This study is a topical study centered on the phrase, ‘lift up your eyes.’ Why look up? What does it mean to lift up one’s eyes? What biblical examples are there of looking up? There are in fact many passages in God’s word of people looking upward towards heaven. They looked upward for promises, insights and visions took place, phenomenal miracles, and prayer were all done through the act of lifting one’s eyes up towards heaven.
Spiritual visions, visitations, and miracles are connected to the act of looking up. Looking up is equated not only to the upward motion of the eye as in looking up, but it also means an opening of the spiritual eyes to see beyond the physical realm. Often this is referred to as lifting up one’s eyes. We can see beyond the physical, present, and temporal into something much greater.
OLD TESTAMENT EXAMPLES
Abraham
Abraham was a man who the word records as often looking up. He saw the future and promises that Yahweh wanted to show him. The passage below is one example of a time when he was directly told by Yahweh to lift up his eyes. He 'looked' at the land that Yahweh was going to give to him.
Genesis 13:14-16
The LORD said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, "Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted."
We know that in the natural Abraham could not see the hundreds of miles of land that Yahweh was blessing him with, thus it was a spiritual act to see all the area of land.
Genesis 18:1-5, 16, 22-23
The LORD appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day. Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby. When he saw them, he hurried from the entrance of his tent to meet them and bowed low to the ground... When the men got up to leave, they looked down toward Sodom, and Abraham walked along with them to see them on their way… The men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the LORD. Then Abraham approached him and said: "Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?"
This is the encounter that Abraham had where he actually ate with the Lord and his angels. After they were finished eating, the angels went down to Sodom and Gomorrah to scout it out. Abraham was standing in the physical presence of the Lord and talking to him about sparing the cities if at least ten righteous people could be found in it. This whole event occurred as Abraham looked up and realized it was more than man that he was seeing.
Joshua
Joshua was getting ready to go to battle against Jericho, when he looked up and spotted someone. At first he thought it was a man armed for battle, but then the revelation came of who it was and he bowed, just as Abraham did.
Joshua 5:13-16
Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, "Are you for us or for our enemies?" "Neither," he replied, "but as commander of the army of the LORD I have now come." Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, "What message does my Lord have for his servant?" The commander of the LORD's army replied, "Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy." And Joshua did so.
David
Many times Yahweh will judge disobedience, and sometimes severely. The body of Christ is often is uncomfortable with the thought that Yahweh will actually send His angels to cause death as punishment for disobedience. An angel from the Lord had already killed 70,000 Israelites, and was in process of destroying Jerusalem when David looked up and saw this angel.
1 Chronicles 21:14-17
So the LORD sent a plague on Israel, and seventy thousand men of Israel fell dead. And God sent an angel to destroy Jerusalem. But as the angel was doing so, the LORD saw it and was grieved because of the calamity and said to the angel who was destroying the people, "Enough! Withdraw your hand." The angel of the LORD was then standing at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. David looked up and saw the angel of the LORD standing between heaven and earth, with a drawn sword in his hand extended over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders, clothed in sackcloth, fell facedown. David said to God, "Was it not I who ordered the fighting men to be counted? I am the one who has sinned and done wrong. These are but sheep. What have they done? O LORD my God, let your hand fall upon me and my family, but do not let this plague remain on your people."
VISIONS
Many times supernatural experiences, or visions are recorded synonymous with looking up as the spiritual eyes opened, and the vision unfolds.
Daniel
Daniel 10:5-7
I looked up and there before me was a man dressed in linen, with a belt of the finest gold around his waist. His body was like chrysolite, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and his voice like the sound of a multitude. I, Daniel, was the only one who saw the vision; the men with me did not see it, but such terror overwhelmed them that they fled and hid themselves. So I was left alone, gazing at this great vision; I had no strength left, my face turned deathly pale and I was helpless.
Zechariah
There are four times in the book of Zechariah where he looks upward. Zechariah while in a visionary state moves from the hearing aspect of the vision, to the actual 'seeing' part of the vision,
Zecharian 2:1-5
Then I looked up-- and there before me was a man with a measuring line in his hand! I asked, "Where are you going?" He answered me, "To measure Jerusalem, to find out how wide and how long it is." Then the angel who was speaking to me left, and another angel came to meet him and said to him: "Run, tell that young man, 'Jerusalem will be a city without walls because of the great number of men and livestock in it. And I myself will be a wall of fire around it,' declares the LORD, 'and I will be its glory within.'
Zechariah 6:1-5
I looked up again-- and there before me were four chariots coming out from between two mountains-- mountains of bronze! The first chariot had red horses, the second black, the third white, and the fourth dappled-- all of them powerful. I asked the angel who was speaking to me, "What are these, my lord?" The angel answered me, "These are the four spirits of heaven, going out from standing in the presence of the Lord of the whole world."
OPEN HEAVEN
There are many places in scripture where the heavens are opened and the vision took place as the person looked upward into the heavens. An open heaven generally means that one is looking up into heaven and it is opened to see into heaven. The open heaven can also be opened so that we can see what is coming down from it. Examples of this are found with Jacob and his vision of the ladder coming down from heaven and the angels ascending and descending upon it (Genesis 28:12), Jesus promising Nathaniel that he would see the angels ascending and descending upon Jesus as the heavens opened (John 1:51). Peter had a trance where he saw the heavens opened and a sheet coming downward to earth (Acts 10:11).
Jesus Baptism
When Jesus came up out of the water at his baptism, the heavens were opened and John the Baptist saw the Holy Spirit descend out of an open heaven down upon Yeshua.
Mark 1:10
As Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove.
John
The disciple John writes that he sees a door standing open in heaven, and a voice saying come up here. It was in heaven that he received his vision of the end times.
Revelation 4:1
After this I looked, and there before me was a door standing open in heaven. And the voice I had first heard speaking to me like a trumpet said, "Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this."
Stephen
Stephen, the first martyr, looks up and sees into the open heavens. Stephen’s ability to see into heaven is directly connected to being full of the Holy Spirit.
Acts 7:55-56
But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. "Look," he said, "I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God."
JESUS
Would it surprise you to know that often Jesus prayed with his eyes opened and looking up towards heaven? Often times we are taught, by well meaning people that the position for prayer is with the head bowed and the eyes closed. Where did we learn this? Is it biblical? The only place in scripture where you will find someone who did not look up towards heaven, held their head low in prayer, is the tax collector, found in Luke 18:13. This is a position of shame as a sinner, not a position as a child of the king. In the Bible, kneeling is associated with bowing down, and is a form of honoring and worship. This study is not a teaching focused on the position of the body in prayer, but rather a challenge to look at what the Bible has to say about ‘lifting up your eyes.’
We are told by Jesus that the kingdom of heaven belongs to little children (Matthew 19:14). Let’s look at the example of our own children. They look up towards us and often exclaim, "Up!" with lifted hands in the air. Our Heavenly Father also desires that we too should look up to him.
Let’s look at Jesus’ example in looking up and the miracles that are associated with Yeshua’s prayers.
Feeding of the 5,000
(also found in Matthew 14:19 & Luke 9:16)
Mark 6:41
Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to his disciples to set before the people. He also divided the two fish among them all.
Lazarus from the Dead
John 11:41-44
So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, "Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me." When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, "Take off the grave clothes and let him go."
Deaf Man with Speech Problems
Mark 7:32-35
There some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they begged him to place his hand on the man. After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into the man's ears. Then he spit and touched the man's tongue. He looked up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, "Ephphatha!" (which means, "Be opened!"). At this, the man's ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.
Not only is looking up associated with prayers connected to miracles, but also for intercession on behalf of his disciples and all believers to come. After Yeshua finished his last super with his disciples, he begins a prayer. This entire prayer that goes through all of John 17, is prayed while Yeshua is looking upward toward heaven.
John 16:32-17:1
"But a time is coming, and has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me. I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world." Chap. 17:1 After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed: "Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you."
OTHER EXAMPLES
There are many other examples of prayers and petitions to Yahweh, our Heavenly Father, while lifting up one’s eyes. Looking up is acknowledging that his throne is in heaven.
Psalms 123:1
I lift up my eyes to you, to you whose throne is in heaven.
We acknowledge that He is the great and awesome creator of our universe as we look up to the heavens.
Isaiah 40:26
Lift your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.
Yahweh is the one that we cry out to for help when we are in distressed or troubled.
Isaiah 38:14
"I cried like a swift or thrush, I moaned like a mourning dove. My eyes grew weak as I looked to the heavens. I am troubled; O Lord, come to my aid!"
CONCLUSION:
There are three things that we can learn from this study on the act of lifting our eyes upward towards heaven.
1. Lets be challenged to look up as a little child, to our Heavenly Father. Looking up is a valid and biblical position for prayer. This is not to say that bowing one’s head in prayer is wrong, however, let's open our hearts to the concept of a new prayer posture. Understand that Holy Spirit must lead everything that we do, even the position of prayer for the particular time at hand.
2. Looking up is connected to receiving promises and looking beyond what is physically visible. Abraham is a good example of this in the Old Testament. A New Testament example would be when Jesus tells his disciples to look up for the harvest is ready (John 4:35).
3. Lifting up our eyes is connected to visionary encounters, as many of the supernatural encounters in the Bible occurred with some form of looking up. So be filled with the Holy Spirit, and lift up your eyes, you may be surprised by what you see!
