Sense-Less

I know a man who, because of a tragic accident has been left mostly blind and without many senses; he can no longer taste or smell. He is strong and able, and loves life, but his senses are very limited.

My friend still gets out, with the help of his wife, and travels, yet he can’t see the beauty of a mountain range or a sunset. He still eats but cannot taste the food or smell its aroma. In his sever limitations he often does not know what he is eating. In short he experiences life on a limited level, he does not experience the full delight of many things as most of us do.

This is a picture of many people and the limitation in our sense of Jesus Christ for both professing believers and those who do not believe. We may read our Bible, pray, attend church and do “good deeds” year after year, and yet experience no true delight in God. We “eat” His Word, reading diligently, listen to sermons, yet never “taste” and “see” that the Lord is good, i.e. delightful (psalm 34.8). We “breath” yet never enjoy the “aroma” of God, the sweet “smell” of His goodness, grace and mercy. We “look” but never truly “see” the beauty of God (Psalm 115.5,6). We perform the mechanical, intellectual actions of “eating”, “seeing” and “smelling” but never experience delightful “sensing” of God. All the Bible reading, praying, and “deeds doing” become “senseless” acts with no flavor, no aroma, no beholding; simply — no delight, just actions and motions; like my friend who eats without tasting, breaths without smelling and sees without beholding.

This is tragic because there is so much richness and fullness in Christ that infinite joy is lost when we do not enjoy His fullness in His Word and in the world.
Something radical must happen to gain these spiritual senses; spiritual taste buds, and spiritual noses and spiritual eyesight that apprehend and sense what they are engaged in. What we need is new tongues, new noses and new eyes, or as Jesus said a “new birth” brought by God that awakens all the senses to God and enables full enjoyment and delight in the One in whom these senses were made to delight. Without the new birth and new senses we are doomed to a senseless life without God our Creator.

Ask God for these senses that turn mere eating into flavorful tasting, breathing into smelling and seeing into beholding, all the greatness of God!