To Encourage You

2 Corinthians 4:16-18 “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”

One of the things that the Bible does for us like nothing else can is help us to see things that are invisible to our physical eyes.  They are things that transcend anything physical. They are greater things, higher things, majestic things, things that those who never concern themselves with God’s Word can never see.  As the verses above tell us, things that are seen are transient, i.e., they are temporary in nature. As an example, this Scripture points to our physical body.  Our body is something that is always before us.  From the moment we wake up in the morning our physical senses dominate our lives. We feel our aches and pains and we see ourselves in the mirror. We experience everything around us with our five senses.  Yet, those senses, as well as everything we experience with them, are all temporary in nature.  As the years pass, we find that we don’t see or hear as good as we once did.  And like our senses, the very things we sense through them are deteriorating as well.  Transient: what a perfect word to describe “the things that are seen.” 

However, for the believer, it is the things that are unseen that should be the primary occupation of our lives, things which are eternal, like our inner self, God, heaven, that sort of thing.  We find that as we do this, everything else looks different to us.  If our focus in only on the physical, the Bible tells us that we will likely “lose heart.”  The things around us are inexorably affected by the physical Law of Entropy. This means that there is a constant progression of physical things toward disorder. Things wear out, including our own bodies, and eventually, every living thing dies.  No wonder if those things are our focus that anxiety, depression, and hopelessness can overtake our thoughts.  But God has told us that we are to focus our thoughts not on these physical things that we can see, but on eternal things that are unseen. 

Take money as one example.  Jesus warned us with these words: “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal” (Matthew 6:19-20).  And what about our bodies?  So many people focus on their physical body as they discipline themselves at the gym to stave off the inevitable physical decline that escalates if we don’t. Yet, we’ve been told that “while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come” (1 Timothy 4:8). Yet, how many focus as much attention on their hidden inner man in this way? 

But above all, it is on the unseen King of kings that our “spiritual eyes” should gaze.  As we look at Him, as we worship Him, as we think about Him, our minds are lifted above the temporal to the eternal. We begin to see not the weaknesses of physical things but the awesome power of the God Who created them all.  We are moved from occupying ourselves first and foremost with the things of this world that are temporary and passing quickly away to what is coming for the faithful ones in eternity as God “make(s) known to (us) the path of life; (for) in (His) presence there is fullness of joy; at (His) right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11). 

You see, that’s how Jesus lived. That’s what He continually looked to. He refused to desire the kingdoms of this world with which Satan tempted Him (Matthew 4:7-10), but the kingdom of Heaven from whence He had come.  And we are to be like Him.  Unlike a world focused on the here and now, we are called to be “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).  It’s in that gaze that we will never lose heart, no matter that outwardly we and everything around us may be wasting away.