LEAD June 2026 | Page 10

a gift. He would have called it an affliction, a calamity, or a tragedy. But blindness changed his perspective.
“ I never would have used the word‘ given,’” he says.“ But that is exactly what I found in blindness.”
The statement sounds almost impossible coming from someone who lost the ability to see his children’ s faces, drive a car, or navigate the world independently. Yet Roberts insists the darkest season of his life became one of the richest spiritually. me lie down in green pastures.”
Before blindness, Roberts describes his life as nonstop, with packed schedules, constant pressure, endless ministry demands, and little room for stillness. Like many leaders, he had learned how to survive on momentum. But blindness forced him to stop.
At first, the stillness felt unbearable. Then something shifted.“ I discovered that God has such lush and green pastures of contentment and joy,” Roberts says,“ that I would have never known apart from blindness.”
Through the loss, he says God began teaching him lessons he might never have learned otherwise.
“ He Makes Me Lie Down”
Instead of finding God only in activity and achievement, Roberts encountered Him in surrender. The tragedy that once looked like destruction slowly became the fertile soil of transformation.
One Scripture became especially personal during those difficult years: Psalm 23.“ He makes
Christian missionary and author Elisabeth Elliot once wrote,“ God teaches us our deepest
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