Vision is the ability to anticipate and provide for future events, to picture and conceptualize, and it fuels creative power and the motivation to accomplish. Hebrews 11 devotes an entire chapter to vision's role in sustaining faith: Abraham looked for a city, Joseph desired burial in the Promised Land, and Moses forsook Egypt because he saw Him who is invisible. Vision is therefore an absolute necessity in a Christian's life. The world, however, threatens to kill that vision, just as life's realities killed the dream Fantine dreamed in the song from Les Miserables. The Christian is called out of this world so that it will not destroy his vision of living in the World Tomorrow the gospel portrays. Vision does not stand alone. It must be supported by godly morality and ethics, by growing understanding of the goal and what it takes to reach it, and by a detailed plan with internal controls that keep one from deviating to the right or left. Fantine's vision of beauty failed because she lacked these supports. The way is narrow and more complex than first imagined, and the greatest failures come in managing one's own part, which requires focus, diligence, and sacrifice of time and energy. Long-term achievement of the vision is built on many short-term achievements, including emotional control in small daily matters. Each day of life must be connected to the dream, so that daily conduct and long-term vision are coordinated rather than left as loose ends.

Spiritual vision is discerning foresight: the mental perception of unseen results and future events, which enables a person to plan and choose rightly. God's revelation is the true vision, and it is the cause of godly conduct. Proverbs 29:18 shows this, for where there is no revelation the people cast off restraint, but happy is the one who keeps the law. Vision joined with the fear of God strongly motivates obedience, because it supplies a mental picture of results while reverence creates the desire to please Him. Prudence is the fruit of vision, as Proverbs 22:3 shows, and wisdom is seeing from God's perspective the best way to produce the best results. Faith works through this mental seeing. Hebrews 11 shows Noah, Abraham, and Moses acting on what they foresaw, so that Moses endured as seeing Him who is invisible. Convictions seen in the mind's eye are more real than physical things because they are eternal. Few receive a literal vision as Paul did, but most receive vision through God's Spirit by calling (I Corinthians 2:9-10). It accumulates gradually through study, comparing, analyzing, and applying, and it must be developed, as the carnal Corinthians show. The world constantly blurs moral and spiritual issues, but following God's revelation is an unerring guide through good times and bad, and no greater gift can be given than the vision of the way to go.

Spiritual blindness is both the result and the cause of sin. God's curse of "madness and blindness and confusion of heart" (Deuteronomy 28:28-29) leaves nations and individuals unable to identify their real problem, which is that God is out of the picture. Obedience yields understanding, since the commandment of the LORD "enlightens the eyes" (Psalm 19:8; 111:10), while disobedience darkens the mind. Sin therefore becomes a snare: each sin clouds judgment and makes the next easier, and repentance does not immediately restore everything. Romans 1 shows that people suppress the truth and blind themselves by their choices, and God then gives them over to those choices, even to a debased mind. At times He amplifies the effect, as with a famine of hearing His Word, strong delusion, and Pharaoh's hardened heart, which followed Pharaoh's own free choice to oppress Israel. In Matthew 6:21-24 Christ teaches that clarity of vision depends on focus. A good eye fills the body with light, but treasuring or serving mammon, meaning anything that is not God, produces darkness. Blinding ourselves can be as simple as letting God slip from view. The converted are not exempt, as the Laodiceans are blind to their true condition and distracted by their mammon. They are responsible for it and must cooperate with God to restore their sight. Indicators of blindness include hatred of a brother (I John 2:11) and a lack of the qualities in II Peter 1:5-9: faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love. Examining these areas reveals what fleshly thing obscures God. God wants to heal this blindness, but the choice must come first.