“Crazy! Mercy! WOW!” Tears falling unchecked, the young husband sitting on the grass peered intently at the carrot in his hand, the fruit tray beside him, the sky overhead and the surrounding trees. He absorbed what he saw as though for the first time.
His wife had just given him an incredible gift — a pair of glasses that enable people with color blindness to see colours. “What looks the same?” she asked. “Nothin!” he choked over a sob. “NOTHING looks the same! Now I know what I’ve been missing all my life!”
I recall vividly my own miracle of corrected sight. As a youngster, I often mistook people walking for horses and dogs. When my parents took me to an optometrist, he placed on my head an odd and heavy pair of glasses with empty slots where lenses should have been. Then he began inserting and removing lenses from a black box by his elbow.
“Is this better?” he kept repeating as I looked at the letters on the wall. “Or this?” and in would go another lens; back and forth.
A few weeks later, we returned to the same office to pick up my new glasses. Outside, I discovered a new world; one I greeted with wonder, excitement and awe. I could see stairs, rather than trip on them. When our car stopped at a stop sign, (I recall this as though it happened yesterday) I blurted, “So that’s why we always stop here! Because it SAYS STOP!” I could barely contain my exuberance. I could see; really see. No more confusing people and animals.
I have cataracts. I hadn’t realized how bad they’d gotten until, while driving just three miles of highway one recent evening, I became confused by the lights. Sure I’d missed my turn, I exited the highway at the next turn and drove onto a farmer’s field. I haven’t been this sight-challenged since before I first got glasses.
Luke 18:35 describes a blind beggar beside a roadside, begging. Hearing that Jesus was passing, he called loudly for mercy. When Jesus asked what he wanted him to do for him, he replied, “Lord, I want to see.”
“Your faith has healed you,” Jesus said. “Receive your sight.” A few seconds later, the man saw his Healer with his own eyes. Immediately he began praising God (likely not quietly or placidly). Nothing looked the same for him either.
I’ll soon place my eyes in the hands of an expert surgeon. I expect nothing will look the same after.
Another kind of impaired sight threatens us all — spiritual blindness. The inability to see absolute truth, to recognize impending danger, to read the writing on the wall of eternity; the ancient Word of God that beckons us to discover the brilliant hues of God’s love and design for all creation. To listen and follow before it’s too late. To live with clear vision and bright faith in Jesus Christ.
Father, correct our vision so that NOTHING looks the same. Especially eternity.
