On our Uganda trip in October of 2017, we stayed in a new hotel in the village of Pakwach. Apparently, it was REALLLLLLLY new because they were still trying to work out a few kinks with the locks on their doors.
A gentleman on the trip, Sheldon – a pastor from Mooresville, had locked his door to go to dinner. Upon an attempt to reenter, he realized his key no longer worked. He tried, I tried, others on the trip tried . . . there was NO getting that key to work in the lock.
Everyone was perplexed. Hours (literally) went by as new keys were tried, the staff of the hotel was contacted and they tried . . . there was no getting back in his room.
He remembered he left the sliding glass doors to the balcony unlocked so this presented us with a new option. He decided he would jump from my balcony to his. However, the balconies were at least 6 feet apart and we were on the third floor. It looked to be a SIZABLE distance down . . . so I challenged him on that idea. The last thing we needed was him with broken bones.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that after a few hours of this waiting, anxieties were pretty high. We stood outside on the balcony waiting on the hotel staff to hopefully find a ladder for someone to climb so that he could re-enter his room.
All of a sudden he said, “Stop!”
I thought he had a new idea of how to get in . . . instead, he had a different kind of epiphany.
“Just look . . . look up.”
I did. The stars were AMAZING! With no ambient light, the brilliance of the night sky was breathtaking. We started picking out constellations and quickly realized our astronomy was QUITE rusty. We could appreciate the brilliance of what we saw, but we lacked wisdom in knowing its true identity.
Astronomers with trained eyes would have been able to call the stars and planets by name. A navigator would have been able to use what Sheldon and I saw to help bring a ship across trackless seas to its desired location.
We just knew it looked beautiful.
We can ONLY see that which we are ABLE to see.
It’s like having our eyesight tested and realizing once assistance is given how much we’ve been missing out on.
Spiritually, Jesus was saying, the pure in heart – those with motives driven by WANTING to see and experience God – are the ones that truly SEE God.
Pure motives – ones driven not by selfish ambition or gain, but motives wanting to experience the fullness of God.
Sheldon was able to get into his room, finally! It took TOTALLY dismantling the door and ultimately he moved rooms so that they could fix the lock/door.
What if we do a deep self-check and dismantle any impure motives we have?
“O the bliss of those whose motives are absolutely pure, for they will be able to see God.” Matthew 5:8