Can you see the invisible man?

by Scott Phillips

An interesting thought I have been working over in my brain was that Jesus had a special quality that most “powerful” people do not have the time to do.  

    He saw the invisible people. 

    He heard the cry of the fringe. 

    He felt the touch of meaning that others would have thought was just a casual brush.

If you catalogue in your mind the ministry of Jesus, most of his significant encounters revolved around these invisible people.  A tax collector up in the top of a tree.  A blind beggar on the side of the street.  A sick lady under the feet.  These are just a few quick example of this characteristic that Jesus displayed. 

We live in a generation that the only way you can talk to people is call them on their cell phone, because when you’re with them, they are on the cell phone.  I am guilty of this most heinous breakdown of personal communication.  A total lack of focus on things that are in front of us, because we have so much noise around us.  We are so busy going somewhere to do something that is so important, that we literally run past things that may very well be more important.

Remember Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan?   I think really, he was demonstrating that the “religious” could not see the man because they were disconnected from what was in front of them because they were looking forward to what was going to happen.

The word is attentiveness.  I fail to give this to my wife like I should.  I continue this weakness toward my children.  I have seen it and felt it at times at church, because there are so many people to be greeted, that I don’t do a good job with any because I am trying to connect with so many.  So instead of having a few meaningful encounters, in my effort to connect with everyone, I connect to no one.

Jesus had this amazing ability to connect.  To look in their eyes.  To ask them questions.  To discern their thoughts.  To speak to them directly.  The result is he did not just entertain the masses, but he changed the lives of individuals through this divine gift of focusing on the person in front of him.  Seeing the ones that no one else saw.  To hear the cry everyone else ignored.  To feel the touch others would have been oblivious to.

My simple prayer tonight is, “Jesus, help me to be more like you in this area.  To slow down and make the most of the time I have.  To focus on what is in front of me.  To do a better job of devoting more of my attention to my wife and children.”

I heard an esteemed elder, Bro. Rocko of Mississippi say just last week, “Many things we do good for God, we don’t know we are doing them.  In the Bible they said, “When did we feed you, visit you, clothe you?”  Jesus' response was, “When you have done it unto the least of these, ye have done it unto me.”  We must understand that it is what we unknowingly do can have the greatest impact.”  (Not a direct quote, but the idea he communicated.)

There is a rhythmic pattern of compassion that should beat out of our hearts that it is no longer a focus or an effort, but becomes an unconscious habit.

My good buddy, Kevin Shindoll asked me tonight, “Do you know the most used noun in the English language?”  He said, “ the word is time.”  “Time is the most used noun in the English language.”  My response to him was, “What we talk about the most we have so little of.”

We must beware of our sense of hurry that we don't miss the reason we are in hurry about.  We must be able to see what is important.  Jesus looked in the dull eyed disciples as they approached him incredulously as he spoke to the Samaritan woman.  They were judging him because it was wrong for him to do that for so many reasons.  Jesus confronted them and basically said, “Lift up your eyes boys what you see before you is the harvest.”  Shortly this single “sinner” woman brought all of Samaria out to see Jesus.  Most would not have wasted their time, but because Jesus saw her, talked to her, the seeds of the Great Samaritan revival recorded in Acts 8 were planted.

Why? Because Jesus saw the invisible woman.

You don’t need superpowers to see them; you only need a greater revelation of Gods love for them.

Straining to see them…

In Him, By Him, Through Him,

Scott Phillips