Was blind, but now I see
AM Psalm 102 • PM Psalm 107:1-32
2 Samuel 15:19-37 • Acts 21:37-22:16 • Mark 10:46-52
I have never lost my sight, but I have experienced temporary blindness on occasion. I remember once when I was forced to wear eye patches for an hour or so and how completely immobilizing (and scary) that was and a few times when it was so dark in the North Carolina mountains you “could not see your hand in front of your face.” In addition, I am terribly nearsighted. Remove my glasses and my world descends into a bunch of murky shadows. I can detect movement, but I can’t tell the difference between a wave of a hand and a football hurtling toward my face. Ouch.
What concerns me more are those moments when I am spiritually blind. I’m talking about lack of vision that is rooted in the loss of perspective, the loss of my own humanity and the loss of faith in what God has planned for me. Frankly, we are all lost, blindly stumbling through life but through God’s grace we can regain and retain our sight and find His way. In today’s New Testament readings, we see three people who are experiencing their own struggles with sight, physical and spiritual. Like us, each of them is “healed” by his faith.
Bartimaeus was a blind beggar in Jericho. He heard Jesus was near and began to loudly, repeatedly and annoyingly cry out for the great physician. He was persistent in his calls for Jesus’s attention, even when told to shut up. When asked, he was firm and quick in what he wanted, “I want to see.” And he did.
For Saul, his blindness came on in a flash of great light. And I have to admit I sometimes think that for all the horrible things Saul was doing at the time, blindness would have been just desserts. And perhaps, I might have let him think through his actions for a bit more than three days. After being stricken, he was told by the Lord to go on to Damascus to wait for further directions. And he did.
For Ananias, he is told what to do by Jesus in a vision. They carried on a conversation much like Saul and Jesus! I find this incredible. After replying “Here I am Lord”, Ananias expressed his concern about going to see Saul, and who can blame him for his reluctance. The reply was swift and sure, “Go.” And he did.
Obviously, the restoration of sight is a common theme here. My eye patches came off; I turned on a lamp; I wear my glasses; Bartimaeus was granted new vision; scales fell from Saul’s eyes; and Ananias saw his way clearly to go to Saul.
The bigger story, however, is the power of faith. On the much simpler side of things, I had faith in the doctor who bound my eyes and faith in the power of a lit lamp. More seriously, Bartimaeus had faith that if he could just get Jesus’s attention he would be healed, and he was. Saul’s faith took him to Damascus and enabled him to wait for Ananias’s arrival, and his faith continued to propel him in his role mightily spreading the gospel. Ananias had faith that this was not somehow a trap, and Saul was not going to kill him. As commanded, he went to Saul where he laid on his hands restoring Saul’s sight and baptizing him. In many ways his actions, through his faith, were the spark for Paul’s great work.
Faith. Throughout the Bible, we see that with a just bit of faith great things can happen and with great faith even greater things will happen.
Written by Dennis McKinnie
...who, like Bartimaeus, wants to see.