Is Looking For Free?
“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 bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” (Matthew 6:22-23)
“Looking’s for free, but touching’s gonna cost you.” How many times have we used this expression as an excuse to gallivant through town and window shop? Though window shopping may not deprive our pocketbooks of much needed funds, window shopping exacts a great toll. Our eyes pay from the treasury of desire, robbing from other much more valuable resources. Now, you may think that you are an endless fount of love and affection; however, we only have so much love in our hearts. At some point (to use another popular expression), we rob Peter to pay Paul. Where our eyes go, so does our affections. And our eyes can only go on place at a time.
What does this look like practically? Well, I stroll into the fine eating establishment across from my office to see a young couple on a date. Young love, isn’t it beautiful? Almost. Her eyes are fixated on Instagram while he’s surfing his phone for the latest SEC football scores. What are they not looking at? Each other. When these young’uns get home, how do you think they will describe their evening? In bright, glowing terms? Or in dark, dour tones? If I was a betting man, I would place my wager on the latter.
Now, we shift gears and look at our relationship with God, and Jesus illuminates the same principle. Our eyes were made to behold His glory (John 17:24). By beholding Him, we are transformed from one degree of glory to another (2 Cor. 3:18). As Jesus is the Light of the World (John 8:12); so too when we see Him, we will be as He is (1 John 3:1-2). If our eye is healthy, beholding what is true, what is just, what is honorable, what is commendable, what is pure, what is excellent, then we will be filled with light (Phil. 4:8). However, the same principle cuts both ways. If our eyes gaze upon the shadows, if our media diet consists in content dark and deplorable, we should not be surprised if our hearts become enveloped in darkness.
Reader, I ask: what are you looking at? What is the content of your screens, of your books, of your vision? To those whose eyes behold the Light, the world will shine in a brighter hue. To those who enjoy the darkness, you cannot see the great joy you are missing. Or as Paul says, “To the pure, all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure; but both their minds and their consciences are defiled.” Be watchful of what you watch.
