Open My Eyes, Lord
By Bevin Summey
()
About this ebook
Jesus! Have mercy on me! The blind beggar cried out these words to Jesus over two thousand years ago. And what did Jesus do? He healed the beggars blindness!
We may not all be physically blind, but we all are born spiritually blind. God does not want us to be in this state, and he offers to us a solution: grace, mercy, and salvation that will open our eyes to the truth of the world and ourselves. We cannot be healed from our blindness without the loving touch of Jesus. He longs to put His hand on our eyes and say, Your faith has made you well. He cannot do this, though, unless you are willing to surrender to Him.
As the beautiful song, Amazing Grace says, I once was lost, but now Im found. Was blind, but now I see.
Are you willing to cry out, Jesus! Have mercy on me?
Bevin Summey
Bevin Summey showed a natural gift in writing at a very young age. Even greater, however, she had a strong passion for Christ and longed to help others know Christ as well. With Christ to guide her, she began to feel the need to use her gift of writing that God had given her to show the world who He really is. After she graduated in 2009, she finally began to fulfill that dream. The Love Letter, her first book, was released in September 2012, and has begun to amaze people at the simple yet powerful message. With the help of God, she’s fulfilling her dream as she continues to quietly work on her books within the little town of Dalton, Georgia.
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Open My Eyes, Lord - Bevin Summey
Copyright © 2012 Bevin Summey
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright ©1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.
ISBN: 978-1-4497-7658-9 (e)
ISBN: 978-1-4497-7659-6 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-4497-7660-2 (hc)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2012921937
WestBow Press rev. date:11/21/2012
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1 Stranded: The World Does Not Care
Chapter 2 Lost Hope: Satan Tries To Take Hope Away
Chapter 3 Broken Record: Repeated Routine
Chapter 4 Someone Help: We Cannot Do This Alone
Chapter 5 Pondering Heart: Is there more for me?
Chapter 6 Following the Voice: Which Voice
Are You Listening To?
Chapter 7 Silence: The World Does Not Want You To Find The Truth
Chapter 8 Finding Jesus: Jesus Hears Your Cry
Chapter 9 Lord, Have Mercy On Me: God’s Unending Grace And Answer To Faith
Chapter 10 Once Was Blind, But Now I See: God Heals Your Blindness
Epilogue
Also by BEVIN SUMMEY
Inspirational
The Love Letter
To God, my Father in Heaven,
who opened my eyes and changed my life.
To my Moma, who I love so much and
helps me through every part of my life.
To my family and friends,
who I am so grateful for all the prayers and encouragement.
To everyone at West Bow Press,
who I thank for helping me achieve a dream that I never thought could come true.
Prologue
Imagine that you’re blind and homeless and that you have no family or friends. You’re just outside the city limits, begging and pleading for someone to help you survive for yet another day, just to start the whole process over again tomorrow. But deep inside, you still hope for something that you’re not quite sure about yet.
Then one day as you’re sitting in your usual spot, once again begging and pleading for anything that you can survive off of, you suddenly feel a change in the atmosphere. You can feel the vibration of people running from everywhere toward the same direction. At first you feel fear, and you begin to think something is wrong and everyone has just left you there.
Suddenly you begin to hear shouting …and cheering? Curious, you get up slowly, walking toward where the shouting is coming from. When you finally get to the back edge of the crowd, you begin to overhear some of the quieter chatter. You can hear, That’s Him! The One who’s been preaching in the Temple
and, Isn’t He the One who healed all those people?
Your heart nearly stops when realization hits you.
Could it be? You wonder, Is it really true?
Well, you decide, there is only one way to find out.
You take a deep breath, gathering all the strength that you have in yourself, and begin shouting, Jesus! Have mercy on me!
You wave your arms, unsure if anyone can see or hear you at all. That is, until someone grabs you by the arm and tells you to be quiet. You want to listen to him, but something in you is telling you that this is Someone much greater than anyone in the crowd, so you continue to shout, Jesus! Have mercy on me!
Suddenly, everyone goes quiet. You can hear shuffling of feet as if the crowd is creating a pathway for Someone. You do not realize that this is exactly what the crowd is doing until you suddenly hear one pair of footsteps walking straight toward you.
When the footsteps stop in front of you, you fall onto your knees, reaching for Him with shaking hands, knowing that you have nothing to lose. Finally, you find the edge of His cloak, and you grip it for all that it’s worth. You look up into His eyes without seeing, and you repeat, more quietly, Lord, have mercy on me.
You hear Jesus laugh softly, not in a mocking way but lovingly. You hear Him shift His feet as He bends down to take your hands and lift you to your feet. Your heart aches as you long to see His face, but your thoughts are interrupted when Jesus does something unexpected. He puts His hand over your eyes and says, Your faith has made you well.
Then you feel a sensation that is somewhere between shock and reverence. Then suddenly you feel Jesus take His hand off your eyes. You slowly open your eyes, daring to believe, and the first thing you see is Jesus, the Lord and God of all creation.
This story was based off of Luke 18:35–43, the story of the blind beggar. As we walk through this journey of life, we are very much like this blind beggar. We just sit around and blindly watch life pass on while we wait for something or someone to come along and help us improve our situation. Then, if no one is willing to help, we are left to fend for ourselves. Or are we?
We spend our lives searching for something that is, in reality, already right in front of us. We are blinded
by the world and its standards. In order to see
past everything that this sinful world lies out before us, we have to set our gaze on Someone higher than this world.
2 Corinthians 4:17–18, For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.
Chapter 1
Stranded: The World Does Not Care
The world is known for many evil things. The list could be very long, but probably one of the most evil things the world is known for is that if you are not rich, popular, or good enough,
then the world will write you off and leave you stranded and uncared for. Because of this, too many people fall to drugs, alcohol, and many other immoral acts to make them feel like they belong and fit into the world. The results, however, are almost always the same: death and eternal separation from God. The misery and heartache has become such a common thing now that anytime death or evil acts are announced on the radio, newspaper, TV, or Internet, the reaction to such news is little to nothing. How is it that we have become so numb to such terrible horror that we no longer seem to care for each other? Why do we act like people are just trash that will eventually be thrown away to be burned?
Romans 12:1–2 says, And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all He has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice - the kind He will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship Him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.
We do not care for others, and people feel abandoned and unloved all because that’s the way the world wants it to be. Satan has taken over how the world thinks because most of the people in the world allow it. We do not have to surrender to Satan’s rule and the sin that has tried to drown anything good in the world. How can we change this situation? Because once we are in Satan’s grasp, it is difficult, but not impossible, to be freed from his deadly game.
In order to be released from