Vision

I love that story. What a difference it makes when you see a situation as God sees it! It’s always a treat to see a buzzard. They are among the largest British hawks and we seldom go for a walk in the summer without seeing one circling overhead, gliding through the warm, rising air.

Effortless!
Free-floating wide-winged
Wheeling on wind’s whispering currents
Sharp-eyed searching
Far-flung fields below.

They have amazing eye-sight and, from several hundred feet above me, can see stuff that I’m totally blind to. For them, seeing so much isn’t a problem – they have the height and they have the eyes. And they need both. Eyes like theirs wouldn’t be much use at ground level; and being a couple of hundred feet above the ground would be a waste of time if they didn’t have the eyes.

Spiritually, we need the eyes and the height. Just as the buzzard needs both. God opens the ‘eyes of our hearts’ (Ephesians 1:18); but then we also need to have what I call ‘spiritual height’. You see, we so easily find ourselves under the circumstances, under pressure, under all kinds of things that don’t just limit and restrict us but keep us from seeing all that God wants us to see.

How do we get to such a spiritual vantage-point? Well, as the buzzards do. They spread their wings to the lift of up-currents of warm air and simply float on them. I love watching them circling and then, as they feel they’re losing height, swooping across until they find another thermal. We need the ‘lift’ that only the Spirit – the Wind – of God can give.

Spirit of God
I give myself to the upward warmth
Of your gentle flow
Lifting me to where my eyes are Yours.

Isn’t that how we get real vision? Isn’t that how we begin to see where we are and where we are going, untrammelled by the ‘circumstances’ and ‘pressures’ of each day and beginning to see as God sees?

It’s a matter of trust. The buzzard trusts the gentle power of the up-currents. We need, so to speak, to spread our wings to the Holy Spirit and trust Him. If we do that, He’ll lift us to that place where we can see all that our Father wants us to see.

Prayer: Father, I’m sorry that I so easily and so often allow the circumstances and pressures of life get me down. Today, I ask You that, by Your Spirit, You’ll open my eyes and lift me to that place where I see as You do and, in my heart, rise above my circumstances. Amen.