Without a Vision

Without a Vision

What if you had a secret formula with the power to cure a thousand ills of the human race? Would you not then freely give up this formula to be distributed to all in need and thereby prevent the death of multitudes?

I am sure you would, unless you were without conscience, and filled with greed, intending to profit from the suffering of others.

I am assuming, however, that you and I are not of that kind and do everything in our power to prevent millions of our generation from perishing.

My point is that we do have that secret formula that has the power to save our generation from a fate worse than death.

Where [there is] no vision, the people perish:
but he that keepeth the law, happy is he. (Proverbs 29:18 – AKJV)

Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained,
But happy is he who keeps the law. (Proverbs 29:18 – NASB)

We have such a vision: the Gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ has been revealed to us:

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. (Romans 1:16 – NASB)

No one need perish once the Gospel has been communicated to them. The Gospel is still the primary responsibility of the church:

 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18-20 – NASB)

It is up to you and me to communicate this “vision” to the masses.

Without a Vision

 © Tuesday 21st March 1995 – by Christopher Shennan)

Where [there is] no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he. (Proverbs 29:18 – AKJV)

“Without a vision the people perish,”

Without a vision the multitudes die.

For the eyes grow dim; hope can’t flourish

When the heart can’t lift in search of the sky.

The human spirit has to dream and reach for

The highest and best that God can provide,

But often, it seems, there’s nothing to search for,

And nothing to stir cold hearts deep inside.

Grant a vision, Lord, to hearts made of stone,

To eyes that are blinded, or growing dim.

Reveal all your glory to those alone —

And those still hungering and thirsting for Him.

Why should those perish who have never heard,

While I hold in my heart Christ’s living Word?

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Engraved illustration of the “chariot vision” of the Biblical book of Ezekiel, chapter 1, after an earlier illustration by Matthaeus (Matthäus) Merian (1593-1650), for his “Icones Biblicae” (a.k.a. “Iconum Biblicarum”).Copy by unknown artist after illustration by Matthaeus (Matthäus) Merian the elder (1593-1650.) This work is in the public domain the United States, and those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years or less.

Withered Hearts

Withered Hearts

Reading: Mark 3:1-6

And when He had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts… (Mark 3:5a – NKJV)

The man`s hand may have been withered, but those of the faction of the Pharisees had withered hearts. Their religious legalism had withered their compassion and blinded the eyes of their hearts.

Jesus was grieved by the hardness of their hearts…

The Greek indicates that Jesus was in a continuous state of grief (Wuest) For a loving Savior, Whose heart bleeds for the lost estate of mankind, continuous grief for hardness of heart is the only reasonable response. He was, A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.

Just because Jesus is a Man of Sorrows, does not mean we have license to add to His grief.  What brings grief to our Savior almost more than anything else, is hardness of heart.

What hardened the hearts of the Pharisees?

Their hearts had been hardened by an act of the WILL:

Three times in the book of Hebrews the plea is made: Do not harden your hearts. (Hebrews 3:8; 3:15; and 4:7)

I have myself had personal experience with this:

At the age of thirteen or fourteen, I was on a bus to school in the morning rush hour. As the bus turned the corner into a particularly busy intersection we saw an elderly man on a bicycle. The bicycle had one of those baskets in front to carry documents or other items. I guessed he must have been a messenger of the court, or some such occupation.

Just as the bus turned the corner his wheel hit something and he, the bicycle, and everything in the basket, landed on the road. The papers were scattered.

The reaction of the boys in the bus was to break into peals of laughter at the plight of the old man as he desperately tried to retrieve the papers in the middle of rush hour.

My own heart was breaking for the man. I had no way to help him since I was in a bus that was soon gone.  Up to that time I had a very tender heart.

To my shame, that changed. It hurt so much to bear another’s pain, I hardened my heart so it would not hurt so much.

It took years after my conversion to Christ for the Holy Spirit to soften my heart again.

Choose rather to bear the pain than to have a hard heart!

Hard Hearts Healed

(© Wednesday 4^th June – by Christopher Shennan)

It hurt so much to feel for those

That were passing though grief and pain,

That I shut their suffering out;

I vowed never to feel it again.

 

At first it came as a relief

To be free from another’s pain

“I have enough of my own to bear,”

I said, “Let others just do the same.”

 

The result of my decision came

As a shock and surprise to me;

I found my heart grew callous, hard,

And my spirit was bound, not free.

 

Then Jesus called, “Come follow Me,

For the burden I bear is light;

Carry another’s load of care

And your own soul will know – delight.”

 

The joy that I feel now is pure;

As I share the pain my brother feels,

The burden I bear gets lighter,

And the hurt I sustain? – It heals.

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