About the “Healthy” and “Unhealthy” Eye

Matthew 6: 22-33
Rom. 5: 1-10

The Lord says, “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness”. A human eye is not just a visual organ. It is inseparable from our free mind. Seeing always means evaluating what we see and forming an opinion about it. The Lord wants us to have a “healthy” eye and teaches us that, using an example from nature. He says, “Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them”. Then He says, “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow”. He calls us to marvel at their unique beauty, and to appreciate how much it surpasses the garments of a king, for whom thousands of people work. The lilies “toil not, neither do they spin. And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these”.

The Lord also teaches us to look at ourselves as the peak of all creation, who therefore has the right to count on much greater care from the Creator. He says, “Are you not of more value than” the birds? And “if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?” “Therefore,  I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear”.

Some will say, “So, are we supposed to sit and wait until God does everything for us”? But again, the Lord reminds us, “Look at the birds of the air”. The truth is that they do not spend a minute in idleness! They fly, build nests and collect food. And yet, they sleep peacefully at night, not caring what the coming day is preparing for them”.  So the Lord calls us not to idleness or frivolous squandering of what is prepared for tomorrow. He only warns us against godless solicitude, so that we are not tormented at the sight of unpleasant circumstances, looking into tomorrow with an “unhealthy” eye and thinking, “What are we going to eat and drink?” or “What are we going to wear?” In doing so, we let our sorrows that may not even exist yet (and, God willing, will not exist at all) destroy ourselves.

Let us not forget that true warriors of Christ “boast in … sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die.

Therefore, let us look ahead with a “healthy” eye. What will happen tomorrow? – Tomorrow there will be God, as He was yesterday, and as He is today. God is forever the same, and “proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. Much more surely then, now that we have been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life. “

Translated by The Catalogue of Good Deeds
Source: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Vyacheslav_Reznikov/propovedi-na-kazhdyj-den/11_1

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