Things Aren’t Always as They Seem

Something scary happened a few days ago. I’m not exactly sure what caused it, but I began to see double. Looking back, it probably had started two to four weeks ago but just became obvious. There were construction barricades across half the road. As I approached it, it appeared to be across both lanes. I had to close one eye in order to see where to drive. I tried to limit driving as it took a lot of concentration. I would close one eye whenever another car came near me so that I was safer. I would find myself mentally exhausted by the end of the day. At one point, my wife drove me since I couldn’t focus. When I wasn’t concentrating, I saw one pickup truck in the correct lane and I saw the double of the truck driving in the ditch. It was very disconcerting. I went in to see an eye doctor and was told this could last a few months. My first thought was, “How will I be able to survive?” After making sure it wasn’t something more dangerous, I was informed that they would put a prism on my one eye glass lens to “bend” the image from one eye to match the other. This should help my eyes return to normal. Are my eyes working right? No. Can I see correctly? Yes. The prism they put in enables me to have clear vision. I couldn’t help but see the correlations with my vision and our spiritual life. If I have surrendered to God, I am still sin and fall short, and yet, because of what Jesus did on the cross for me, God sees me as a saint. As a result of faith, God doesn’t see me for who I am, but who I have become through Christ. I am righteous in God’s, again not because of my amazing character, but because Jesus’ sacrifice changes how God sees me. If, however, I were to fall away from God, backsliding in my faith, I become completely fallen (spiritually). Right now, without the prism, my vision would not be good. Without Jesus in my life, I would be a spiritual disaster. The big difference is that with my vision, I could close an eye to regain clear sight. When it comes to our spiritual walk, there are no temporary fixes or shortcuts. It actually is when God opens our eyes that we see things as God sees them. I don’t want to have spiritual double vision because I already see too much that is wrong. Father, thank You for rescuing us from our near sightedness. May the joy of knowing what Christ did fill my heart. Amen