I am reading a book right now where one of the characters, as a child, had horrible vision, but didn’t know it.  As a result, she missed out on so much.  She didn’t understand why her siblings always wanted to go on adventures and explore.  She remained quiet and in the background,

One day at school, it was discovered how bad her eyes really were.  The school contacted her mother to tell her that she desperately needed glasses.  The mother believed that glasses weren’t necessary and that all you had to do was exercise “weak” eyes to make them stronger.  After much cajoling, the mother relented and the poor girl got the glasses she needed so terribly.

Through those thick, coke-bottle glasses, a brand new world opened up to the girl.  She would stand with mouth wide open just staring at all that had been around her her whole life, but that she had never seen.  She was amazed that she could see individual leaves on every tree she looked at.  “….Lori loved seeing the world clearly.  She started compulsively drawing and painting all the wondrous things she was discovering, like….the way the setting sun painted the underbellies of the clouds pink but left the piled-up tops purple.  Not long after Lori…decided she wanted to be an artist…”

Don’t you love that?  When a sense that has been dull comes alive and transforms a person’s life it’s an incredible thing.   I feel like that every morning when I put my contacts in.  The world becomes brighter and more interesting and alive.  There is a greater sense of motivation when you can see what’s out there.

Jesus healed many people who were physically blind and had lost hope.  And it completely changed them.  But He also opened and still opens spiritual eyes to the reality of who He is, how He loves, and what He can do.  When He corrects our vision to see what is actually right in front of us, it transforms our lives.  The possibilities become endless.  Our faith grows.  Our attitudes change.  Love begins to spill out of us.  Like Lori, we begin to see the beauty of everything around us, of everything that God is, of the people that He has so graciously put in our lives.  If we are looking through those glasses, we see things like never before.  Our mouths fall open and we begin to see not only the forest, but the trees.  Not only the trees, but the leaves. And we begin to understand that all of the big things that God is and does are made of up of all the little things that we see every day.  And that beauty will leave us breathless.

Mark 8:22-26 – ….He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?”He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around. Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.