I recently had the privilege of writing and sharing about the believers’ vision and victory.

It was an honor to serve the family of this senior citizen who was a devout Christian. What follows are the thoughts I shared with them during a funeral service. I leave them here with a prayer that you’ll experience what she had.

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Last Friday evening, your loved one was finally freed from the confines of this body holding her back. But death was only our illusion. Her immediate reality was “the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”

In the still dark and wee hours of my Saturday morning, I arose with one primary word on my mind. That word was none other than disillusionment. I had to arise to study, meditate, and write words.

I firmly believe that words matter. Jesus, Himself, is known as the Word. Proverbs 25:11 tells us, “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.”

Let’s consider the word, disillusionment. As a noun, Oxford Languages defines it as the state of feeling disappointment resulting from the discovery that something is not as good as one believed it to be. Merriam-Webster gives this definition for the noun, disillusion. It is the condition of being disenchanted: the condition of being dissatisfied or defeated in expectation of hope. Disillusion as a transitive verb means to free from illusion. Also, to cause to lose naïve faith and trust.

What does this word have to do with why we are assembled? All across our country, many people are living in a state of disillusionment. I am convinced many Christians exist there and need a route out of that miserable state. That escape route cannot be found by simply reversing the route that got them there. A whole new direction is needed.

How did they arrive at this state of disillusionment? For many Christians, it’s as simple as faith misplaced. They got wrapped up in this world’s poor ideologies. Not led by the Spirit, they placed too much trust in human leaders. Christian, there’s a reason why the Bible cautions us to “love not the world, neither the things that are in the world” (1 John 2:15). We are admonished to steer clear of trusting in the fallen systems and attitudes that oppose God’s righteous leadership of our lives and His Kingdom.

Some Christians arrived in disillusionment because of fatigue. Weariness grew from months upon months of cautious living and mitigation efforts to thwart off the worst pandemic of our lifetimes. We’re tired of canceling events, and we miss what normal used to look like.

Still, I believe most Christians arrived in disillusionment because of a failure to see, scripturally known as lack of vision. They took their eyes off Jesus Christ and His vision for their life. Or perhaps their gaze was never fully fixed upon Him. They lived by the wrong sense of sight.

This was NOT the case for your loved one. She never lost sight of her Savior. His presence maintained a steady tug upon her soul. Like the Apostle Paul of our NT, she “was not disobedient to the heavenly vision” (Acts 26:19). Vision is what landed her in the presence of her Savior. Hear me clearly. A virus is not what caused her to leave this earthly existence. Heavenly vision is what gave her that victory. Her faith gave way to sight as she took her last breath here, and she arrived in the splendor of His presence, to see Him whose banner over her is love. “Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:57).

Vision is the antidote for disillusionment. “Where there is no vision, the people perish” (Proverbs 29:18). Your loved one had a revelation of Jesus Christ many years ago. She fixed her gaze upon Him as she experienced what it is to be born again. That personal relationship set her eyes towards Heaven. Make no mistake, she did not perish. Once she escaped our presence, she arrived in her heavenly home more alive than ever before!

The Christian’s vision does not originate in this world. The born again who have their eyes fixed upon Christ begin to yearn for a home for which they’ve never been. Again, I say, vision is the antidote for disillusionment.
And once that revelation is received into the soul, the antidote goes to work.

There comes a silent but noticeable transaction for the born again. They have the vision, but the more they look unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, that which they’ve laid hold of, begins to lay hold of them. At that point, I believe the antidote develops into antibodies against the disillusionments of this world. That person, who is in Christ, is never again fully satisfied with this life. They begin to yearn for eternity and their home in Heaven. They begin to know, “For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). They know the final victory is coming because to be absent from this body is to be present with the Lord (see 2 Corinthians 5:8).

To those of you who hear what the Spirit is saying to us today, let me leave you with this. Do not allow the death of our friend and your loved one to send you on a trip to disillusionment. There’s a better place to go than the disenchanted state of hopelessness.

Rev. W. L. Hopper expressed this sentiment that I can’t resist sharing. The hymn he wrote is titled If I Knew of a Land. The opening verse says,

If I knew of a land where no sorrow ever came,
Where the weather was just right and there were no sick nor lame;
Where there’d be no goodbye and the people lived for aye,
I would sell all I have and move today.

The chorus provides the thrust of hope that the blessed moving towards:

Well, I know of a land where joys are waiting,
Where the people live forever and for aye;
Twill be one eternal day, without a sorrow,
And some morning when He calls I’ll move away.

Jesus called, and your loved one gladly answered. If you desire to follow her to that land, then you must set your focus upon Jesus as your Savior. There are no alternate routes. You must go by the way called Calvary, just like she did. You must understand that you are a sinner and that He is the Savior. See that the Cross is empty, and your sins have been paid for by His sinless blood. Continue and see His borrowed tomb is empty because He rose to new life and stands ready to offer you salvation, full and free.

• Friends and family – whether or not you ever get the virus, you’d better get a vision for Heaven. Without a vision, people perish.
• And whether or not you’ll take the vaccine, you’d sure better get the victory that’s found in knowing Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior. Thanks be to God who gives us the victory!
• Get a vision for your life here and for the eternity that’s to come. And whatever you do, get the victory. This is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith (1 John 5:4).