John Wesley

The Eyes of the Heart

Posted on by Betsy

A contemporary praise song leads with the phrase “Open the eyes of my heart, Lord. I want to see you.” This wording invites us to ponder what it means to have eyes in our hearts. Not to be taken literally by any means, it does seem to imply a way of perceiving and knowing God in a way that relies more on our emotional quotient, our “EQ'” than our intelligence quotient, than our “IQ.” It invites us to consider not what we know, but what we feel. Do you feel God moving in your soul? What emotions are experienced when you see God revealed in marvelous ways? What does your heart tell you?

John Wesley experienced a dramatic revelation of God when he was listening to someone teach one day. Take note of that: he was listening. He wasn’t preaching, attending to the sick, observing the wonderful works of God in nature, converting the prisoners: He was listening. He had grown quite discouraged in his ministry and was contemplating leaving. A friend advised him to “preach faith, and then when you find it, preach it some more.” He dragged his weary spirit to a meeting in Aldersgate and then it happened. The speaker read from Luther’s Preface to the Epistle to Romans when suddenly he felt his “heart strangely warmed.” Wesley wrote in his journal: “While he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me for the law of sin and death.”

God had opened the eyes of his heart, and a movement that would eventually become The United Methodist Church was born.

Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus employs this same beautiful language.

Ephesians 1 (Common English Bible)

17 I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, will give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation that makes God known to you. 18 I pray that the eyes of your heart will have enough light to see what is the hope of God’s call, what is the richness of God’s glorious inheritance among believers, 19 and what is the overwhelming greatness of God’s power that is working among us believers.

This church was struggling mightily with many corrosive issues that threatened to undo them. This group of former gentiles had little structure or understanding of God’s plan for salvation. The rulers of the present day were evil and not to be followed. Paul desired that they open the eyes of their heart to the power of God at work in Christ; a power far greater than any earthy ruler or authority. He wanted them to open the eyes of their hearts to the place that Christ’s body, the church, had in leading the world.

This power is conferred by the energy of God’s powerful strength. 20 God’s power was at work in Christ when God raised him from the dead and sat him at God’s right side in the heavens, 21 far above every ruler and authority and power and angelic power, any power that might be named not only now but in the future. 22 God put everything under Christ’s feet and made him head of everything in the church, 23 which is his body. His body, the church, is the fullness of Christ, who fills everything in every way.

Is God dealing with you today? What issues are you facing? Have you lost sight of God’s power to redeem and sustain you?

Open the eyes of our hearts, Lord. We need to see you.

The Energy of God’s Strength by Kathy Schumacher

The Seeming Absurdity of God

Posted on by Betsy

If you have ever raised a teenager, you may have gone through a period when said teenager decided that you know absolutely nothing. When we parent our toddlers and elementary-age children, we are the authority on everything. Then something strange happens as they enter Middle School … suddenly our parental brains empty of every last bit of knowledge as theirs fill up with all kinds of great wisdom. Things we say to them at this point come off as sheer silliness and we are downright stupid in their eyes.

Luckily they grow out of that somewhere around the first year of college, when we miraculously become smart again.

Such is the case today in Paul’s letter to the church in Corinth. He writes to them about the way the truth of Jesus Christ is perceived by its critics:

1 Corinthians 1 (The Message)

18-21 The Message that points to Christ on the Cross seems like sheer silliness to those hellbent on destruction, but for those on the way of salvation it makes perfect sense. This is the way God works, and most powerfully as it turns out. It’s written,

I’ll turn conventional wisdom on its head,
I’ll expose so-called experts as shams.

So where can you find someone truly wise, truly educated, truly intelligent in this day and age? Hasn’t God exposed it all as pretentious nonsense? Since the world in all its fancy wisdom never had a clue when it came to knowing God, God in his wisdom took delight in using what the world considered stupid—preaching, of all things!—to bring those who trust him into the way of salvation.

He was addressing the culture of his time over 2,000 years ago, but the same teaching applies to today. The cross indeed is foolishness to those who have not received it. Knowing Jesus, it turns out, is a spiritual knowledge born of experience rather than a scholarly, intellectual pursuit. John Wesley, a well-educated Anglican priest, discovered this on a ship during a turbulent sea crossing. He observed the Moravian travelers calmly praying and singing hymns rather than panicking. Later, he sat down to study Romans and he wrote in his journal that he felt his heart “strongly warmed.” These two events helped him move his faith from head knowledge to heart knowledge. You can read all you want to about Christ, but until you accept him as Savior and Lord, you will never really know him.

22-25 While Jews clamor for miraculous demonstrations and Greeks go in for philosophical wisdom, we go right on proclaiming Christ, the Crucified. Jews treat this like an anti-miracle—and Greeks pass it off as absurd. But to us who are personally called by God himself—both Jews and Greeks—Christ is God’s ultimate miracle and wisdom all wrapped up in one. Human wisdom is so cheap, so impotent, next to the seeming absurdity of God. Human strength can’t begin to compete with God’s “weakness.”

Is today the day when you will accept Christ as your Lord and Savior? Are you being called to humble yourself in his sight and receive him as your personal redeemer? If you’ve been thinking about this for a while but haven’t experienced it yet, today is your day. You are one prayer away from salvation.

Each one of us who has already made this commitment is personally called by God himself to tell others about Christ, God’s “ultimate miracle and wisdom all wrapped up in one.” The way to do that is to tell your personal story. How do you know Jesus? Go and tell. You never know what seeds you will sow.

Fall Beauty by Kathy Schumacher