My colleague, Pastor Sun-Joong Kim of Janesville, Wisconsin, shared a reflection on seeing clearly which resonated with me on several levels. Not seeing clearly is something I know about.
A few years ago, I went to see a doctor because I was having a problem with my arms. They were no longer long enough to read the newspaper. The eye doctor explained that this was a common concern of people my age. He said there was nothing he could do to lengthen my arms, but that there was a wonderful new invention which would make it possible to see well with the arms I have.
So, I got bifocals. At first I found them quite uncomfortable. I kept tripping over my feet, and I couldn't remember whether to look up or down when I wanted to read something. I had a sore neck and blurred vision for a while, but it got better every day. I had to get used to a whole new way of seeing things.
Pastor Kim, who moved recently to south central Wisconsin where he serves Asbury United Methodist Church in Janesville, and Plymouth United Methodist Church in Orfordville, wrote about his visit to the eye doctor:
“Soon after I moved, perhaps because I was tired, I began to see flashes of light in my eyes for a couple of days. Then floaters appeared, as if small flies were moving before my eyes. Most disappeared, but one did not.
My eyes get tired easily. Reading has become more uncomfortable, and the letters look blurry. I used to have no problem reading my sermon manuscript in 12-point font. Then I changed it to 14, then 16, and sometimes even 18.
I began to worry. What if there was a problem with my retina? What if I was slowly losing my eyesight? So I went to see an eye doctor.
After putting drops in my eyes to dilate my pupils, the doctor examined my eyes carefully. To my surprise, he told me that my eyes were healthy. There is a little cataract, but not enough to need surgery. As for the floater, he said it would be better to live with it rather than have surgery, which could bring risks such as infection or even loss of vision.
I was relieved.
Still, my eyesight is certainly not what it used to be. It may be simply aging, or I may need a different prescription for my glasses. As for the floater, I have to accept it as part of my life and live with it.
Whenever I see our church pianist, Carolyn Schulz, I feel something difficult to explain. She has served as a church pianist for fifty years, and she is blind. She learned music through Braille, and once she hears a piece, she can memorize and play it.
Whenever I watch her playing the piano or other instruments, I find myself looking back at my own life. I have lived all my life with two seeing eyes and two hearing ears. Yet how often have I looked at people with biased eyes?
How often have I listened too quickly to useless words and gossip about others, allowing myself to be influenced and even carried away by them?
And as a result, how often have I judged precious people and their precious lives too easily? How many precious things have I missed in my life because of that? And how many precious people?
When I watch Carolyn playing, sometimes I feel that she has another kind of eye: an eye that sees more deeply than physical eyes can see.”
In a recent article about Carolyn Schulz in The Janesville Gazette, Neil Johnson wrote,
“Schultz is blind, sightless since birth. Yet, everything in the music Schultz plays lives in the intentness of her eyes. As the organist for Janesville’s Asbury United Methodist Church, Carolyn Schultz doesn’t just accompany hymns. She listens to the rise and fall of a prayer, the timbre and register of the church’s choir, or the silence in between, when the church’s congregation and its pastor fall quiet enough to hear someone’s keys jingle in their pocket. Then she plays.
Johnson added, “With thin, delicate pianist’s fingers that are as lithe as a child’s, even at age 81, she plays both the piano and the church’s organ. And when she plays, her face expresses it all, from the rise and fall of the notes to the sounds of voices singing around her. Her music reflects the feel of the room.”
Pastor Kim said, “As I grow older, my eyesight is becoming weaker. It is certainly different from when I was young. But now I want to have eyes that look more deeply. I want ears that are not easily influenced by useless words, but ears that truly listen to the precious people around me. Perhaps I have now reached an age when I should have such eyes and such ears. My prayer is:
“Lord,
do not let me look only at the surface.
Do not let useless words take my ears.
Give me clear eyes and clear ears,
so that I may not miss the truly precious people in my life.”
The Reverend Dr. Sun-Joong Kim came to the United States in 1997. He first served a Korean immigrant congregation of the United Methodist Church in Texas.
Kim then moved to Wisconsin in 2013, where he has served churches in Cumberland, South Milwaukee, East Troy, Lake Geneva and Hartford before being appointed to pastor two congregations in the Janesville area in July. He was born and raised in a Christian family in Seoul, Korea. His father is a retired ordained elder in the Korean Methodist Church. Kim said, “My parents gave me the name “Sun-Joong,” which means “a pure mediator between people for the sake of God’s kingdom.”
Pastor Kim was ordained in the Seoul Methodist Annual Conference at the age of 25 in 1989. He earned his Bachelor of Theology and Master of Theology degrees from Methodist Theological University in Seoul, Korea, his Master of Divinity and Doctor of Ministry degrees from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, and another Master of Theology degree from Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas. Kim also completed two years of Clinical Pastoral Education residency at hospitals in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. His ministry experience includes serving local churches in both Korea and the United States, as well as chaplaincy in the Korean Air Force and in hospitals in the United States.
The Rev. John Sumwalt is a retired pastor and the author of “Shining Moments: Visions of the Holy in Ordinary Lives.” Email him.