Eyes of your heart – Saturday 21st November 2015- Month of prayer and giving guide

‘I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people…’ (Ephesians 1:18)

‘I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened’

Paul is continuing to emphasize his devotion to prayer for these believers by praying for the ‘eyes of their heart to be enlightened...’ what does this mean?

i) ‘Eyes’- he uses the metaphor of sight: he wants them to ‘see’ the truth with greater and greater clarity.

ii) ‘heart’- The word ‘heart’ (καρδίας) is the centre of who we are- the source of all our passions and decisions.

So we should understand Paul’s prayer as a desire that these Christians grow in knowledge of God (and their future hope that we’ll look at tomorrow) and that it moves from the head (the academic and theoretical) to the heart- their lives being affected by the truth; in fact a Christian doesn’t truly know a thing until it has moved into the heart! (All word should be incarnated). 

Christian knowledge should never remain theoretical, it should always become practical.

For example, one may know that God calls us to a life of faith in regard to generosity but God wants this truth to move into the heart so that we actually live a generous life that joyfully reflects Christ. 

You may want to pray something like this,

“Father, I thank you for transforming my thinking in regard to you. Please help me, and all at Community Church, to continue to grow in knowledge of your truth and let our hearts be so moved that our lives become ever more like Jesus and pleasing to you. Amen. ”