Eyes Wide Open?

Are you able to discern beyond what is happening around you physically at work? Is your direction for your career or business based on physical or spiritual sight? Do you take people, things and events at face value or do you interrogate them further in the spirit?

2^nd Kings 6 gives an account of Elisha and his servant surrounded by a Syrian army. They’ve been sent by their king to capture the prophet and his servant is understandably distressed. Yet Elisha is unmoved because he can see something his servant can’t – horses and chariots of fire that far outnumber those of the Syrian army. 

Nothing is as it seems in the marketplace. There have been numerous prophecies of even more shaking coming our way this year. Fear and distress are a natural response. But they’re not our only option. We need to ask God to open our eyes as He did those of Elisha’s servants. 

Revival isn’t pretty. God has to upset the status quo before He can establish His purpose in the marketplace. 

Clarity 

If you’ve ever dealt with visual impairment, you know that just because you open your eyes doesn’t mean you clearly see what’s in front of you. 

One of filters that greatly impairs our spiritual sight is our physical sight. When God reveals something to us spiritually, but it doesn’t correspond to what we’re seeing or feeling physically, we can easily dismiss what we got from God. 

This happens when we prioritise what is physical over what is spiritual. Yet, everything happens first in the spiritual realm, then in the physical realm. Not the other way around. We shouldn’t look around us to confirm what we’re seeing spiritually but to enforce its manifestation through prayer and action. 

In 1^st Kings 18, Elijah sent his servant to check for a rain cloud that would symbolise the end of years of famine. His servant had to go back 7 times before the rain cloud finally manifested. 

There are things God is speaking concerning the business sector that seem like a mirage given the current global circumstances. But in the midst of economic famines, we must be faithful like Elijah’s servant to keep going back until we see God’s word come to pass. 

Keep praying. Keep working. Continue diligently pursuing God in all you do. His word will not return to Him void. 

Comprehension

Babies are typically born with the ability to see the world around them but they don’t know what they’re looking at. As caregivers, we have to give them the language of sight. Teach them letters and numbers. Shapes and patterns. And well into adulthood, we continue to learn the identity of things we see for the first time. 

So it is with the spiritual realm. As spiritual babies, we may be able to see certain things but we have to be willing to learn the language of spiritual sight. Otherwise we will interpret what we’re seeing spiritually with our physical understanding.

But unlike the independence we gain as we physically grow, the more we mature in the faith, the more we need to submit ourselves to continually be taught and led by the Holy Spirit and fellow brethren. 

Just because you’ve been in a career or a business for a given duration of time doesn’t mean you know all there is to it. There are infinite mysteries to be discovered in God concerning your profession. Don’t settle for crumbs when your inheritance is a feast. 

It’s also possible to spiritually discern a matter correctly but interpret it wrongly. For instance, a business is struggling to make ends meet. You discern that it is a spiritual attack. However, you think it is because the business was flourishing and its competitors are jealous. Yet it could be that the season has come for the business to shut down and those involved in it to move on to other things. Times and seasons are as much a reality in business as they are in other areas of life. 

We’re living in an age where Christians are too quick to speak. We hear God and take off running without tarrying to make sure we understand what God is saying to us and what He requires of us. 

Yet the Bible is clear that we know in part. Anything you get in a moment is but a fragment of revelation – a tiny piece of a greater whole. For you to effectively steward that revelation, you need the requisite divine wisdom for it. 

Submit any spiritual matter to your spiritual cover. Partner with someone to pray over it. Tarry in God’s presence until He releases you to act on it and shows you how to do so. 

Focus 

If you’re able to see and comprehend, there’s one more frontier you must conquer – holding onto the truth that has been made known to you. 

If the enemy can’t stop you from receiving truth, he will try to distract you from it. Peter had a revelation of Jesus that allowed him to walk on water. But the moment he took his eyes off Jesus and focused on the storm, he started to sink. 

in this pandemic era, there are all sorts of hot takes and strategies being given on how to do business and progress career wise. If the wisdom you are getting is taking you away from the initial instructions God gave you, you need to consider where your focus is. 

God is not the author of confusion. He wasn’t unaware of the pandemic when He spoke to you. He factored it in alongside every other challenge He knew you would face. Hold fast to what He told you until He Himself directs you otherwise. 

This decade, more than ever before, our eyes must be fixed on Jesus. The distractions are too numerous to count. The contrary voices a dime a dozen. 

Prayer: 
Lord, open the eyes of my understanding. I want to see Your heart and hand in my career and the world around me. Grant me clarity, comprehension and focus. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

This edition of Telios Chapters is an excerpt from Battle For The Marketplace By Mary Kamau.

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