Casting a Vision for God's Love is a Vital Part of Life: Record and Landmark Article June 21

Many of you who know me personally know that often times I can’t get through a conversation without talking about my dog. He is affectionately known as little man, and he is only little in size, not personality. When I first adopted him, he had been abused and lost one of his eyes due to neglect. This past week, he suffered a corneal abrasion in his other eye, and immediately I turned into an anxious wreck over my dog’s vision. The wonderful staff at the Animal Hospital of Statesville is treating him, and he’s getting to be more spoiled than most days. However, for me these questions of sight raised interesting questions about vision and what we see.

            As with any medical treatment, be it canine or human, one must consider all the possible outcomes of such treatment. I’ve given some thought as to my dog’s vision, and if something terrible or unforeseen happened, what life without vision would be like. Questions such as how to care for him, and if I had the option what would I want him to see last? I think that opened up a conversation in my life as well. Given the choice, what would I like to see last on this earth? If death or other calamities took my earthly vision what would be the last things I could hope to see.

            The obvious answers to these questions are almost surface level and simplistic. The list of loved ones and family members (both four-legged and two) comes to mind. But all of those answers to what we would like to see in our last moments of vision give a pretty clarifying statement about what we think of when we think of God.

            The idea I have that if given the choice, I would want to be surrounded by those things that remind me most of the love and grace extended to me by my Creator. These visual, tangible representations of Divine mystery intertwined with mortal beings and inanimate objects are what call us to a deeper understanding of God’s vision for us.

            Though I am worried about my dog as any pet owner would be, I know that if some day his vision is taken from him that doesn’t mean I’d stop loving or caring for him, in fact that love and care may increase. Likewise with the God of all things we can be assured that when we lose vision or life for that matter the God who created us doesn’t stop loving us, in fact, our presence and knowledge of the holy will only increase.

            This week, be assured in Heaven’s grace. Let grace be made evident through your relationships with humans and pets and all of creation. Make it evident to the point where even those who have lost their physical vision or even their spiritual vision may once again look upon the sunrise of faith and be lost in the mystery of it all.