The advice to “Never read a Bible verse!” by apologist Greg Koukl at first sounds like a cynical rant from a non-believer but, upon reflection, it is good advice when coupled with the additional sentence: “Read at least a paragraph”. Context is always important when trying to ascertain the meaning of hard-to-understand Bible passages and apparently that is true even for well-known Bible theologians like John Piper. It was encouraging to me to read in one of his articles recently that while he had struggled for a long time to understand a passage in the Sermon on the Mount, a footnote to a passage 14 chapters later held the key to opening up the meaning for him. It was even more enlightening for me to read his post since it dealt with a topic that holds special interest for me due to events that go back 65 years ago, as well as some that involve the things that the Lord is teaching me as I approach my 70th birthday. Allow me to explain.
I was born with severely crossed eyes and had three eye surgeries by the time I was five years old. One of my earliest memories is of having to be led by my parents in the subway tunnels around Mayo Clinic since my eyes were bandaged for many days following surgery. The last surgery was successful although I still deal with some side effects – some very minor like not being able to use binoculars and some more irritating since my eyes get tired easily and then go out of sync. Most people would agree that being able to see well is important; but as critical as our eyesight is, there is a different kind of seeing that is far more critical to our wellbeing than our physical eyesight.
In his post Dr. Piper was asked to explain how he came to understand Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 6:22-23 (“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”) in light of it being surrounded by passages that deal with money and treasure. Matthew 6:19-21 contains the admonishment not to lay up treasures on earth and is followed by Jesus’ statement that “No one can serve two masters.. You cannot serve God and money.” (Matthew 6:24). Piper felt for years that Matthew 6:22-23 just seemed to dangle without connection to what went before and what came after. He acknowledged that these verses make sense when read on the surface: if your eyes are closed everything is dark, but when they are open you can see – but that interpretation was not meaningful in the context of the surrounding passages.
The answer for Piper came 14 chapters later in Jesus’ teaching of the parable of the workers in the vineyard, some of whom worked all day for the same wage as those who were hired at the end of the day and were very disappointed that they didn’t receive a bigger payment— even though they received exactly what they agreed upon when hired. These workers didn’t appreciate the Master’s generosity (which represents God’s grace) toward the other workers and they angrily complained using a lament common to us all: THAT’S NOT FAIR! The Master responded in Matthew 20:15 by saying: “Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?” There is a month of Sundays worth of preaching in those two sentences, but the key for Piper’s understanding of Jesus’ teaching about the good eye and the bad eye was discovered in the footnote which includes the literal translation of “Do you begrudge my generosity?” as: ”Or is your eye bad because I am good?” It’s obvious that this bad eye doesn’t like generosity or grace—it’s a greedy eye that is so jealous that it values one’s own financial interest far above the interests of anyone else— and that understanding gives meaning to the placement of the verses 14 chapters earlier regarding the healthy eye between the verses dealing with having a proper attitude toward money and material things.
The flow goes something like this starting with Matthew 6:19:
- Don’t hoard material wealth and possessions here on earth, but rather use what God has given you to pursue eternal treasure (like being rich in good deeds and being generous and willing to share with others. (See 1 Timothy 6:17-19). Verses 19-21
- If you let a good eye guide you, you will stay focused on the kind of treasure that lasts forever, but if you follow a bad eye you will be living in darkness and will selfishly value your material possessions more than God’s grace. Verses 22-3
- You can’t have it both ways: either God or money will be your master. Verse 24
The conclusion: the middle verses were not out of place one bit! To quote my Barnabas of 32+ years: “God usually knows what He is doing!” And yes, there is a bit of intentional understatement there.
2024 has been a difficult year for me due to a number of health issues, family issues, lingering church issues from the church we left after attending for 37 years, and issues in the classical Christian school that my family helped start 10 years ago. I realize as I write this that the type and severity of the issues I have dealt with will almost certainly seem minor to many who will read this, and I ache for those who deal with challenges far more severe than mine. The reality is that we all deal with challenging things – some created by our own sinful behavior and some that are created by others or that are far out of our control. Jesus didn’t tell His followers that they might encounter difficulties, that there was a possibility that they would experience challenges in their lives—No, He said, “In this world you will have trouble.” John 16:33 (NIV) Not maybe, not might—but absolutely they will face trouble. He went on to say, “But take heart for I have overcome the world” and He offers not only hope in the face of challenges but the absolute certainty that He is preparing a future home for us where there will be no more trouble, no more tears, and no more disappointment. In the meantime, until our faith becomes sight, we will all face trouble in this world.
In recent weeks I have to admit that I have given in to a slight bit of feeling sorry for myself due to a significant impending monetary loss resulting from circumstances that were largely out of my control – and I have even tried to negotiate with God: “Don’t you know that I intend to give a big chunk of that money to the church, to the school, and to missions?” In those moments I was at risk of running afoul of the teachings in Matthew 6 in several ways: I believed the lie that material things provided me with real security, and I greatly overstated my role in God’s work by not acknowledging the fact that 100% of what I “own” actually belongs to Him. I had forgotten that He is allowed to do whatever He chooses with what is His. (Matthew 20:15) The post from John Piper helped me to see that I was seeing my situation from a very self-focused perspective, and my vision needed a major adjustment. The amazing thing is that God not only used that post to adjust my heart attitude, He followed it within 24 hours with a perfect example involving, of all things, eyesight, to show that His economy is far different from mine.
A year and a half ago Darwin (IM’s previous president) asked me to start communicating with one of our missionaries in Africa, and I was happy to do so. This young man was interested in starting an agricultural project in his home area, and my wife and I eventually donated a modest sum to buy some pigs, goats, and cows. The pigs didn’t work out and were given to some local families, but the goats and cows provided a small amount of income. To be honest, it had been a number of months since I had heard anything, and I pretty much thought that since it was self-sustaining, my involvement in that project was done. However in the midst of my pity party in late August, and within 24 hours of reading the Piper post about bad eyes, I received a most unexpected message from my missionary friend on What’s App. It was a picture of a young girl of about 13 years of age and a young boy of about 10. Here is the message: “Our first big support ministry from the farming project. We were able to facilitate almost fully the surgery of these two children who had eye defects. The girl was not seeing anymore and the boy was almost losing his sight. They had their surgeries on Wednesday and Friday this week. They were discharged today (August 31) and expected to return on the 12th of September. The surgeries were both successful. Thank you for your support.” What???
I immediately hit the floor with tears in my eyes at how a gracious, kind, generous, healing God could take a small amount of money from a selfish man who was mourning the coming loss of money that he didn’t really need, and restore the sight of a young blind girl and an almost blind boy. My shame at my self-pity was quickly replaced by pure wonder at how the Lord had reminded me that as a generous God, full of grace and mercy, He can do much with little, and our loss would not affect His work in the least. My prayers have since changed from “God, please work a miracle and don’t let me lose this money! ” to “Thank you, Father, for this tangible reminder of your abundant, overflowing grace in my life and for the future grace of spending eternity with you! Please help me to love that which is worth loving and to keep my eyes focused on the kind of treasure that lasts forever.” God is so, so good!
Greg Nicholas
Greg and his wife Julie live in Clear Lake, Iowa.
Greg is a member of IM’s Board of Directors
and has been involved with IM for more
than 30 years.
