What We Cannot See

Have you seen the short video on Facebook?  As it begins, a young boy is sitting in a lawn chair outdoors.  There are tall, green trees in the distance and a large expanse of green grass all around him.  The blue sky is clear and the day is sunny. As the camera begins to focus on the boy, his blue and white checked shirt and khaki shorts come into view.  He is about 10 years old, and he is holding a smallish brown, cardboard box in his hands.  The people near him, parents and family, are asking the boy to open up the box.  He is clearly intrigued and pleased, if somewhat overwhelmed. 

As the boy sets about opening the package the onlookers, who are not visible in the picture, are excited and encouraging the child as he tears open the box.  Then comes the moment we have all been awaiting.  The boy pulls the gift out of the box.  It is a pair of glasses.  The boy looks up at the people watching and seems confused, he does not need glasses to see, and so why are all of them so excited about these glasses?  Everyone in the group at this point is so excited; they are all telling the boy to put on the glasses.  So he does.  Then he begins to turn his head and look around and then he begins to cry. Overwhelmed, his happy tears run down his face.   There is a look of total amazement on the face of the boy.  These are special glasses; they are designed to aid those who are color blind.  The glasses allow a person to see the different colors that exist in the world.  This child had only ever been able to see black, white and gray.  With the glasses that all changes.  Before the glasses, he had no concept of the colors that exist; no way to discern them, no words to describe them.  And really, if you cannot see the color red, how can you know what red it?  How can you know how to describe the color purple?  What words can give an idea of blue? The knowing of the color is in the seeing of it.

The glasses opened up an entirely new arena of reality for the boy; one he did not know he was missing.  In the seeing of the colors around him, he knew color.   Which gives me a reason to wonder what I cannot see?  Not only what I cannot see, but what is unfathomable, unknown and perhaps unknowable unless someone gives me glasses to see.  Someone who already can see the colors and knows the colors are all around and cares about me enough to let me know what it out there.

A similar situation of “unseeing” is recorded in the book of 2Kings chapter 6.  The prophet, Elisha, is trapped in a city and the enemy king has surrounded it with an army.  There is no way to sneak past the soldiers, horsemen and chariots.  Elisha’s servant is understandably upset at what appears to be certain death.  He asks the prophet, “Alas, my master! What shall we do?” I can only imagine the servant is not encouraged much when Elisha answers; “Do not fear, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”  Now, the servant can certainly count, and he and Elisha make two people, and even the people in the city are not enough to constitute an army, equipped and ready for battle.  Can you imagine the feeling of doubt about the sanity of the prophet?  The power of the fear that was creeping into his  every muscle, the adrenaline beginning to kick in and the servant’s frantic search for a way out?  This was the end….

But Elisha knew something that the servant did not. Elisha saw something the servant could not see.   Like the family of the color blind boy, who knew color existed, even if the boy did not, Elisha knew the army of God existed and was present.  And he could see it.  The servant had no clue that the army was real and was in truth present at that very moment.   How could he know, how could any person, know unless those that could see told them.  Elisha prayed for his servant, “O LORD, I pray, open his eyes that he may see.”  What the servant saw, once his eyes were opened was overwhelming.  “And the LORD opened the servant’s eyes and he saw; and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around.”

What exists that we do not see, what exists that we have no inkling is out there?  Have you ever wondered about that?  What are we missing because we cannot even fathom it exists?  Our sight, our senses do not detect all reality.  Our experience of the world and life in the world is bounded by what we can perceive, but not all reality is apprehended sensually.  What if the sensory experiences in our lives become blinders on us, limiting what we can see and know about reality.  What if the only avenue we trust for truth is blocked off because we can’t measure or quantify it?  Could we, in our quest for definitive answers, be missing an entire universe? 

That is why we need the help of someone who can see past the edge of the blinders, someone who knows that colors exist; someone who can correct our blindness so we can see fully.

O  LORD, I pray, open our eyes…..