When God Opens Your Eyes: Four Things Balaam's Donkey Can Teach Us About Seeing Clearly

Let me start with a story — because I believe the best lessons in life almost always come wrapped in one. And this particular story comes from a book of the Bible that most people rush past without realizing the treasure buried inside. The book of Numbers. I know, I know — it sounds like a book full of census data and names you can barely pronounce. But tucked inside Numbers chapter 22 is one of the most unexpectedly powerful stories in all of Scripture. It is the story of a prophet named Balaam, a donkey who could see what the prophet could not, and a God who loves us enough to interrupt our plans before they destroy us.

The title of today's message is simple: When God Opens Your Eyes. And I want to walk you through four things this story taught me — things I believe the Holy Spirit wants to say to every person reading this right now.

Point One: You Can Be Close to God and Still Be Blind

This is the part of the story that undid me when I first really sat with it. Balaam was not some random person. He was a prophet. A known, respected, powerful man of God. Kings from other nations knew his name. If you wanted to know what God was saying, Balaam was your person. And yet — when the angel of the Lord stood directly in the road in front of him, sword drawn, ready to strike — Balaam could not see it.

His donkey could. The donkey swerved, squeezed against the wall, eventually lay down in the road — all trying desperately to protect his master from an angel Balaam was completely blind to. And Balaam's response was to beat the donkey and demand he get back in line.

I sat with that for a long time. Here is a prophet of God, trained and experienced, genuinely close to God — and he missed it. How?

The disciples in Luke 24 had the same problem. These were the men who walked with Jesus through His entire earthly ministry. They knew He was going to die. They knew He was going to rise. And yet, when the risen Jesus walked right beside them on the road to Emmaus, they could not recognize Him. They literally explained the story of Jesus to Jesus. It was not until verse 31 that "their eyes were opened, and they knew him."

Here is the truth this story will not let me avoid: familiarity with God is not the same as sight. Sometimes we can know our Bible, keep our prayer routine, attend every service — and in the moment that actually counts, miss what God is doing entirely. We can limit God to our own understanding. We can let pain, confusion, or the pressure of our own plans narrow our vision until we cannot see what is standing right in front of us. Sometimes the thing we are most frustrated by is the very thing God is using to get our attention.

Point Two: Blindness Makes You Misinterpret Everything Around You

Here is something that hit me hard: when Balaam could not see the angel, his blindness did not just affect him. It caused him to hurt the one thing that was faithfully trying to protect him. He beat the donkey three times. He called the animal foolish. He was ready to kill it.

We do this too. When we are not seeing clearly — when our spiritual eyes are closed to what God is actually doing — we can misread the faithful people around us. We can beat the very things God has placed in our path as protection. We can call obstruction what is actually redirection.

Think about the Three Trees from the old Sunday school story. Three trees grow up together in a forest, each with a dream. The first wants to become a great ship. The second wants to be the king's bed. The third wants to stand somewhere beautiful where people will come and stare in wonder. They get cut down — and everything goes wrong. The first becomes a feeding trough in a stable. The second becomes a small fishing boat. The third gets stored in a pile, forgotten.

They were heartbroken. But then a young couple arrived at that stable with no room in the inn — and the baby they laid in that feeding trough was Jesus. The humble manger was a cradle for the King of kings. The fishing boat became the pulpit from which Jesus preached to thousands. And that forgotten pile of wood? It became the cross. The instrument of the world's redemption.

What looked like failure was actually the fulfillment of the greatest calling imaginable. But you cannot see that without God's perspective. Without open eyes. The tree that thought it was worthless was carrying the weight of eternity.

This is also what Elisha's servant discovered in 2 Kings 6. He woke up one morning, opened the door, and found an entire enemy army surrounding the city. He panicked — which is exactly what any of us would do. But Elisha prayed a simple prayer: "Lord, open his eyes that he may see." And when God opened his eyes, the servant saw that the mountains around them were full of horses and chariots of fire. The army of God vastly outnumbered every threat. It had been there the whole time. He just could not see it.

The enemy you are staring at today may look overwhelming. But there is a reality you are not yet seeing. God has not left the field.

A Moment to Reflect

Pause here for just a moment. Is there something in your life right now that you have been interpreting as a setback, a closed door, or a frustrating detour? What if God is trying to get your attention through it? What if the donkey is not the problem — you just cannot see the angel yet? Ask the Holy Spirit right now: "Lord, open my eyes. Show me what You are actually doing in this situation." He will answer that prayer.

Point Three: When God Opens Your Eyes, He Sometimes Interrupts Your Plans First

Let me tell you about a snake, a backyard, and one of the most expensive lessons I have ever learned.

I grew up in a pastor's family, so I thought I knew a thing or two. One summer day, home alone with my cousin, a ball rolled into an old chicken coop — and I came face to face with a very large, very poisonous snake. My cousin was watching. I was the cool one. I had a plan.

Without waiting for anyone, without praying, without asking for a single ounce of wisdom from anyone older or wiser — I executed my plan. Kerosene first. Then gasoline, because the snake had not moved. Then a lit match. The snake, now very much motivated to leave, ran on fire through our dry summer backyard. My parents walked through the gate right at that moment. By the next morning, everything was ash.

I tell that story with full humility — and full laughter at myself — because it captures something I think we all do. We think we know exactly what to do. We have the plan fully formed in our heads. And we rush forward without once asking God if it is even the right plan. If I had waited ten more minutes, my parents would have been home. They would have handled it. The garden, the backyard, and my dignity would all have survived.

Balaam did the same thing. The king of Moab called and Balaam saddled up without one conversation with God about it. He let a foreign king influence him before he ever let the King of kings weigh in. And that one omission put him on a collision course with an angel, a talking donkey, and a near-death experience — all of which could have been avoided with a single brief prayer: God, what do you want me to do here?

God will sometimes allow interruptions, detours, and closed doors not to punish you — but to protect you. A door God closes is not a door God forgot about. It is a door God intentionally shut because He can see what is on the other side and you cannot. When conviction hits during worship. When something unsettles your spirit about a plan that looks perfectly logical. When the donkey keeps refusing to go — stop and ask why before you reach for the stick.

It is always better to consult with God before the backyard burns.

Point Four: When God Opens Your Eyes, Everything Changes

Here is what I love most about the Balaam story. After all of it — the beatings, the missed signals, the riding headlong toward disaster — as soon as God opened Balaam's eyes, everything changed in an instant. He saw the angel. He fell down on his face in the road. He confessed immediately: I have done wrong. He did not justify himself or argue. The moment he saw clearly, his entire attitude was different.

That is what when God opens your eyes actually looks like in real life. It is not a slow, gradual fog lifting over months of effort. Sometimes it is a flip. A sudden moment of clarity — in a chapel service, in a quiet moment during worship, in the middle of a prayer that finally gets honest — where God shows you things from a completely different angle and nothing looks the same afterward.

God had been with Balaam the whole journey. He had not abandoned him. He was simply waiting for the moment when Balaam's eyes could be opened. And the same is true for you.

I want to be honest about something I experienced this past week. My wife and I were stressed about our next steps — jobs, location, finances, the whole uncertain pile of it. And then one morning in chapel during worship, God spoke clearly to my heart. He said: I called you. I brought you here. Do you really think I am going to give up on you now? And everything I had been carrying got lighter in about thirty seconds.

Sometimes we treat God like a search engine — we run to Him when we have a problem, grab the answer we need, and then leave without including Him in the rest of the process. We want the ingredients from God's kitchen but we do not want Him in the cooking. But God does not want to just point you to the next step. He wants to be present in every single one. He wants to be in the mess with you, not just waiting for you on the other side of it.

Jeremiah 17:7-8 gives us the image God wants for your life: a tree planted by a river. Not straining, not striving, not panicking every time the seasons change. Just deeply rooted beside a living source, drawing steadily from what is always there. That is what a genuine, growing relationship with God looks like. Not a five-minute prayer box you check off. Not a religious ritual you perform to feel covered. A real relationship — where you talk to Him about your day, tell Him your plans, and actually let Him respond.

And here is the deepest truth of it all: your story is not just for you. When God opens your eyes and brings you through something — the broken season, the confusing detour, the backyard fire — that testimony becomes fuel for someone else's faith. Other people's stories build us. Our stories build them. That is how the kingdom of God works. Every step you take with God matters more than you know.

God Is Not Done With You

Whatever season you are in right now — whether you are stressed about your next step, staring at a closed door, or beating your donkey in frustration — I want you to hear this: God brought you to this point. He is not going to give up on you now.

The prodigal son's father was not standing at the end of the driveway with a lecture. He was standing there with robes and a feast, scanning the horizon for a child to come home. That is your Father. Arms open. Eyes watching for you. Ready to give you new eyes the moment you turn toward home.

Ask Him to open your eyes. Then get still enough to see what He shows you.

A Prayer and a Next Step

If this message landed somewhere real in your heart today — if you recognize that you have been moving without consulting God, or that you have been misreading your detour as disaster — I want to invite you to pray this right now:

"Lord, open my eyes. I confess that I have been running on my own plan without truly asking what You want. I confess that I have sometimes missed You because I was too certain I already knew the answer. I surrender my next steps to You. I want a real relationship — not a religious routine. Show me what You are doing in my life. I trust You. Amen."

If this message encouraged you, share it with someone who is in a frustrating season and needs to be reminded that the donkey might just be trying to protect them. Leave a comment below and tell us about a time when God opened your eyes and changed your perspective completely — your story could be exactly what someone else needs to read today. And if you are looking for a community where real stories, real faith, and real encounters with God are welcome, come join us for a service. You are expected and you are wanted here.

Preached on April 26, 2026 | Horseheads, New York

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You can also watch the full sermon on our Youtube page below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HS54O7a4VqQ