Eyes for Eternity

“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.”
(2 Corinthians 4:18)

We’re into February, and what lies before us is the final cold and winter weather over the next month or so. This season of dark nights and wet days is the last gasp of wintry weather and temps before of the new life that will be coming in Spring.

If you look at this verse in context Paul is actually writing about people who are suffering, and not to let the afflictions of this life draw our focus away from what awaits in eternity. This season with everything looking so dead reminds me of how we can be also be lulled into forgetting eternity by the beauty of the world.

It’s easy to focus on what we see around us, but Paul is cautioning us not to let our eyes and our soul rest there. While at time’s it’s hard to imagine, all that surrounds us is only temporary. Paul reminds us to focus on the eternal things which are the underlying promise of Christianity and the whole purpose behind Christ coming to earth. Redemption for mankind. Not temporary redemption, but ETERNAL redemption. Christ didn’t come just to make this life easier, prettier and better. A sacrifice of that magnitude only makes sense when eternity is on the line.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t take time to appreciate the temporal and be thankful the God of the universe has taken time to make our world so full of beauty. If what we see around us is going to perish and He has made it this wonderful, I can only imagine what the unseen will look like!

Eternity is the only appropriate focus for our souls that makes sense.