He Can See Clearly Now!

Yesterday Dan was saying how much better he was seeing. And this morning, as he was getting ready for work, he said his vision was even better than yesterday. Then he called me in the afternoon. "I can see even better, now!" This evening he told me that he thinks he is seeing better out of the eye that had surgery than he is out of his other eye with it's contact lens.

Dan has had poor vision since he was a small child. He wore thick glasses until we met, in Abilene, and started dating. I remember when he got his first contact lenses, because I was the one who broke his glasses! It was a winter day, with one of those rare west Texas snowfalls. Nothing turns college students into little kids again like a snow covered campus. I was especially excited because it was my first year in Texas, and I had been missing Alaska's snowy winters.

Part of the fun of a winter snowfall is throwing snowballs. I guess I had pretty good aim, because I rounded up one of those white missiles, hurled it toward Dan, knocked his glasses off his face and broke them. I felt so bad, but it turned out for good, because he had been thinking about getting contact lenses for awhile, and the broken glasses gave him the impetus to go see the optometrist about them. That was over 40 years ago, and he's worn contact lenses ever since.

The doctor who did Dan's artificial lens implant last Wednesday said that his vision would continue to improve for several weeks or, even, months. And, yet, already he is seeing better than he ever has. God has given man the mind, the curiosity, the drive and the tools to do great things here on earth. Some use those gifts in the arts, some in the trades, some in research and others in the medical arts. We are thankful for the amazing research that has gone into developing an artificial lens that can work with a person's own eye muscles to focus at various distances; for the medical staff who skillfully worked on Dan's eye; and for God who gives every good and perfect gift.