I remember once taking a train ride into the city from where I live in Sunbury. There is a particular stretch of railway line that runs beside the Calder Highway for a time. The highway and the railway track are, perhaps, 200-400 metres, or so, apart for a while – at different stages - after Diggers Rest. After that, highway and track diverge. I remember sitting in the carriage, looking out of the window at the landscape and all the other features like houses, bridges, towers, paddocks, and creeks that were passing by. I had driven past these hundreds of times before on the highway, of course, but had never seen the details like I was seeing from the carriage window.
Everything was the same, yet everything looked different. Obviously, this was because my focus was different. I was seeing things with “fresh eyes”. The same things I had always seen, but in a fresh way, from a different perspective. Instead of being focused on the road ahead, concentrating on the task at hand, and being partially aware of what was in the distance, or within my peripheral field of view, I now had uninterrupted, full focus. I didn’t need to concentrate on much - just see what I was seeing, if you know what I mean. It was like the landscape where I have lived for more than thirty years was freshly revealing more to me. Of course, that’s only partly true. It was the same landscape, but without the need to focus on my own concerns (not that that is necessarily a bad thing), I was able to see with “fresh eyes” from the carriage.
Our busyness demands an incredible level of focus and concentration each day. There is so much going on, and the intensity varies. The demand can be so intense at times that we cannot see what is right there in front of us – and, often, those scenes and features are always there. We just don’t see them or, if we do, they do not demand of us, appropriate attention.
This is one of the issues that arises for me when I read the account of the Samaritan woman whom Jesus met that day at Jacob’s well. Following that amazing conversation, this downtrodden woman goes back to her village and shares her experience of the Messiah, who spoke to her in such a life-changing way. The disciples return as she was leaving, and another conversation ensues …
John 4:31-35 (NIV)
Meanwhile His disciples urged Him, "Rabbi, eat something." 32 But He said to them, "I have food to eat that you know nothing about." 33 Then His disciples said to each other, "Could someone have brought Him food?" 34 "My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of Him who sent me and to finish His work. 35 Don't you have a saying, 'It's still four months until harvest'? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest.”
Jesus saw something that the disciples did not. He saw fields ripe for harvest. He urges the disciples to open their eyes. In other words, “if you look carefully and without distractions, if you’ll focus, you’ll see what I see.” And this, of course, is what Jesus Himself, had learned to do. A little further on, He would say:
John 5:19 (NIV)
"Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by Himself; He can do only what He sees His Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.”
Jesus had learned to look at the world around Him and “see” what God was doing, what God was initiating, what God was inviting Him to do, as well. He only participated in that – this was His “food”. He lived on this. I kind of think that this was what was happening that day at Jacob’s well. Jesus suddenly saw what the Father was doing and that automatically became His agenda, and He participated in it. One woman comes to know Him, and then, many more. Suddenly, He saw the fields that were ripe. He then alerts the disciples to “open your eyes” to see the same fields ready for harvest.
This is the way in which the Church begins the process of carrying out the Great Commission. And this is no random thing. It is focused. We need to learn to open our eyes to what God is showing us in the moment and this is often very specific and momentary. We cannot afford to miss these moments.
Perhaps, one of the skills we need to quickly develop if we are to gather in the harvest around us is to learn to open our eyes and see what is there – what God is revealing. Maybe it has always been there, but as God reveals it to us, the moment is clearly ripe. This opening of our eyes is a spiritual discipline, I think. Let’s get really good at it. The disciples? All they saw that day was a despised woman from a despised people, and are thinking of where they needed to go and what they needed to do next. God saw harvest. He alerted Jesus. Jesus alerted them. And this immediately became the new agenda. A harvest was ripe and ready, nothing else mattered.
Open your eyes and see what God is revealing to you in the coffee shop, in the workplace, on the train, in your street … This may take a daily, first-thing, preparation which becomes part of our prayer life: “Lord, help me to see what You are showing me today … that I may join myself to what You are doing, like Jesus did. Open my eyes, Lord, and I promise to participate with You, and know the special joy of the sower and the reaper together.”
Open your eyes, wherever you are!
Practice doing so.
The fields are ripe for harvest.
Ps Milton