VISION EXPRESSED

I’ve got new lenses in my reading glasses. Just as well. I’d been peering at a message on my phone and misread one of the words. I thought I saw ‘treasure’ when the word was ‘reassure.’

At the opticians I was surrounded by children who, having had the obligatory school holiday hair cuts and been taken to have their feet measured, were now having their eyes tested and frames fitted. Everyone seemed happy at the prospect of seeing more clearly. As was I.

My phone message was from someone overseas who’d written about reassurance in the face of uncertainty. His reassurance came from a Bible verse where Jesus told his anxious disciples, “I am in my Father and you are in me, just as I am in you.” They belonged to God’s family; the bonds of love were strong and assured – whatever the circumstances.

Like many persecuted Christians today, the first disciples had good reason to feel unsafe. Those words of Jesus reassured them that though they might not be safe, they were secure. “I will be with you always,” Jesus said. “Nothing will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus,” wrote St Paul.

Whatever we may face, that’s something to treasure. My misreading of ‘treasure’ and ‘reassure’ wasn’t so erroneous after all.