Eye exam overruled
After a regularly scheduled eye exam for my driver’s license, I was shocked to hear I had not passed. The motor vehicle department said I would need to come back and retake the test with corrective lenses. Instead, I called a friend who is a Christian Science practitioner.
As a lifelong student of Christian Science, I had learned that I only need to turn to God to see healing take place in my life, no matter what the circumstances. The Bible assures us that God is “of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity” (Habakkuk 1:13 ). The practitioner encouraged me in my study of the Scriptures and the writings of Mary Baker Eddy. In our brief conversation, he mentioned that it was simply fear that was stopping me from seeing myself as God’s clear image and likeness, which the Bible declares us to be (see Genesis 1:26, 27 ).
The practitioner’s prayerful acknowledgment had a big impact on me. I dropped all concern about passing the eye exam, even though I was only given a 30-day grace period to renew my driver’s license. Through prayer, I began focusing on what God already knew about me as His perfect, spiritual idea. Mary Baker Eddy writes about vision in the textbook of Christian Science, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, “A demonstration of the facts of Soul in Jesus’ way resolves the dark visions of material sense into harmony and immortality” (p. 428 ). I liked that idea and reasoned that God’s image and likeness could not include any dark images of aging. Instead, I found comfort in the assurance that “thine age shall be clearer than the noonday; thou shalt shine forth, thou shalt be as the morning” (Job 11:17 ).
Any thought coming to me that even resembled fear, I mentally looked at carefully, realized was simply a suggestion that God was not in complete control of His universe, and dismissed with confidence, knowing it could not stop me from seeing all the good God has bestowed on man. According to the first chapter of Genesis, “God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good” (verse 31 ). I knew that if this was true in “the beginning,” as God saw it, it must be true throughout His entire creation and for all eternity. On page 259 in Science and Health, next to the marginal heading “The divine image not lost,” Eddy affirms, “The true likeness cannot be lost in divine reflection.”
One morning I awoke with the thought to go in and get my driver’s license renewed. I had not considered that corrective eyewear would be necessary in passing this test. I went back to the same office, retook the vision test, and passed without a question. I felt so happy and strengthened to know that I need not fear failure of eyesight at any age.
Since that exam over three decades ago, every time I get ready to renew my driver’s license, I examine the thoughts that are coming to me and root out any that are based on fear. After a half century, I am still not required to wear glasses while driving or doing any other activity, including reading.
On page 249 of Science and Health, Eddy has given us a wonderful statement of healing practice that also shows what true vision is: “Let us accept Science, relinquish all theories based on sense-testimony, give up imperfect models and illusive ideals; and so let us have one God, one Mind, and that one perfect, producing His own models of excellence.”
Seaward B. Grant
Boston, Massachusetts, US
