“For everyone who listens with an open heart will receive progressively more revelation until he has more than enough. But those who don’t listen with an open, teachable heart, even the understanding that they think they have will be taken from them. That’s why I teach the people using parables, because they think they’re looking for truth, yet because their hearts are unteachable, they never discover it. Although they will listen to me, they never fully perceive the message I speak. The prophecy of Isaiah describes them perfectly:
Although they listen carefully to everything I speak, they don’t understand a thing I say. They look and pretend to see, but the eyes of their hearts are closed.”
Many of us trudge along through life living by what our eyes can only see in the natural. Without the ability to see spiritually we can not see beyond the natural circumstances of life. Just as Jesus revealed, the Father wants to show you the realities of the Kingdom so that you will flourish in life.
Jesus spoke to the people in parables because they could not see nor could they hear and understand or receive what he was revealing to them about the reality of the Kingdom of God (Matt. 13:12-14).
Throughout Scripture we find that the children of Israel struggled with seeing, hearing and understanding. Their hearts became dull, their ears heavy, and they shut their eyes. They were foolish and could not understand what God was saying and doing. They were a rebellious people (Isa. 6:10; Jer. 5:21; Eze.12:2; Matt. 13:15; Acts 28:27; Rom. 11:8)
Isaiah prophesied in Isaiah 6:9: “’You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.” We don’t want to be like the children of Israel having an opportunity to hear and understand what the Lord is doing today, and not participate in bringing the gospel message to a fallen world.
The Apostle Paul prayed for the church of Ephesus, “..that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come” (Eph. 1:18-22).
Spiritual sight is seeing beyond the natural world into the realm of the spirit. Paul prayed that they would have eyes to see into the realm of the Spirit. He prayed that the light of God would illuminate their eyes of their imagination, flooding them with light. Paul wanted to open their spiritual eyes until they experienced the full revelation of the hope of Christ’s calling. The wealth of God’s glorious inheritances that he finds in us, his holy ones!
Have some fallen into the same trap?
“They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity,they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed” (Eph. 4:18-19).
The apostle does not say that they might not have perceived the truth; or that they had no ability to understand it. He speaks of a simple and well-known fact that is seen now as well as then that the understanding becomes darkened by indulgence in sin.
There are many today whose hearts have been darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of ignorance of God’s truth. They are considered nominal Christians — church-goers or otherwise religious people whose “faith” does not go beyond being identified with a church, Christian group, or denomination.
Believers can become desensitized to the truth of God’s word when their hearts are hardened. They’ve lost sensitivity to the Holy Spirit and the truths put forth in the Bible.
Father God can see beyond our broken places and the longing of our heart. He can repair the broken place in our lives, but we must be willing to expose where those broken places are. We need to say to Him, “Lord, this is where I’m hurting,” then He can pour the oil and wine to bring healing and open our eyes to the truth.
- God’s love is incomprehensible. There is nothing we can compare with it.
- God is still watching over His Word to perform it.
The Hebrew word for vision is chazon or Chazzah (חָזָה) is to perceptively see. LOOK, SEE, PERCEIVE
“Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained, But happy is one who keeps the Law.” (Prov. 29:18 AMPC)
Where there is no vision [no redemptive revelation of God], the people perish; but he who keeps the law [of God, which includes that of man]—blessed (happy, fortunate, and enviable) is he. (Prov. 29:18 AMP)
The church has lost is vision, it’s commission to “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to follow all that I commanded you; and behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:19-20)
In 2019, I perceived that God is moving to restore His righteousness to the land. I will be revealing more in coming posts. He says in Psalm 34:15 “The eyes of the LORD are on the righteous, and his ears are attentive to their cry;” His eyes are upon the righteous providentially protecting them. His divine guidance or care.
As believers, we are called to stand for righteousness and truth. In today’s climate that seems difficult, but His eyes watch over those who do right; his ears are open to their cries for help.
Now, having been born of the Spirit, we don’t want to fall back into a limited material lifestyle. Rather, we want to press on to maturity in our spiritual life. We are called to live by the Spirit, walk by the Spirit, seek the things that are above, look at what is not seen (see Gal. 5:25; Col. 3:2; 2 Cor. 4:18). We are born again to live in and see and hear the spirit realm as normally and naturally as we live in and see and hear the physical world. We are born from above and supernatural living is our birthright.
The mature, through practice, have their senses trained to discern good and evil (see Heb. 5:14). That is how we grow up in spiritual things: we practice. The more we practice interacting with the supernatural, the safer, stronger and wiser we will be, and the easier it will be to distinguish satan’s counterfeit from the divine.
My prayer for you is that the eyes of your heart be wide open and enlightened to be looking to see what God is doing and not get distracted by what we see happening today.
Blessings,
Dr. Francine
Note: All Scripture is taken from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.
BEYOND CHURCH WALLS 