I’m myopic. Some mornings, I walk around the house unable to see clearly without my glasses until I’m all ready to face the day.
This morning at the kitchen sink, while nearsightedly getting a drink, I saw a still, brown blob on the counter.
There’s a dead cockroach on my counter?! I instantly felt dread, and concern, and disgust, and annoyance. I also looked around to see if Anthony was around. He wasn’t. Ugh.
I leaned forward to get a better look at the unwelcomed invader and to determine disposal strategies. (And maybe Anthony would walk into the kitchen while I stalled…)
Oh! On closer inspection, that ghastly carcass proved to be a stray potato peeling, shriveled up and forgotten from yesterday’s dinner prep.
Clearly not a cockroach
Wow. While blurrily viewing the world, I’d totally jumped to uninformed, drastic conclusions. That felt foolish.
It didn’t take long for Jehovah’s words to Isaiah to sting just a little:
And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not.
I appreciate when the Lord takes the time to teach me through silly things I do. The cockroach scare was such a quick reminder that seeing clearly really matters. I need to consciously ensure that my vision is as clear and penetrating as possible.
I was reminded of Elder Jeffrey R. Holland’s general conference talk about a healed blind man. He encouraged our clarity of sight.
One concluding thought: Joseph Smith’s 19th-century frontier environment was aflame with competing crowds of Christian witnesses. But in the tumult they created, these exuberant revivalists were, ironically, obscuring the very Savior young Joseph so earnestly sought. Battling what he called “darkness and confusion,” he retreated to the solitude of a grove of trees where he saw and heard a more glorious witness of the Savior’s centrality to the gospel than anything we have mentioned here this morning. With a gift of sight unimagined and unanticipated, Joseph beheld in vision his Heavenly Father, the great God of the universe, and Jesus Christ, His perfect Only Begotten Son. Then the Father set the example we have been applauding this morning: He pointed to Jesus, saying: “This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!” No greater expression of Jesus’s divine identity, His primacy in the plan of salvation, and His standing in the eyes of God could ever exceed that short seven-word declaration.
Commotion and confusion? Crowds and contention? There is plenty of all that in our world. Indeed, skeptics and the faithful still contend over this vision and virtually all else I have referred to today. In case you may be striving to see more clearly and to find meaning in the midst of a multitude of opinions, I point you toward that same Jesus and bear apostolic witness of Joseph Smith’s experience, coming as it did some 1,800 years after our blind friend received his sight on the ancient Jericho Road. I testify with these two and a host of others down through time that surely the most thrilling sight and sound in life is that of Jesus not only passing by but His coming to us, stopping beside us, and making His abode with us.
Sisters and brothers, through the incessant din and drumbeat of our day, may we strive to see Christ at the center of our lives, of our faith, and of our service. That is where true meaning lies. And if some days our vision is limited or our confidence has waned or our belief is being tested and refined—as surely it will be—may we then cry out the louder, “Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me.” I promise with apostolic fervor and prophetic conviction that He will hear you and will say, soon or late, “Receive thy sight: thy faith hath saved thee.”
Elder Holland promised with apostolic fervor and prophetic conviction that we can receive that salvific sight!
Joseph Smith’s words confirm Elder Holland’s sentiments: Stand still…and see.
Therefore, dearly beloved brethren, let us all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still, with the utmost assurance, to see the of God, and for his arm to be revealed. (Doctrine and Covenants 123:17)
What a perfect sight that will be!
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