It was a Sunday morning. I had been up for a long time. As a youth and associate pastor, I came in at 5 am for prayer and was usually the last person to leave after church finished. I was tired and ready to go find some lunch.
As I was about to pack up, a young boy who was waiting for his mother came up to me wanting prayer. I asked this 5 year old what he wanted God to do for him. He pulled his thick black rimmed glasses off his face and threw them on the wooden bench we called the prayer altar and said,
“I’m tired of these things! I want Jesus to heal my eyes!”
I was rather young and I did believe that God did miracles and healings but this had a complicated edge to it. What if I prayed for him and nothing happened? Would I have ruined a child for life when it came to believing God would do anything for him? I was still immature so I was thinking about all these things.
After sizing up the situation I made a decision. I didn’t even pray a prayer. I did what was really a cop-out!
I said, “According to your faith be it unto you. “ It was really my way of putting the burden of faith back on the boy and not me and God!!
The boy began yelling, “I CAN SEE! I CAN SEE!”
There was a small clock at the back of the little church. I told the kid to look at that clock and tell me what time it was. We needed to verify that something had happened. He turned around, looked at the clock and said, “I can’t. I can’t tell time!”
About that time his mother came in and the boy was still yelling that he could see. His mom was a pretty new believer and was thrilled.
There was one problem. His dad was not a believer. In fact, he wasn’t just a non-believer, he was hostile to the gospel and to God and all that “stuff” he didn’t think was real. He was very angry when mom and son got home from church that day with the little boy refusing to wear his glasses saying that he could see.
The next day they sent their son to school. The dad made him wear his glasses. His teacher was told that he was to wear his glasses. At recess that day, the boy had a head on collision with another kid on the play -ground. He complained that he couldn’t see with his glasses so they demanded his eyes to be checked. When his eyes were checked they found that he couldn’t see with the glasses on because his eyesight was perfect!!
Somebody had faith that Sunday morning but it wasn’t me! It truly was according to the young boy’s faith! By the way…his dad was speechless!
© Copyright Lisa Swayze 2018
