The last few days have been more involved in the world of medicine than I might have chosen.  Among other things, Natalie managed to get another urinary tract infection while taking a 90-day supply of preventative antibiotics.  We’ll see what the next round of procedures will bring, but all indications say it may include anesthesia.

I force her to take regular potty breaks, and she wants me to hang out with her in the bathroom, so I do.  As I stood in the doorway today, looking at her lovely blue eyes and kissable rosy cheeks, I smiled.

“Natalie, you’re really pretty.”

“I can’t see it.”

“You have a pretty face and a cute new shirt and pretty black flower in your hair, and you look pretty.”

She rolled her little eyes around in their sockets trying to see her own face and hair.

“I can’t see that!”

“I know, but I can.  And you’re pretty.”

And I thought how true that is for all of us.  We are lovely— living lives of service, adorned with sacrifice and affection— but our eyes don’t spin around that far, and we don’t see how beautiful we are.

Something inside me tells me that somewhere a Heavenly parent smiles on me in much the same way and reassures, “You can’t see it, but I can.”

When a parent overlooks shortcomings and just sees the goodness in someone, I believe it’s a small dose of how God sees all of us who are trying to love Him and serve Him:

Genesis 6: 8 But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.

What better thing to see reflected back in someone’s eyes than grace, especially coming from the eyes of someone you love and are trying so hard to please?

Jeremiah 1: 5 Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee.

Prov. 5: 21 For the ways of man are before the eyes of the Lord, and he pondereth all his goings.

Doctrine and Covenants 124:1 (This was spoken to a prophet, but I believe it can be applied to us in our own realms and responsibilities.) “I am well pleased with your offering and acknowledgments, which you have made; for unto this end have I raised you up, that I might show forth my wisdom through the weak things of the earth.”