god in 3d: seeing god at work in your life and the world around you - chapter 1

8/8/2019 God in 3D: Seeing God at Work in Your Life and the World Around You - Chapter 1

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God in 3D

Seeing God at Work in Your Life and the World Around You

By Joey O'Connor

Chapter 1

Lord, I want to see!

Luke 18:40

In the movie, The Sixth Sense, Cole Sear is a nine-year old boy with a special gift.

He has the unique ability to see dead people, a most undesirable gift for us mere mortals.

As I watched The Sixth Sense, for the first time in my movie-going history, I felt, “Now

here is a kid I can relate to!” Unlike you, death runs in my family. I have the distinct

honor of being raised in a family of funeral directors. That’s right, over a hundred and ten

years of California funeral history hanging in the branches of my family tree. Growing

up, like Cole Sear, I saw lots of dead people. Lots of cemeteries. Lots of riding around in

the family hearse. Lots of burial plots. On Friday nights, when my friend’s families were

going out to dinner or to the movies, our family went to funerals. Naahh.

Still, I did grow up playing around hearses, caskets, cemeteries, churches, and

well, lots of bodies. I knew the role of embalming fluid, the purpose of a crematory and

that motorcycle escorts are not real policeman long before most boys figured out how to

tie their shoelaces. Raised with a very clear view of my mortality, my father gave me a

unique opportunity to see life from a completely different perspective. A whole other

viewpoint. I saw life and death with a unique set of eyes. I knew who was ceased and

who was deceased.

When we read about Jesus walking from village to village in the Gospel stories,

what I love about Jesus is how he sees people from a completely different perspective.

With eyes of love and compassion, Jesus sees broken people who are hurting and in need

of a savior. He sees both the physically blind and the spiritually blind. He knows we’re

all lacking spiritual vision and he doesn’t hold it against us. Unlike anyone who ever



came before Him, Jesus sees all the rag-tag, mixed-up, shattered hearts of every person

He meets. Surrounded by people who are physically alive, Jesus sees to the center of their

hearts and knows with deep compassion that His is the only living heart among them.

Jesus has a vision and a depth of perception that lasers right through to people’s heart. He

can see people like no other. He sees the whole duplicitous, spiritually fragmented, sinful

conundrum of humanity. And along the way, Jesus happens to meet quite a few people

who know they have a vision problem. People who, in one way or another, have the

courage to admit their spiritual blindness and who long to see what this offer of new life

in Christ is all about.

In Luke 18, we meet a blind beggar sitting alongside the roadside as Jesus is on

his way to Jericho. When Jesus walks by, the blind guy asks the crowd what’s going on

and why all the commotion? He gets the news that Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. With

that, the blind beggar’s heart leaps. In knowing his own blindness so well, he has the

clarity to recognize exactly what he needs to do. This is my chance! I’m blind and poorer

than anyone I know, so what have I got to lose? And so, the man cries out in desperation,

“Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” In a split second, the leaders of the crowd tell

the blind beggar to pipe down. Shut up. Keep quiet. A formidable opposition. Make that

invisible opposition. The beggar can’t even see who’s trying to block his way to the Great

Physician. So what does the blind beggar do? He does what any self-respecting blind

beggar does…he screams even louder, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Ignoring the needs and demands of the crowd, Jesus stops. He orders the blind

man to be brought to him and the following conversation ensues…

When he came near, Jesus asked him “What do you want me to do for you?”

“Lord, I want to see,” he replied.

Jesus said to him, “Receive your sight, your faith has healed you.”



Stop. Hold everything. Read those words again: What do you want me to do for

you? Those could possibly be some of the most powerful words in the New Testament.

Personalize them. Go to God with that question. You just might be surprised, pleasantly

surprised, by His generous response to your boldness, like the blind beggar, born of faith.

Now our friend the blind beggar could have been the nice, polite, well-mannered

beggar the community expected him to be. But he wasn’t satisfied with the nickels and

dimes people tossed his way. No way, no chump change for him. He wanted to see. And

he literally wanted to see God at work in his life. This was his chance to go for it.

Sacrificing what little dignity he had, the blind beggar starts screaming, jumping up and

down, risking his predictable yet miserable existence. Looking like a crazy man, he

throws himself at the mercy of the One he believes can heal him. Now that’s a blind man

with vision.

Moving from spiritual blindness to spiritual vision demands the very risky step of

honesty and a deep internal refusal to be content with status quo. Authentic spiritual

transformation requires absolute honesty about our true spiritual condition whether we

are close to God or very far off. Tepid little passionless pleas get us nowhere. No matter

how long or how far we are in our journey with God, at any given point in our life, there

will always be moments or seasons when we have to deal with our own spiritual

blindness. Though we might say, “Yes, I want a deeper vision of seeing God at work in

my life and in the world around me,” there may be certain things about ourselves we

don’t want to see. We may say we want to hear from God, but do we really want to listen

to what God might say? We want spiritual insight, but are we willing to take a closer look

at the very things He might show us? Yes? No. Maybe so?

Honesty helps us get past the spiritual veneer and plasticity that leads to a rigid,

heartless, law-abiding form of religiosity. A vague “spirituality” won’t help either.

Honest confession about our spiritual blindness, divided hearts and our true need for God



can get us past religious pretension and pious sentimentality. And by all means, I’m not

talking about trying harder. Geez, try harder for what? That God will love me more? That

the Creator of the world will be impressed with my spiritual gymnastics of jumping

through plastic hoops like a little circus dog trying to earn His applause? I’ve recognized

that trying harder, for me at least, is one of my subtle attempts to resist His grace instead

of resting in what He has already freely provided in Christ. No blind man tries to see

harder through his blindness. Nor can we try to be “more honest” when we can’t even see

our own dishonesty. Honesty requires a clear perspective to see what’s in our own heart.

That’s what God prefers. No posing. No posturing. No pretending.

Just raw, authentic honesty.

I remember when Michael, my brother-in-law, was dying of cancer. After a four-

year battle and countless prayers for healing, it became very obvious, short of a miracle

that Michael was not getting better. And Michael’s cancer was no obscure cancer that

only shows up on a CAT scan light board. What began in his nasal passages eventually

grew outward and horribly disfigured his handsome face. Think Newport Beach sailor,

tennis player handsome face. Add to this, like so many families dealing with the many

losses that come with terminal illness, his loving wife Lisa and four beautiful children. At

one point during Michael’s struggle, I remember a very distinct conversation with God,

“Lord, I am not with you on this one.”

So what do you want? You bought this book because you want something. If

Jesus was standing right in front of you and asked, “What do you want me to do for you,”

what would you say? Would you honestly say what’s in your heart? How much

heartbreak, disappointment, hurt, grief, disillusionment, bitterness and disenchantment

with God are stored in silent hearts that have yet to be honest with God? How many

spiritual blind spots are created by not getting real with God? Taking your cue from the

blind man’s boldness, would you take the risk of unloading what God already knows is in



your heart? Lord, I am not with you on this one. I’m not feeling the love. Not feeling too

radiant here. Do you even give a rip about what’s going my life?

Maybe, in part, our spiritual blindness and our inability to see God at work in our

lives stems from our inability or unwillingness to have an honest conversation with God?

I know that so many of my frustrations in life are not caused by a lack of answers from

God, but my lack of authentic conversation with God. Maybe it’s my obstinacy and not

God’s? Maybe I’m holding out on Him? Maybe there are also unseen spiritual realities at

work opposing the honest questions and desires in your heart? Maybe there’s a whole lot

more going on than what you can see with your two eyes? You and I are not Cole Sear,

but the Bible is very clear there are a whole host of unseen realities and forces at work

opposing your heart’s desire to see God at work in your life.

If we simply take Jesus at his word, “I no longer call you servants…but friends,”

(John 15) with that amazing offer of friendship comes an open door for honest

conversation. That’s certainly a great place to start. Jesus has a crystal clear perspective

that sees beginning, middle and end. This is the perspective and clarity that we so need

for our lives. If we’re really serious about seeing God at work in our lives and the world

around us , ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ is both a challenge and an invitation.

Left unanswered, it is a question that could haunt us the rest of our lives. Seeing God at

work in our lives and developing deeper spiritual vision raises a whole host of risky

questions, some of which we’ll never receive answers for this side of heaven, but it is a

risk well worth taking. We need what only God can provide in clarity, perspective and

spiritual insight. For now, let’s just keep it really simple and be like that blind guy with a

very honest request.

Lord, I want to see.

By getting honest with God, we just may start to see Him work in our hearts and

lives far more than we ever imagined possible.

god in 3d: seeing god at work in your life and the world around you - chapter 1

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