Some friends and I were what-iffing the other day and the question came up: “If you had to be blind or deaf, which would you choose?”
Everybody quickly answered deaf. I eventually got to the same answer, but it took me a little longer. I probably value my hearing more than most.
I’m an auditory learner. I remember things I hear much easier than things I read. I can recognize people’s voices without seeing their faces. Music is nothing short of an addiction and I can pick out the tiniest details in the different recordings of the same song.
But when it came down to it, it seemed that losing my hearing would rob me of more joy, but losing my sight would rob me of more functionality. And that’s more important.
Right?
Nobody would ever debate the importance of eyesight in day-to-day life and I won’t even spend time defending its value.
And yet, recently I have begun to notice that if I’m not careful, my vision can easily become an undetected handicap.
I’m still trying to get back to my 30 minutes of running, you guys. I started over back in March and I’ll enjoy several weeks of progress and then there’s a setback. Illness, injury, family crisis.
I completed the Couch to 5K program in about six weeks the first time last fall. I am now about three months in and just over halfway through. And the increasing heat and humidity are NOT HELPING.
The app keeps track of your progress, your time, tells you when to walk, when to jog, when you’re halfway there, etc. If you keep it open on your screen, it has a countdown clock for each segment.
And I have learned after almost a year of using this app, I should NEVER look at the countdown clock.
Because if I’m in the middle of a jog, starting to run out of steam, look down at the clock to see how much longer I have to run and it says anything more than 30 seconds, I quit. There’s no considering it, digging deeper, trying to go a little longer. It’s an immediate ‘nope, there’s no way,’ and the jog is over.
I know it’s lame. It really is. But I’ve learned that about myself. So now when I’m starting to get tired and I’m DYING to see how much longer I’m supposed to go, I don’t let myself look. It’s really hard. But I know if I look, if I see how much more I have to do, I’ll quit.
So force myself to think of something else: Focus on the music, find a new route, notice new houses or landscaping and wait for the ‘trainer’ to tell me it’s time to cool down.
And you know what? I can ALWAYS do more than my eyes tell me.
As Obi-Wan Kenobi says, “Your can eyes can deceive you. Don’t trust them.”
One of my favorite movies of all time is Gone with the Wind. I have no idea why. It’s incredibly depressing and FOUR HOURS LONG. But I’ve seen it enough times to pretty much have the whole thing memorized.
There’s a scene where Scarlett and Rhett are making a desperate attempt to flee Atlanta while it’s literally burning down around them. (A little movie trivia: The structure that’s burning behind them in the scene is actually part of the old King Kong movie set.)
The horse pulling the cart they’re in looks at the fire all around, can’t see a way forward and refuses to move. Rhett even gets out of the cart and attempts to lead him on foot. No dice. It was fight, flight or freeze. Rhett and Scarlett were hoping for flight, but unfortunately the horse was opting for freeze. Not good.
Suddenly Rhett yells for Scarlett to throw him her shawl. He quickly covers the horse’s face with it and says, “Sorry. You’ll like it better if you can’t see anything.”
And shockingly, he’s right. Out of sight, out of mind, I guess. Rhett tugs on the horse’s harness and the animal decides to move without a moment to spare. The horse was paralyzed by what he saw and it completely trumped his actual capacity to get out of there. His vision would have cost him his life, if someone hadn’t covered his eyes.
In the realm of social justice, seeing clearly is critical. We must shine the light on racism, sex trafficking, slavery, abuse, abortion, terrorism. Turning a blind eye may help the unaffected sleep at night, but will never affect change.
But there are other times when Jesus stands on the water in the middle of a storm and essentially says, Don’t look at anything but Me. Put your blinders on, get out of the boat and walk.
Sometimes I wonder how I would respond if I could see the countdown clock on my life, telling me how much longer I have to run. Fifty more years? Five more years? Five more hours?
No, it’s better that I not know.
And I praise God for the merciful blindness He blesses me with on a daily basis. Because I am capable of much more than my eyes would have me believe. There’s no time for flight or freeze. I have to fight. The fight is more dangerous than I even realize. And it’s better that way.
When Paul is giving his Armor of God speech to the Ephesian church in chapter six, he reminds us that the battles we face are much bigger than we can see.
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms, (v. 12).
Yeah, I don’t need to see that.
I need to be aware, to be sure. But God knows exactly what is beneficial for me to see and how much is too much.
Can I confess something embarrassing?
I’m afraid of Haiti.
Not of the people. I know many who have been there, including Brad, who have said that the people there are kind and generous. They’re not what I’m afraid of.
What I’m afraid of is what I’ll see. I know it’s a place of unspeakable poverty and suffering. And honestly, I’m afraid the darkness would leave me paralyzed and traumatized. And with an ongoing struggle of depression and anxiety, frankly, I’m afraid of what it would do to me.
Isn’t that one of the most selfish things you’ve ever heard? I’m too afraid to look at something hard because it might upset me too much.
I could get on an air-conditioned plane and be back on my butt on my couch with a Diet Coke and a bag of chips in a matter of hours. The people who live there don’t get to opt out of their circumstances. It’s their life.
It’s the same reason I haven’t seen Roots or Twelve Years a Slave. I’ve seen clips, just moments of those films that I will never forget. The horror of the truth and history they represent makes me want to throw up.
There are horrible things that are too much for our eyes (some more than others) but some things are too wonderful for us to handle as well.
In Exodus 33, Moses has the unbelievable hutzpah to demand that God show him His glory.
(I’m sorry. You asked GOD to do what now? SHOW YOU His GLORY?)
And because he and God had that kind of relationship, it went down like this:
And the Lord said, I will cause all My goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim My name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. But, He said, you cannot see My face, for no one may see Me and live. Then the LORD said, There is a place near Me where you may stand on a rock. When My glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by. Then I will remove My hand and you will see My back; but My face must not be seen (vv. 19-23).
Did you get that? God’s GOODNESS was more than Moses could handle. Just the sight of the face of God can kill a man. Because His glory, the full weight of it, is more than our fragile, finite bodies can withstand.
Can you imagine something being so GOOD, so BEAUTIFUL that it actually kills you? Not to be cavalier or irreverent, but what a way to go!
Maybe that’s why the eighth century poet wrote the prayer asking God to be his Vision, his Wisdom and his Best Thought, which was later turned into the beloved hymn, Be Thou My Vision.
I need Him to be my vision. I need Him to determine what I need to see, what I don’t need to see. If I could get the filter of His wisdom added to the prescription in my glasses, that would be great. I would only see what I am supposed to see.
There’s this movie clip from Facing the Giants that’s being shared all over Facebook right now that almost brought me to tears.
First of all, I love sports movies. Always have. (Even before I found myself LIVING in a sports movie.) At first glance, they’re all about the physical ability of the athletes. But the movies always show the emotional and psychological struggles of the players as well. And that’s where I get sucked in.
In this clip (go watch it), a player unknowingly proves that he is capable of twice as much as he thought when what he could see was temporarily not a factor. Like me with my countdown clock or that poor horse trying to escape the flames, his vision was actually his handicap.
My eyes see what they see, but my VISION needs to come from my God. He alone knows how to bring things to light in a way that won’t paralyze me with superfluous details and damaging images. Instead of leaning on my own limited eyesight, I must trust El Roi, my God who Sees.
Everything.
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of All
