This has to do with perspective—how things look from where.
With the dawning of faith in his heart the Christian begins to see things in a new light. The change may be slow, as the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit proceeds in his heart, but it is real.
Blurred vision is often a sign of Christian immaturity, and many go through life very conscious of the immediate but woefully unaware of the eternal.
The Apostle Paul experienced a blinding revelation of the risen Christ. From that moment he was a completely changed man, and in later years he said in his defense: “Wherefore, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision” (Acts 26:19).
Paul’s perspective had changed, and as time went on he was the recipient of direct revelations, so that he could write the Galatian Christians: “For I would have you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For I did not receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came through a revelation of Jesus Christ” (Gal. 1:11, 12, RSV).
Paul the legalist, the zealot who went about to destroy Christians, became one of them and the most effective witness to their common Lord.
Job, a good man and convinced of his own goodness, went through trials experienced by few. As he experienced the loss of all the world had to offer, there came a day when his perspective was completely revised and he said to God, “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:5, 6).
There should come a time when every Christian has an entirely new perspective on life and the things around him. Delay in acquiring this new perspective can mean untold conflicts of body and spirit. Until there is a genuine change of orientation life remains an enigma, and we grope our way with myopic outlook, unaware of immediate values and unable to see down the corridors of time. All around there are those asking: “Who am I?” “Why am I here?” “What is my destiny?” They remain confused because they seek not their answers of the One who came to answer, and to introduce man to the heavenly vision.
From where unregenerate man stands, the baffling questions of life can never be adequately answered. Only when he stands at the foot of the Cross can he catch a vision of this world and of the regions beyond. In the light of the divine revelation in the person and work of the Son of God, man comes to know who he is, why he is here, and what his eternal destiny is.
The heavenly vision has been the guiding star of those who know and love God from the beginning:
Abraham went out from his home at God’s command, unaware of his destination but deeply aware of God and His faithfulness.
The patriarchs, by faith, had a perspective which carried them from place to place and from generation to generation. The writer of the Book of Hebrews says of them that they could have returned to their own country, “but now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city” (Heb. 11:16).
Moses had at hand every privilege and blessing of the royal household of Egypt. In his restlessness he thought he could deliver his own people in his own way. Driven out into the wilderness he met God, and there came to him a new perspective of this life and of the next. There came a time when he went out as an earthly refugee, leading other refugees, but because of his heavenly vision things were different—“By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he endured, as seeing him who is invisible” (Heb. 11:27).
Stephen too caught the new perspective. Deeply versed in the Scriptures, filled with the Spirit, he saw his witness rejected and lost his life because of it. But as this transition was taking place God gave him a new vision of that which was in store, and he cried out: “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God” (Acts 7:56).
The heavenly vision has not been confined to those of past generations alone. As time marches on a growing host of men have seen, and even today are seeing, the City of God. This is not a question of being “so heavenly minded that they are of no earthly use.” Rather, it is a question of seeing things in their proper perspective.
Paul, writing to the Christians in Colossae, emphatically states: “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God” (Col. 3:1–3).
Is that the perspective of the Church today? Hardly. The general emphasis is on secular matters, on social, economic, and political concerns, with little or no difference from non-Christians. The heavenly vision is a horizon lost in the haze of secular interests, an intangible to the worldling but something which should be very real to the believer.
Our Lord was exceedingly practical. He knew of man’s material needs and of the necessity of secular pursuits, but he wanted these kept in proper perspective. He spoke of the perishable nature of things and the eternal preservation of spiritual assets. He urged that we set our basic desires on the things of his kingdom, assuring us that immediate necessities would be ours.
The heavenly vision should be for the individual Christian, and for the church of the living God. Because many whose names are on church rolls have no vision of the spiritual and eternal, we find their affections centered in this world. Because the Church is so often led off into secular activities she too shares in the lost vision, and in so doing she fails to help where man’s greatest need is to be found.
It has been truly said that Christ came into the world, not so much to preach the Gospel but that there might be a Gospel to preach. He came not so much to make the world a better place in which to live but to save men from sin and its consequences. He came to change our perspectives, to enable us to look with the insights of the Spirit and to judge rightly between that which is eternal and that which will perish with the using.
Why are we so often blind to the heavenly vision? There can be but one answer: our senses, desires, and perspective are all directed horizontally, around us, rather than vertically, to the living Christ.
If we have the heavenly vision we are enabled to look at the future of this world and the next in the light of the divine revelation. Although we see “through a glass darkly,” we know that some day we will see Him face to face. Although we remain aware of chaos without and strivings within we know that some day there will be a new heaven and a new earth and we will be a part of it. What a heavenly vision!
