LENS ME YOUR EAR
Glasses: do you wear them? I have since the last part of grade seven. That's the better part of twenty-eight years! I guess if one does anything that long, one gets used to it. So, I've learned to be content with a viewing apparatus cleaved to my face. In fact, I've gotten to the point that I actually think I look better in glasses, but my convex conformability doesn't mean that I didn't once dream of going glassesless.
Actually, the dream of having eyes unadorned was systematically planted in my psyche through a friend by the name of Jim Dewar. Jim, who's lived much of his life with extremely thick, extremely heavy glasses, immediately fell in love with his first pair of contact lenses. With the zeal of an ex-smoker looking to rid the world of every stick of tobacco, he sought to free the face-shackled masses from their chains. His favorite trick was to come up to me and say, "Want to see me clean my glasses?", after which time he then proceeded to blink his eyes once and smile.
Eventually, I caved in and took the plunge into the eye-poking, saline squirting world of the contact wearer. Unfortunately, I had to have hard lenses and I never did get used to them. I'll never forget the first time I tried to preach with them. I had been wearing my contacts for less than a week, but my eagerness overruled any caution I might have felt. Unfortunately, I didn't noticed that as I got out of our car to enter the church, one contact had fallen out and landed on the floor!
I had almost reached the midway point of the introduction to my sermon when I started to feel like someone had drugged the communion juice. I generally preach from a manuscript so this was particularly interesting. I'm not sure if I actually covered my naked eye with my hand, or if I just closed my one eye, or if every lady in the congregation thought I was repeatedly winking at them, but for months after that, the congregation called me the "preaching cyclops"! (Not really.) Needless to say, it wasn't my favorite moment in the pulpit!
The last time I looked at my contacts, they had been sitting untouched in the medicine cabinet for well over three years. As I opened their containers, I noticed that all of the solution had evaporated. The contacts now resemble fossilized fish scales, but I still keep them around to remind me of what happens when you succumb to peer pressure!
Now, all that I've told you thus far was just to introduce you to the fact that this past winter, Graham and David proved to be truly of our gene pool (Sheila wears glasses, too). Fortunately for them, glasses have come a long way since I first had to don them. Unfortunately for us, eight-year-olds and glasses never form a lasting bond. Just last week I picked up David's second pair of frames and today I was informed that Graham lost one of his lenses.
They were at an all day track meet at the local high school and the screw that held one of his lenses in, fell out. Both glasses and lens made their way into David's backpack, but somehow between going into David's backpack and getting home, the lens made a break for it. I think it was a survival thing!
Here's where the story gets interesting. After Sheila found out that the lens had indeed gone AWOL, she phoned the school bus driver to see if she had found it on her bus. The driver said that she knew it wasn't on the bus because she believed that she had spied what must have been the lens shining in the grass at the track meet. Following her directions, the boys and I took a trip back to the school and in less than a minute, this very thin, very small lens was found by John, our oldest boy! Now, if you knew our family and how we tend to live in a world of the "looking" and "lost," you'd understand that this discovery was truly miraculous!
Let me share with you the words of Jesus that immediately came to mind as I placed the lens in my pocket:
“Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.” (Luke 12:6, 7)
What an amazing statement about the care and concern of our Heavenly Father. Our God is a God of details! Nothing is overlooked; nothing is deemed too insignificant for His care. Not only does He know me, He knows every hair on my head. This fact alone is astounding since that number is in a state of constant flux! If He's that concerned about the smallest detail of our lives, then, really, what have we to fear?
Let me leave you with
a few questions to chew on:
Is there any problem, any situation that's too small for us to pray about? If so, how small is too small?
If God has every hair on your head numbered, is there anything He doesn't know about you? Is there anything He doesn't see you do?
Finally, how encouraging would life be if God only wanted to be paged for the big stuff? After all, isn't life at least 90% small stuff? Isn't life's journey covered with small steps more than big leaps? I take great comfort in the fact that God notices each small step of my life because that means that even if I don't see everything clearly, at least I am following the One who does!
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