Blind Eyes

From Oct. 15, 2015

I read somewhere that the woman you are at 40 is the woman you wished you’d been at 30. I so agree. Turning 40 last year was so much better than turning 30. I really mean it! Yes I do…except for one thing: my eyesight got noticeably worse. For years I went glasses-free, footloose and fancy-free, giving no thought to my eyesight. I had been blessed with 20/20 vision and I took it for granted. Ah, the good ‘ole days when I could pick up a book and read at will, pick up a box of cereal at the store and see how many grams of sugar I’d be filling my kids with…but then it ended. My sight is so much worse at close range, I pretty much have to have my glasses on me at all times.

When we go through a huge shift in the way our body functions, it can really alarm us. Sight loss, paralysis, chronic pain, surgeries that leave us less parts than we were born with…all have serious life-changing effects. The impact of my newly-impaired vision makes me shudder at the thought of losing even more of my eyesight.

And yet, I may often walk through my days much more spiritually blind, with many more life-impairing effects, than any physical disability could ever bring me. When the “eyes of my heart” do not see God at work in the midst of trial, in the midst of suffering, in the midst of pain…I can become impaired. How? By not seeing truth. When I let circumstances dictate what I believe to be true, I am not seeing clearly in a spiritual sense. I need to put my gospel glasses on. I need to see my Father God in light of His true Word, not in light of my faulty sight. When I am trying to read something in a book or online and I am straining and straining, I immediately look for my glasses (which I usually find sitting atop my head!). But when I am trying to “read” a life situation and keep straining and straining to understand, what do I immediately reach for? Is it God’s Word, or prayer? Evermore I want the answer to that to be “Yes.”

Now, to be sure, having spiritual sight doesn’t mean we suddenly “know” all the “whys and wherefore” of our suffering or trial. But we can have peace, remembering the I AM that holds us in the midst of it. I don’t want to walk through life spiritually blind when Jesus has already given me the eyes of faith I need to see clearly.

Keeping my gospel glasses on daily, even moment-by-moment, means I am looking through the lense of God’s Word and Jesus’ work on the cross for me. I interpret things by holding up scripture that says,

“If God be for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:34), or

“I give them eternal life, and they will never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand” (John 10:28).

These types of verses speak the truth to my heart about how God loves me and cares for me, and how he will never let go of me. This informs my sight. This brings clarity to my blurred vision in the moment.

For every time I have to pick up my eyeglasses to read something, I want to remember that I also need to be putting on my gospel glasses…and I’ve worn them for much longer in this life. I should be a pro by now at living with my gospel vision, but I’m not.

Lord, help me today to be mindful of the gospel eyes you’ve already given me when you saved me. Help me to see all my trials today through the light of your Truth. Open the eyes of my understanding, “in order that (I) may know the hope to which He has called (me), the riches of his glorious inheritance in His holy people” (Eph. 1:18)