Read: Matthew 6:19-34

I remember, at the turn of the new year this past January, a certain televangelist touted 2020 as the “Year of New Vision.” 20/20 vision . . . get it?

He clearly did not envision this. A few months into the pandemic this meme circulated: “Turns out nobody had 2020 vision.”

In this part of his Sermon, Jesus speaks about vision – the way we see things and what we should be looking at and where our attention should be focused. This Word seems especially important: “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy [cf. footnote: generous], your whole body will be full of light.”

What does Jesus mean that the eye is the lamp of the body? N. T. Wright suggests three things: “First, he means that we must, as we say, ‘keep our eyes fixed on God’ . . . . Second, . . . Jesus literally meant that we should take care what we actually look at . . . [and] Third, the eyes are like the headlights of a car. Supposing you’re driving along a dark road at night, and you try to switch the lights on – and nothing happens! You suddenly realize just how dark it really is. That’s what it’s like, Jesus is saying, if your eyes are not fixed on God, and if instead they are following whatever eye-catching, pretty thing happens to take their fancy.”

For me – during this season – my eyes are not following “whatever eye-catching, pretty thing happens to take their fancy.” My eyes are too often drawn to the dire COVID-19 statistics or to the chaos of our politics or the violence on our cities’ streets. The effect is the same: darkness, anxiety, distress, a heaviness of spirit.

In the he sixth Beatitude Jesus suggested that our vision, the way we see things, was connected to the state of our hearts:

“Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.” (5:8)​

Even in the midst of a global pandemic and political chaos, may we see God.

​- Pastor Dave