Eyes to See

I almost missed her.

That is the part I keep coming back to.

Before I walked into the temple today, I sat in my truck for a moment. I was running a little late, but something in me needed to pause.

Not rush.

Not grab my bag and hurry in.

Just sit still for a minute with God.

That morning, I had been reading in 2 Kings about Elisha and his servant. The servant was afraid because all he could see was the army surrounding them. But Elisha could see something more. He could see heaven surrounding them too.

So Elisha prayed, “Lord, I pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see.”

And that prayer stayed with me.

So there in my truck, before I walked into the temple, I whispered my own version of it.

Heavenly Father, help me have eyes to see today.

Help me pay attention to the things I am missing.

Help me see myself the way You see me.

Help me notice what is right in front of me.

I think sometimes we pray for eyes to see because we are hoping for something big.

Something unmistakable.

Something deeply spiritual.

Maybe a sign.

Maybe a feeling. Maybe some kind of sacred confirmation that God knows us, sees us, and has not forgotten where we are.

And I do believe He gives those moments.

But today, I learned that sometimes eyes to see is not about noticing more things.

Sometimes it is about noticing more people.

As I walked toward the temple, I looked up at the angel. I have seen that angel so many times before, but today I noticed a little extra detail I had not paid attention to before. I smiled a little, because I thought, this is it. This is me having eyes to see.

I was looking for the spiritual detail.

The symbol.

The object.

The little hidden thing I had missed before.

And then I heard a voice.

A woman was sitting on a bench nearby, and she made a kind comment about my dress. I startled a little because I had not seen her at all.

I had been so busy looking up that I almost missed who was sitting right in front of me.

Her name was Lonnie.

And when I looked closer, I could see she was in distress. Tears were on her face. Her heart looked heavy. She told me she had been there since 3:00 in the morning. Her husband, Michael, was in the hospital, and she was not allowed to see him.

I think there are moments when time feels inconvenient and holy at the same time.

I was late.

I had somewhere to be.

But she was right there.

And suddenly I realized my prayer had been answered, just not in the way I expected.

I had asked God to help me see what I was missing.

And He showed me Lonnie.

Not the angel.

Not the architecture.

Not the symbol carved into the building.

A woman on a bench with tears on her face.

I walked over and sat with her for a bit. I asked if I could pray with her. And for a few minutes, the temple grounds became something even more sacred to me. Not because of where we were standing, though that mattered, but because God had placed one of His daughters in my path and invited me to notice.

Isn’t that so often how He works?

We are looking for answers, and He gives us people.

We are looking for signs, and He gives us someone to love.

We are looking for direction, and He gives us an interruption.

And honestly, I almost missed it.

That is the part that feels tender to admit.

Because how many times do I ask God to help me see, and then I decide ahead of time what the answer should look like?

How many times do I look for Him in the big spiritual places, while missing Him in the ordinary human ones?

How many times am I so focused on what I need from God that I miss who God is asking me to notice?

I think we do this more than we realize.

We miss the person in pain because we are busy getting to our appointment.

We miss the quiet prompting because we are overthinking the obvious problem.

We miss our own worth because we are too busy measuring our weakness.

We miss the blessing because it does not look like success, ease, or a perfectly answered prayer.

And maybe, perhaps, we even miss ourselves.

That was part of my prayer too.

Help me see myself the way He sees me.

That one is harder sometimes.

It is one thing to believe God loves the woman crying on the bench.

It is another thing to believe He looks at me with that same tenderness when I am tired, distracted, late, emotional, or not quite as put together as I hoped I would be.

But I felt Him teach me something today.

He sees the person on the bench.

And He sees the woman walking past her.

He sees the tears we show.

And the ones we hide.

He sees the hospital worry.

The marriage worry.

The child worry.

The faith worry.

The loneliness that sits quietly in the chest while everyone else assumes we are fine.

He sees the woman who has been waiting since 3:00 in the morning.

And He sees the woman sitting in her truck asking for eyes to see.

I walked into the temple a little later than I planned, but maybe more prepared than I would have been if I had rushed in on time.

Because my heart had been softened before I ever reached the door.

I had been reminded that spiritual vision is not just seeing angels around the mountain. Sometimes it is seeing the person on the bench.

Sometimes it is noticing the hurt behind the compliment.

Sometimes it is stopping when your schedule says hurry.

Sometimes it is praying with a stranger named Lonnie and carrying her husband Michael’s name with you into the house of the Lord.

I do not know what happened after I left her.

I do not know what the rest of her day looked like.

But I know this.

God knew exactly where she was sitting.

And He knew exactly where I was walking.

And in His quiet, merciful way, He let our paths meet for just a few minutes.

Maybe that is what eyes to see really means.

Noticing the heaven that is already surrounding us.

Noticing the people God places in our path.

Noticing that sometimes the miracle is not that the circumstance changes right away.

Sometimes the miracle is that someone does not have to sit alone in it.

Today, I asked God to open my eyes.

And He did.

He helped me see Lonnie.

And in seeing her, I think He helped me see Him.