Open Eyes, Burning Hearts
Do you remember your physics professor telling you about the principle of inertia? Sir Isaac Newton described it in his First Law of Motion, which states that an object in motion will maintain its velocity and direction until an external force acting upon it changes its speed and direction. This principle is true in our lives. We all move toward a certain direction, and no matter how much we desire to change, we often find ourselves unable to, leading to feelings of uncertainty and hopelessness. We compensate by trying to do things that make us “happy,” yet these do not change our real state one bit. This is due to the presence of sin in our lives. The Bible says we are in bondage to sin, and we are unable to free ourselves from its death grip.
However, there is only one force outside of ourselves that can change our lives’ direction. This force is a powerful, divine Person who loves us and who does not want us to perish. His name is Jesus, who is the Christ, the Only Son of the living God. He has solved humanity’s eternal problem of sin by taking our place, suffering and dying on the cross for our sins. Then by rising from the dead – thereby defeating sin and death – he offers forgiveness and salvation to those who would put their faith in him.
The problem is in our failure to recognize Jesus and his ultimate act of divine love and sacrifice for us, and we continue on with our confusion and deception towards the wrong path. A revelation from God alone can set us free from these blinders!
There is a wonderful story in Luke 24:13-35 that illustrates this point. Two of Christ’s disciples were on their way to a village called Emmaus from Jerusalem. Along the way, Jesus, who had just risen from the dead, joined them, but they were prevented from recognizing him. Asked by Jesus what they were talking about, they told him about their Master who died on a cross a few days earlier. They were distraught, confused, discouraged, hopeless, and did not know what to do or where to go because they had hoped that he was the promised Messiah. Furthermore, some women from their company bewildered them with reports of seeing angels who proclaimed Jesus is alive. At this, Jesus rebuked them for their slowness of heart to believe, and began to open the Scriptures to them concerning him.
The day was now spent, and the two disciples asked Jesus to stay the night with them. During the evening meal, Jesus blessed and broke the bread and gave it to them. At this their eyes were opened and they recognized Jesus, who immediately vanished from their sight. “Did not our hearts burn within us while he opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:32, ESV), they said to each other. That night they immediately went back to Jerusalem to tell other believers that Jesus is indeed alive!
Just like the two disciples, many people have no revelation of what Christ has done for them. They don’t even recognize him right before them working in their very lives, and they continue to move along with their confusion, discouragement, and brokenness. The good news is that God alone can open our eyes and give us revelation of himself, through his Word and Spirit. When he opens our eyes, our hearts burn with a sense of purpose and reason, like a chord being struck perfectly in the fiber of our beings reminding us of the real reason for our existence, pointing us to the real source of real life. When God speaks, our hearts come alive and burn with passion because it recognizes its Maker, the One who gave it its purpose and meaning. We all have felt this tug in our hearts many times in our lives, and we have been slow of heart to believe.
Like that external force changing the course of an object in motion, God can change our life’s course. When God opens our eyes, our hearts burn with passion for him, and our purpose changes towards the direction of our destiny in him! When God gives us revelation, all the confusion, doubt, and discouragement become insignificant. The more God reveals himself to us, the more we know who we are, the more we know our purpose, and the more we will hear our hearts sing the song of our very reason for being! That is why people whose eyes have been opened by God live differently and passionately for his glory!
Ask God to open your eyes, my friend, and let his presence, his word, and his love ignite your heart with passion for more of him in your life!