For we walk by faith, not by sight.
- 2 Corinthians 5:7
How do we walk by faith? When we have two eyes walking by sight is easy. We simply open them, stand up and start walking. Due to my kidney issues, I have recently experienced some vision loss in my right eye in what they term NAION (non-arteritic anterior ischaemic optic neuropathy). It's quite a mouthful. It is hypotension & anaemia related, and presents quite a nuisance to me. It means there was limited blood supply to certain smaller vessels for a time, that have had a significant impact. So walking by sight now is quite different to me. It has become more meaningful in my life than it has in the past. But, is that what the Lord is talking about in this important and underpinning verse? The Christian walks through life spiritually as well as naturally. Naturally, we trust our eyesight much more than we realise. With my current eye issue, I have lost a bit of peripheral vision, and now see how important it was. I was walking through the shopping centre a few days ago and asked Heather to walk on my left-hand side, as I can't see her with my peripheral vision when she is on my right. I need to turn around to see where she is, yet she is right beside me. I feel like I'm 100 years old at times. "you don't know what you've got till it's gone" applies to me now, though, it's almost a privilege to understand these new empathies, despite them being expensive. We trust our eyesight more than we realise. We believe what we see. We bank on what we see. We go to Court based on what we have seen, because over the years we have built up an enormous amount of faith in our eyesight, and will vehemently argue a point on what we have seen.
A common phrase is, “I Know What I Saw! “ Barristers love eye witnesses, because of the certainty. Have we got that same level of certainty about our walk of faith? What else comes by the power of sight? Most of our memories and descriptions of things past come from what we saw, while a limited number come from what we have experienced or heard. We venture into great explanations of movies, objects, people's features, houses, landscapes, food, work and leisure environments based on sight. When believers walk by faith, they walk through the spiritual side of life as well as the natural.
We don't place hope in our natural eyesight. We have seen what we have seen. However, walking by faith necessitates hope, because we walk into the unknown with no sight to speak of, just the confidence that we have a heavenly realm for which we are destined when we depart this life.
True faith requires expectation; otherwise, it would be called pot luck — I might get to heaven if there is one, but then again, there may be nothing there! That is not faith. The faith written of in this verse holds to the value of expectation. We walk in expectation. We cannot see it, but we keep it as being just as real, and our conviction and confidence of the heavenly realms for which we are destined just as evident as if we had seen it already and know it is there. These two fundamental elements of life, faith and sight, should become equal in the assurance of what we know and expect as we mature in Christ.
Today’s Prayer: Dear Lord, thank you for faith, and please help me with mine. I have faith that I am bound for heaven if I stay the course, but please help me with my expectations in other things requiring faith.
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