Greater Vision

© 2011 Gary Coots Photography

I love my friends and the way they share my joys and my sorrows! Lately I've been telling everyone about losing my eyeglasses and how God works with life's details to teach us and take care of us. 

Most will agree that nothing is quite as frustrating as a lost article, and I seem to have many. I admit that we have free will to create such circumstances, but why does God allow these situations, and how does He work through them? In late spring, I lost my healthcare spending account (HSA) debit card. There were many times I could have used it for deductibles, co-pays, etc. I looked for it a few times to no avail. Invariably, I found myself at another doctor or dentist, wondering what happened to it. As the year began drawing to a close, I became concerned about the balance on the card and what forms I would have to fill out and file to use it up.

Then on Halloween, my daughter became gravely ill and needed emergency surgery. I flew out to California and stayed in a hotel room for a few nights. I was proud of myself for not losing anything, and as I checked out on the last day, I remembered to check my eyeglass case. It was empty. I even recalled where I had last seen the glasses, and I searched the room for some time trying to find them. I finally gave up, thinking they might be in the car. I checked with the front desk repeatedly to see if anyone turned them in. No luck.

When I got back home, I checked to see if I could simply reorder the same glasses. I was told that the prescription expired. "The Lord means for me to go to the eye doctor," I thought one morning. I also thought that I would like to try a new eye doctor.

One of the girls at work is new in town, and she began asking around for eye doctor recommendations. She was desperate for some new contacts. "This is no coincidence," I thought. When another coworker said her uncle was a great optometrist with a practice just down the street, I hopped on it. I called and got an appointment the very next day. That night, I picked up an obscure wallet that I never use, and there was my HSA card!


When the lab assistant did that annoying air-puff-in-the-eye test, she seemed a little too enthusiastic about it. I had to have four puffs in each eye! Then the doctor informed me that the pressure in my eye was very high and that I am at risk for glaucoma. "I'm a glaucoma specialist," he said. That was no coincidence!


I will be having more tests and don't know what the future holds. However, I do know that God wanted me to go to that doctor so my illness could be revealed. I avoid annual visits to the optometrist, so there's no telling how long I would have been like that—years, most likely, with possible damage to my optic nerve! But the best part so far is that I will have some classy new glasses, I'm getting checked out, and my unspent HSA paid for the whole thing.

Now I can say, "Thank God for lost articles!"