Testimony of Healing September 25, 2006 Issue

NORMAL VISION RESTORED

DORIS LIBEY

I had worn glasses for distance ever since I'd gotten my first driver's license. Then, when the symptoms of an infection in my eyes from falling plaster dust had cleared, I found that I still couldn't see well enough to drive safely.

Expecting only to get new glasses, I went to an ophthalmologist. The situation was more serious than I thought, and he told me treatment could involve a risky cornea transplant for one eye. But I will always appreciate his consideration of my desire to rely on prayer for healing. In fact, he encouraged me to continue this reliance.

I began to pray together with a Christian Science practitioner about my vision. One of the things he encouraged me to do was observe little children and endeavor to become more childlike. That was a wakeup call. I realized I was overly critical of myself, my family, and church friends. I looked up the word critical in the dictionary, and found that it comes from the Greek word kritikos, one meaning of which is "able to discern." This made me think of the spiritual description Science and Health gives of eyes as "spiritual discernment" (p. 586). If spiritual discernment was what my true capacity to see was all about, then my job was to base my thinking more and more on divine reality instead of human appearances.