Wholly Devoted Eyes Series

Introduction:

A. The story is told of a woman who rushed to her doctor.

1. Looking very worried and all strung out, she rattled off, “Doctor, take a look at me. When I woke up this morning, I looked at myself in the mirror and saw my hair was all wiry and frazzled up, my skin was all wrinkled and pasty, my eyes were blood-shot and bugging out, and I had this corpse-like look on my face! What's wrong with me, Doctor?”

2. The doctor looked her over for a couple of minutes, then calmly said, "Well, I can tell you that there isn't anything wrong with your eyesight!”

B. I hope that nothing is wrong with the physical eyesight of any of us!

1. But even more important than having good physical eyesight is what we do with our ability to see.

2. There are critical spiritual implications with regard to our eyes that we need to talk about today.

C. Today, we return to our series on being wholly devoted to God.

1. In this series, we are exploring what it means to love and serve the Lord with all that we are and have.

2. There are two verses that provide the foundation for this series.

a. Jesus taught that the greatest command is to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” (Mark 12:30)

b. Paul gave this command “Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness” (Romans 6:13).

3. So we have been trying to learn how to wholly devote every part of ourselves to God.

a. We began by looking at how to have a wholly devoted mind.

b. Then we explored how to have a wholly devoted heart.

c. Last time we looked into having wholly devoted tongues.

4. Today, I want to help us consider what it means to have wholly devoted eyes.

I. The Spiritual Importance of Our Eyes

A. Just like the other subjects we have covered so far in this series, the Bible has a lot to say about our eyes.

1. One of the things the Bible addresses is the spiritual blindness that some people experience.

2. In Matthew 13:14-17, Jesus quoted Isaiah 6:9-10,

In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:

“‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding;

you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.

15 For this people’s heart has become calloused;

they hardly hear with their ears,

and they have closed their eyes.

Otherwise they might see with their eyes,

hear with their ears,

understand with their hearts

and turn, and I would heal them.’

16 But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. 17 For I tell you the truth, many prophets and righteous men longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.

3. Because we live on this side of the Cross, we have the opportunity and ability to understand more about what God was doing and has done than those in earlier times.

4. We have the opportunity to see, hear and understand like never before, but that does not make seeing, hearing and understanding automatic.

5. We still have a responsibility and must put forth the effort to focus our minds, hearts and eyes on spiritual things, so that we might be able to serve God with all that we are.

B. In another interesting general passage about our eyes, Jesus talks about the importance of our eyes.

1. Matthew 6:22-23 reads, “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. 23 But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”

2. What Jesus is saying here is that we should have singleness of vision and purpose.

3. We should set our eyes on the goal and keep them there.

4. Just prior to these verses, Jesus said that where our treasure is, there our heart will be.

5. And right after these verses, Jesus said that we cannot serve two masters.

6. Later in the chapter, Jesus challenged us to seek first His kingdom (6:33).

7. So as we will learn today, the focusing of our eyes on the right goals and on spiritual things is one of the most important aspects of having wholly devoted eyes.