VISION [part 1]

"Your eye is the lamp of your body."
Luke 11:34

So, I read this verse from Matthew 6 a few weeks back (see related post here), but I just took it as face value, that your eye needs to be healthy--seeing clearly. Seeing that this world is dark and needs the light and the Light of the world is in you, etc. But last night as I was reading through Luke 11, this caught my attention.

Immediately as I read the word "eye," another word passed through my mind.

vision.

And it makes sense, right? Your eye provides your vision. Check out this verse in Proverbs 29:18, "Where there is no vision, the people perish." So, the opposite of having no vision and perishing is having vision--and living. So, the questions were posed in my mind: What vision prompts me to live? What is my reason for living? What's my vision?

Then comes the 2nd word that caught me..."lamp."

What does a lamp do? It reveals, it shines light upon something. So if the eye--the vision--is the lamp of the body, what is that saying? Your vision reveals, shines out, what is within you, in context, the light within or the darkness within. So what I live shows what is inside of me.

And the final word..."body."

What does the Bible say about my body? Well, I'm glad you asked. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20, "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price; therefore glorify God with your body." Yeah, now this is all starting to come together for me.

My vision in life is what I'm living for. And it shows/reveals/shines out what is within me, which is the Holy Spirit, which signifies that life is not about me anymore, it's about Him, to "glorify God with my body." In summation, my vision is to glorify God.

My vision in life, my aim, my goal, my all--why I am living--is determined by what is within me. The purpose behind everything I do shines out and reveals what is within me, inside my body. The Holy Spirit is in me--John 16:14 says, of the Holy Spirit, "He will glorify me."--and just as the Holy Spirit glorifies God through me, I will glorify God. That is my sole purpose for living. That is my vision: to bring glory to God.

My vision reveals what is within me.

"The eye is the lamp of the body. When your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light, but when it is bad, your body is full of darkness. Therefore be careful lest the light in you be darkness. If then your whole body is full of light, having no part dark, it will be wholly bright, as when a lamp with its rays gives you light." (11:34-36)

"No one, after lighting a lamp puts it in a cellar or under a basket, but on a stand, so that those who enter may see the light." (11:33)

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