Search this blog

Pages

Showing posts with label blindness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blindness. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 22, 2020

Christmas... Again?

 ’What do you want me to do for you?’

‘Sir,’ he replied, ‘let me see again.’”

--Luke 18:41

 

 

Entering Jericho, approaching Jerusalem, near the end of His ministry, Jesus is stopped by a blind man begging beside the road. The crowd has told the blind man to leave Jesus alone, but he only cries out the louder. Hearing his cry, Jesus stops and asks him what he wants, and the man replies:

            “Let me see again.”

 

And Jesus restores his sight. 

 

Again.

 

Again.  That word is what stood out to me this morning as I did my reading.  How many times have I come to God asking to be forgiven “again.”  How many times have I come to God asking to be healed “again?”  How many times have I come asking for help “again?” Asking God to help me see His will, His love, His grace, His presence… Am I not constantly, in one way o another, asking God to let me see again?

 

In the stillness of this quiet morning, let me see Your grace.  In the weird way my daughter loves turtles, let me see Your love for all creation.  Even in my struggles and failings, Lord, let me see Your will.  In the flat tire or the broken alternator let me see Your hand.  In my loneliness and sorrow, let me see Your cross.  In the homeless man walking through traffic, begging for help, let me always see Your face.   

 

Let me see again.

 

Isn’t that the point of Christmas?  To open our eyes. To let us see again…  There had been a time when God walked with man in the shade of the garden.  There had been a time when He went before us –leading us-- as a pillar of cloud, and followed behind –protecting us—as a pillar of fire.  Or when God was seen face to face by Moses, or witnessed in a still small sound by Elijah… God’s glory had been seen or felt in so many ways… But time and again we are blinded by our own glory, by our own worries, our own jealous desires. 

 

And so, He came again. Not in the pillar of smoke or the pillar of flame, not in some mysterious symbolic action or strange radiance or shekinah glory. But in the flesh. As a tiny baby in a simple manger, humble, vulnerable, like one of us… like ALL of us.  And for all to see, again.

 

And again… This year, as you prepare for Christmas take a moment to pray the prayer of this blind man on the road to Jericho.  The crowds may be telling you not to bother with God. The crowds may be telling you to worry more about last minute shopping, and packages and Christmas cards and delivery dates and long lines at the UPS store.  But, don’t listen to the crowd.  For they too are blind.

 

Instead, take a moment to still your heart, pause all the preparations, and the gift-wrapping and cookie baking, and the Hallmark movie marathons, and just sit down for a moment, someplace quiet and still. Light a candle.  Take a moment away from all the busy-ness and close your eyes to all the distractions.  Take a breath and be still. And wait… He is coming. Truly.  In the stillness, can you hear Him?  He is on His way. Now, whisper the blind man’s simple prayer:  Lord, let me see again.

 

 

Sunday, March 10, 2019

Making God Manifest—a meditation on the blind man and the beatitudes


“And His disciples asked Him: Rabbi,
who sinned, this man or his parents, that
he was born blind? Jesus answered:
It was not that this man sinned, or his parents;
but that the works of God might be made
manifest in him.”  --John 9:2-3


When we wonder about suffering, whether in the world art large or at our own particular “ill luck,” or insufficiency, we might want to remember that the suffering isn’t our fault, and it isn’t the fault (or the sin) of our parents.  When some pain or lack in our lives gets too hard to handle, we often seek someone to blame.  We look for some kind of explanation; and it often seems easiest to blame a person—make them the villain of our story.  It feels like a curse has come upon us, and someone has to be at fault; either we have brought this on our self, or someone else is the cause. If we blame bad luck, or fate, or “the world,” then in effect we are actually blaming God (whether we are using a big “G” a little “g”).  But, here in this little story, the Lord seems to be telling us that what feels like a curse (or bad luck) may in fact be a kind of blessing.  Even better, an opportunity for a blessing to be shared: for the “works of God to be made manifest” through us.

In my personal Bible study, I am still reading through the Psalms, and in my work Bible study group we are reading Isaiah, and now for Lent I am rereading a wonderful book by the Orthodox writer Jim Forest, The Ladder of the Beatitudes (Orbis Bks.1999). Which (in turn) sent me in search of John's gospel and this story about a man born blind.   (As the psalmist says: “All doers of evil are scattered…” –and boy am I!)

Anyway, as part of his introduction, Forest devotes a brief chapter to this story from John 9 about a man born blind. And because it seems to have nothing to do with the beatitudes, I almost skipped right over it.  I was too eager to get to the whole "tofu and potatoes" of the poverty and mourning and all that "blessed are" stuff… What does this blind guy have to do with beatitudes, anyway?

Aside:  Let me back up a moment here.  Some people are of the opinion that reading is a linear act… i.e. page 1 is followed by page 2 and then 3 and then 4 and so on until the end is reached (or the book is lost on a bus –whichever comes first).  But I (being a librarian) am a professional and have never felt constrained by things like page numbers and chapter order or plot progression.  To my family’s chagrin and frustration (I fear), I often will begin a book somewhere near the middle and read for several pages (or chapters) before going back and picking up pieces of the earlier action (at random).  It is possible this odd habit of reading a book as if it were a cubist painting is a form of literary dementia, or simply a sign of intellectual instability… Nevertheless, it is true, and I thought I should confess it. 

Back to the story at hand:  Instead of skipping the chapter, for some reason I kept reading; and as I did, I had that wonderful exhilarating sense that something of great import was being said; a truth revealed.  Near the end of his brief chapter, Mr. Forest takes a moment to put himself in the place of the blind man.  He imagines sitting in darkness and hearing people talking; they are asking someone questions (about him!). Whose fault it is that he was born blind (him or his parents)? And with some curiosity, he listens to hear what will be said.  But what he hears catches him off guard. It is someone speaking not about fault or sin or blame, but about making the works of the Lord visible.  Forest imagines the blind man’s confusion; how can his blindness have anything to do with the glory of God?  But then something happens.  The voice comes near and a man puts wet clay on his eyes and tells him to go wash it off.  And when he does, suddenly it is true; the work of God is made manifest in all His glory. 

And that is when I started thinking back to that discussion I was having with my wife the other day. Driving home from work, we were trying to remember all the beatitudes, and wondering what Jesus actually meant by these paradoxical teachings; and how we (personally) might find a blessing in each of them.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are they who mourn, blessed are the meek, blessed those who hunger and thirst for righteousness… blessed are the persecuted…
And we struggled.  How can one find a blessing in poverty? Where is the blessedness in mourning? How does one find good in being persecuted? To be concrete, how is homelessness a blessing? In the moment, in the experience of it, they all feel like crushing weights, disasters even.  Yet, Jesus tells His apostles that the blindness of this man isn’t a punishment or a disaster, but an opportunity for the work of God to be made known.  Thinking about this, I realize that I too was blind.  I was getting to wrapped up in the darkness of my own anxieties (and habits) to see the truth; I was too busy blindly searching for the “right answer,” to let God’s work be made manifest.  Yet, something stopped my heedless rush, someone slowed me down with a little simple discussion of a seemingly unrelated passage from a different gospel (simple as dirt and spit) and opened my eyes: the beatitudes are not just about us, or about our comfort, they are about making the glory of God manifest to the world. They are about creating opportunities for God’s presence to be revealed.  And where does Jesus promise He will always be: in the hungry, in the naked, in the prisoners (the persecuted)…

Take a moment and read John 9, you can read the whole chapter in less than 5 minutes.  Then open Matthew and read the Beatitudes (5:3-12), and spend a little time praying over it with that blind man in mind. (And maybe pick up a copy of Jim Forest's book.) Anyway, that will be part of my Lenten prayer this year and if I am lucky, I may begin to see my life in a whole new light. 

Anyway, that’s my plan. This Lent, I will be contemplating the beatitudes with the help of Jim Forest.  And my hope is that I can learn something about the blessing of poverty, or mourning, of hunger and thirst, of mercy and peace or… perhaps, I will wait a while to ask for that other one…

Lord,
Let me not be blind to Your presence in all
those who hunger, in all who mourn, in all who
feel persecuted, belittled or forgotten. Open my eyes
to Your glory, Your grace, Your love made manifest
in the needs of others. Stir my heart, that I may greet
all those in need with generosity with love and humility.
Amen