Fixing Our Eyes on the Unseen

Do you have a life verse? Mine is 2 Corinthians 4:18, which is posted on our ministry website and at the end of every e-mail I send:

"So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." (NIV)

What does Scripture mean when it tells us to fix our eyes on what we can’t even see? How do we begin to do that?

Even though as Christians we affirm the reality of the spiritual realm, sometimes we succumb to the naturalistic assumption that what we see is real and what we don’t see isn’t. Many people conclude that God can’t be real because we can’t see Him. And Heaven can’t be real because we can’t see it. But we must recognize our blindness. The blind must take by faith that there are stars in the sky. If they depend on their ability to see, they will conclude there are no stars.

For many people, including many believers, Heaven is a mysterious word describing a place they don’t understand and therefore don’t look forward to. We will one day be delivered from the blindness that obscures the light of God’s world. In the meantime, here in what C. S. Lewis called the Shadowlands, we must remind ourselves what Scripture tells us about the life to come. What we otherwise could not have known about Heaven, “God has revealed to us through the Spirit” (1 Corinthians 2:10). God tells us about our eternal home in His Word, not so we can shrug our shoulders and remain ignorant, but because He wants us to anticipate what awaits us and those we love, and because it has the power to transform the way we live today.

Life on Earth matters, not because it’s the only life we have but precisely because it isn’t—it’s the beginning of a life that will continue without end. It’s the precursor of life on the New Earth. Eternal life doesn’t begin when we die; it has already begun. With eternity in view, nearly any honest activity—whether building a shed, driving a bus, pruning trees, changing diapers, or caring for a patient—can be an investment in God’s kingdom.

God is eternal. His Place is eternal. His Word is eternal. His people are eternal. Center your life around God, His Place, His Word, and His people, and reach out to those eternal souls who desperately long for His person and His place. Then no matter what you do for a living, your days here will make a profound difference for eternity and you will be fulfilling the biblical admonition to fix your eyes on what is unseen.

Excerpt from Seeing the Unseen, Expanded Edition, Copyright 10/17/17 WaterBrook & Multnomah, by Randy Alcorn. Used by permission.