“Open My Eyes, That I May See”
Have you ever played the game Bean Boozled? The basic premise is that each style of jellybean could be one of two flavors. Green could be “Lime or Lawn Clippings,” blue could be “Berry Blue or Toothpaste.” What makes the game interesting is that you cannot tell which flavor you’re getting until you eat it. If you’re unlucky enough to get one of the bad-tasting jelly beans, it leaves a very unfortunate taste in your mouth.
This silly game ties into a profound truth: nobody appreciates it when we think we’re getting one thing, but in fact, we get another. In my business classes, they called this the bait and switch—luring someone in with the promise of one thing only to provide another. We’ve all experienced this, and I’m not just talking on a consumer level. We’ve all experienced this on a personal level; at one time or another, we have been “fooled” by a person or organization, thinking they were one thing only to find that they were, in fact, another.
The passage we are looking at in James this week addresses how this should not be the case with believers. This passage is a call to authenticity.
James 3:9-12:
9 With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God. 10 From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers,[a] these things ought not to be so. 11 Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water? 12 Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water.
These verses fall in the context of a larger teaching on the power of words.
In Matthew 15, Jesus said, “It is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person.”
Our words are like a mirror to our soul; they reveal the true nature of ourselves.
I was told a story once about a church that was absolutely exploding! They were seeing more people pouring in than their facilities were designed to accommodate. This inevitably created traffic issues. One day after a worship service, people were leaving, and a confrontation began in the parking lot. The same people that were just praising God with their mouths in the service were now cursing each other in the parking lot after church.
“My brothers, these things ought not to be so.”
This doesn’t mean we give up on praising God but instead seek God so that He can do the work of transforming us at our core. We don’t need to just change our actions; we need our hearts to be transformed.
Luke 6:45 says, “For out of the abundance of the heart, his mouth speaks.”
Our actions are not just actions; they are a reflection of the depravity that is present in all of us. And only God who can transform that depravity into something that is honoring to Him.
This Sunday, we will be singing a hymn titled “Open My Eyes, That I May See.”
It’s interesting to me that in this song, the first two verses are focused on seeing and hearing God and His truth, but the third is focused on our witness.
In verse one, we sing of desiring to have our eyes opened to God’s truth (Psalm 119:18).
In verse two, we sing of desiring to have our ears opened to hear God’s voice (1 Kings 19:11-13).
But in the third, we sing of the desire that when we open our mouths, it may draw people to God!
As we learn and sing together this week, may our eyes be opened to God’s truth both in Scripture and the truth about where we fall short of “living a life worthy of the calling of Christ” (Ephesians 4:1).
May our ears be open to God’s voice.
And may our hearts be transformed so that when we open our mouths, those we interact with aren’t left with an unfortunate taste in their mouths, but instead are drawn to a relationship with our Heavenly Father, for His glory.
Adam