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Keep your eyes open
“But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear”
Matthew 13:16
On Wednesday I had to take my car in for some maintenance, so I decided to walk back along the canal. I have walked this route many times before, at one point as I walked through a copse of trees, I was overwhelmed by the volume of bird song, coming from the hedgerows and trees. So I started to look for the birds that were making a beautiful chorus all around me. I saw literally hundreds of birds in just over 400m of walking. Thrushes, tits, chaffinches and was just amazed that I had never seen or heard this before.
Obviously I was on my own and the children were not making a noise and it was early, but I just wondered as I walked, how much of God do we miss out on, because of our busy and crowded lives.
This verse in Matthew is not really about our physical ears and eyes, but our spiritual ones. Its about hearing the word of God and obeying it. Listening to God and seeing him in the quiet times as well as the mighty thunderstorms. Its having time to listen to him in the first place. How often do we open our ears and listen to the voice of God, how often do open our spiritual eyes and see the great things that God is doing, everyday.
Lamentations reminds us, that,
“...the faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning.” How often are we aware of the grace and mercy and faithfulness of God?
Its great to listen to nature, but it is not the end of the world if we miss out on hearing it, even though I will make a greater effort to listen out for the birds in the future. But if we keep missing out on what God is saying to us, it is as if we are blind or deaf. If we keep missing out on what God is doing every day, our faith will diminish and our love for him will dwindle and appreciation of him will lessen. Seeing and hearing the birds made me want to Glorify God, how much more would hearing God make me want to praise him.
Andy Hodson
