? Fear prevents many from leaving a cage with a wide-open door.

Hope Requires An Attitude of Surrender

Surrender acknowledges that God is the ultimate source of good. To have freedom without surrender is to live with the delusion that you are self-sufficient. Hoping in yourself alone doesn’t produce assurance–it’s wishful thinking at best and a fatal gamble at worst.

You might think that freedom and surrender are mutually exclusive, when in fact they support each other perfectly. Surrendering to God and His reality produces true freedom.

If you are not surrendering to God, then you are living in an alternate reality of idolatry. You might feel free initially, but eventually, you will realize you are living in a cage as a slave. An astronaut that leaves a spaceship (without a source of oxygen) for open space is free in one way. The astronaut will survive for a brief time, but this reckless choice leads to death not life.

In this case, the one who surrenders to the confines of the spaceship lives to roam the universe or return to Earth. You can be a slave to righteousness and remain free.

Hope Requires An Attitude of Trust

To be able to surrender to God, you must first trust Him. Trusting God allows you to surrender to Him; surrendering to God produces true freedom. With true freedom, you will experience a powerful, unwavering hope that nourishes your soul.

To hope you must trust God will keep His promises to you.

Trusting is difficult in an environment that is corrupt and decaying. It’s easy to slip into agreeing with hopelessness and distrust. It’s easy to mistrust God and fear. But none of it is mandatory.

Even though evil exists in our world and it betrays God and humanity, we have a choice to trust. When you are lost, this verse will guide you home–into God’s arms.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart;
    do not depend on your own understanding.
Seek his will in all you do,
    and he will show you which path to take.

Proverbs 3:5-6 NLT

Our own understanding is limited and can be faulty. God is saying there is something more true about trusting in faith than trusting with evidence and proof. Even so-called facts can be faulty. How many people believed that the Sun revolved around the Earth before additional facts disproved it?

God’s understanding is never wrong. Trust God because He is your good parent. Look beyond your immediate environment and trust Him no matter what is happening around you.

As you go about your daily life making decisions, keep your spirit open to hearing God’s will. When you trust that He will direct you, you don’t have to hesitate to act. God is holding your hand. Don’t hold back all that God made you to be.

Love provides faith. Faith allows you to trust. Your trust leads to surrender and freedom. Then you’ll have real hope.

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Last revised October 31, 2020

What You Fear Losing Limits Your Freedom

What You Fear Losing Limits Your Freedom

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Reading time: 3 minutes

Fear always has to do with losing something. You could fear losing your life, your possessions, your sanity, your salvation, your job, your spouse, your control, your health, your family, your reputation, your money…

There are so many things to worry about losing. Some things are inconsequential while others are important. Either way, however, Jesus promises that nothing you can give up for His sake will be permanently lost. He says you’ll get it back, and then some, if not exactly during your lifetime, then certainly during the next lifetime. Whatever you lose for God’s sake, God will return to you something even better, even though what you lose will cost you something.

If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it.

Matthew 16:25 NLT

 “Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.

Mark 10:29-30 NIV

What Do You Fear Losing?

If you can eliminate your fear, then you are truly free. Nothing will be able to hold you hostage. No one will be able to successfully blackmail you.

What fears are you holding on to? What are you afraid to lose?

Try saying, “I’m afraid that I will lose my ________________” or “I’m afraid I won’t get __________________.” How do you feel? What’s true in this moment?

Now try saying, “I’ve got nothing to lose” or “I’ll be fine no matter what happens.” How do you feel? What’s true in this moment?

In each of those moments, how ready are you to press forward toward your goals?

I experience those moments as hopeless and hopeful.

Loosen Your Grip on Your Fears

Think about what brings you the most anxiety or worry. Try to narrow it down to an emotional concern like people-pleasing. Who will be upset with you if you choose a path you want? If it’s anyone besides God, then you are allowing yourself to be held hostage. You are limiting yourself because of your need for approval or your need for others to understand you.

Sure, it’s nice if others like your decisions, but you’ll be okay if they don’t. Some things are right or wrong. God is clear about what those are. Many other decisions God leaves up to you. Don’t hold yourself back from exercising your God-given freedom to choose how to live.

Open Your Heart to Receive

After you prove to yourself that there is nothing you will withhold from God, you are in a place to receive. Abraham reached this when he was willing to sacrifice his son Isaac. This place might seem like a state of indifference, but it is actually far from it. Patience is different than complacency.

The patient person waits with expectation and trust in God’s goodness. Even if you never receive what you want, you will receive something better eventually. This person can persevere through all of life’s trials.

Indifference frees a person from the burden of caring. But without such a burden, life lacks meaning and purpose. It’s not worth living.

Fear is either gripping your heart or you can be gripping the heart of God. When you are fearful, your hands are too busy to receive from God. In your darkest moments, humble yourself by pleading to God that He will purify your heart from ill motives. Then you’ll be able to walk in freedom with a clear conscience. Then God will grant you the desires of your heart (Psalm 20:4, 34:4-5, 37:3-7).

More about Jesus’s compensation.
More about overcoming fear.
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Fulfillment Is Determined By Your Focus

Fulfillment Is Determined By Your Focus

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Reading time: 3 minutes

What would bring you the most fulfillment? If you could pursue it, should you pursue it? The answer depends on what you believe will bring fulfillment.

Think about a time when you purchased something that delivered much less satisfaction than you first imagined it would. Who or what can you blame? Was it the slick salesperson? Was it hyped-up advertising? Or perhaps it was your deep longing for fulfillment that you blindly projected onto the purchased item.

Life Often Lacks Fulfilllment

Put your hope in Christ instead of what happens to you, because:

This earthly life doesn’t have any guarantees… but God’s promise of eternal life does come with guarantees.

You might not deserve God’s love… but you have it and can never lose it.

You might disappoint God… but you are never a disappointment.

You might feel lonely… but you are never alone.

You might feel unwanted… but God made you for a purpose.

You might live with a chronic sense of shame and worthlessness… but God assigned you great value simply by creating you as unique in His image.

You might feel powerless… but the greatest power in all existence lives within you if you believe in Jesus Christ.

You might be down… but you are not out. If you don’t have everything you want in this life exactly the way you want it, that is perfectly alright. You can’t find any real fulfillment in anything this world offers (1 John 2:15-17).

Fulfillment Mostly Comes From the Next Life

For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.

2 Corinthians 4:17 NIV

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

Romans 8:18 NIV

And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.

1 Peter 5:10 NIV

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

John 16:33 NIV

‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

Revelation 21:4 NIV

Listen, my dear brothers and sisters: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him?

James 2:5 NIV

All of these scriptures point to one significant meaning: don’t put so much emphasis on what happens to you in this life. The more you are willing to give up in this life, for the cause of Jesus Christ, the more your reward will be in heaven (Matthew 19:29). The more you cling to what you can gain in this life, the more empty-handed you will be in the next life (and the emptier you will be in this life).

And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.“Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. “Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man!

Luke 6:20-22 ESV

Allow your deepest hunger, your deepest lacking of fulfillment, to drive you to God for the only true fulfillment (John 4:14).

More on Pursuing Fulfillment
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7 Kingdom Secrets Revealed By Jesus

7 Kingdom Secrets Revealed By Jesus

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Reading time: 3 minutes

Matthew 13 contains 7 parables that Jesus admits are Kingdom secrets (13:11). When Jesus tells stories about God’s Kingdom, He is speaking about heaven. The Kingdom of Heaven can be best described as having growth, value, and exclusivity.

A dichotomy appears in every story that Jesus tells. Jesus teaches us about heaven by using strong contrasts. It seems like He doesn’t want there to be any room for ambiguity. The people who listen to His stories are without excuse because He speaks plainly enough. Yet, Jesus emphasizes that people can be divided into two groups: those who can understand Him (the Good) and those who listen to Him but can’t hear or understand Him (the Bad) (13:13).

Good and Bad have other relevant labels that Jesus uses throughout Chapter 13:

  • Good and Evil
  • Haves and Have Nots
  • Understanding and Confused
  • Seeing and Not Seeing (Blind)
  • Hearing and Not Hearing (Deaf)
  • Open Minds and Stubborn Minds
  • Turn to God and Turn Away from God
  • Fruitful and Barren
  • God-planted and Enemy-planted
  • Saved/Selected and Unsaved/Rejected
  • Preserved and Destroyed

Kingdom Growth Parables

Secret #1: Receptive Hearts Required

In the Parable of the Sower (13:3-9, 18-23), Jesus divides people into those who have “good soil” and those who have “bad soil.” Only those with receptive hearts (good soil) are in God’s Kingdom.

Secret #2: Jesus’s Good Seed Required

In the Parable of the Weeds (13: 24-30, 36-43), Jesus divides people into those who come from “good seed” and those who come from “bad seed.” There are actually two farmers planting seeds in the same garden (the world). The good farmer plants good seeds. The bad farmer plants bad seeds. Only those planted by Jesus will make it into heaven.

Secret #3: Humble Beginnings Lead to Powerful Endings

In the Parable of the Mustard Seed (13:31-32), Jesus contrasts the smallness of the seed with the largeness of the outcome. He is saying that size doesn’t matter and can even be misleading. Appearances can be deceiving. A lot can come from a little. That’s part of God’s design. Jesus is the perfect example of this, being born in a manger.

Secret #4: Reaches Everywhere

In the Parable of the Yeast (13:33), Jesus continues the theme of humble beginnings by describing His kingdom as starting in one place but with the ability to spread everywhere. There is no place that it cannot reach (Psalm 139:7-8).

Kingdom Value Parables

Secret #5: Source of Greatest Joy

In the Parable of the Hidden Treasure (13:44), Jesus emphasizes that His Kingdom provides the greatest personal fulfillment possible. It’s worth pursuing at all costs. It’s worth giving up everything to obtain it.

Secret #6: Worth More Than Anything You Own

In the Parable of the Pearl of Great Value (13:45-46), Jesus emphasizes that His Kingdom has a greater value than anything you can own. It’s worth going all in to obtain it. The value is in the quality and rarity of the item. Nothing else comes close to heaven. It is beneficial in every way.

Kingdom Exclusivity Parable

Secret #7: Some Will Inherit It and Some Won’t

In the Parable of the Fishing Net (13:47-50), Jesus returns to the theme of dichotomy to summarize His main teaching point. People will be sorted into two groups: the ones selected for the Kingdom and the ones rejected from the Kingdom.

What is the main message behind all these secrets? It’s in what Jesus says to His disciples after they are alone. If Jesus is speaking to you and you can understand what He is saying, then you are blessed!

I have explained the secrets about the kingdom of heaven to you, but not to others.
But God has blessed you, because your eyes can see and your ears can hear! Many prophets and good people were eager to see what you see and to hear what you hear. But I tell you that they did not see or hear.

Matthew 13:11,16,17 CEV

Rejoice that you can see, hear, and understand!

How to advance God’s Kingdom.
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