Cycle A 4th lent
1. While I can’t identify with Blindness….should I take out my contacts, I dare say I would be severely handicapped to perform many simple pleasures and tasks.
-You would never let me drive.
-Watching TV would be no better than listening to the Radio.
-I can only read a newspaper if its’ 3 inches from my face.
-Work would be exasperating in using the computer & calculator.
-Playing sports would be impossible. In my blurryness I can’t judge speed or distance with any accuracy to perform well.
If it’s important for me to function, I MUST have my Contacts in.
2. There is no better way to explain a WARPED spiritual reality than to allow our understanding of a unwanted physical reality to play out. Imagine people who are GOING BLIND from a disease or who have ENDURED BLINDNESS from birth. Physical blindness in this world, is intended as a sign of Man’s Existence, without God. Doing the FLIPSIDE; Being able to see after years of darkness is intended to be a sign of our RESPONSE to the Goodness of a God who is always loving us.
3. Our first reading has something to say about blindness. While it is about the Anointing of David as King of Israel, it’s paired with this Gospel to show us how there are times when we refuse to SEE how God wills to use other people for His plans, because we use FAULTY CRITERIA in placing people in positions to do God’s work.
God told Samuel a priest/prophet of Israel to go to Bethlehem and from the FAMILY of JESSE, he would Anoint the next King of Israel.
The story tells us that Jesse brought 8 of his 9 sons before Samuel to be that King. God rejected them, even though Samuel thought them worthy. In Samuel’s eyes, they each presented a GOOD appearance and seemed to have LOFTY statures.
Then God asked Samuel if there were any other sons. That’s when Jesse called David, his 9th and youngest son, who was out tending sheep and was brought in from the fields. God then told Samuel that David is the one he had chosen to be King. God liked the ‘STANCE of his HEART’. Therefore Samuel should ANOINT Him.
Samuel and Jesse were BLIND to seeing anything special in this 9th and youngest son David, that God could use. David the handsome, young, but humble Sheppard Boy was the PERFECT choice of God.
4. The point of the blind man in the Gospel is to tell us that life without God, at best is Discouraging and frustrating. All our Actions will be Doomed to failure and our lives will lie in defeat, UNLESS our hope is, that what Jesus did for the blind man in the Gospel, Jesus will do for us…if we respond to him. We must WALK the journey to God in FAITH, just as our blind man did of his own free will.
5, Did you notice the steps of FAITH. Jesus took MUD and PASTED his Eyes, telling him to go WASH in the pool. The blind man could have said, ‘This will never work’. But instead he got help to get to the pool. It’s in responding to the simple things, that our journey of faith begins. In that RESPONSE, our BLIND MAN was CURED.
The blind man’s Journey continues. He is confronted by the Pharisees to name names. He tells us JESUS CURED Him. Then he added Jesus is a PROPHET. And when Jesus confronts him, he says he believes that he Jesus, is the ‘Son of Man’. And finally his Steps of Faith allow him to BOW and WORSHIP …GOD!
Our Gospel Blind man, starting with release from a physical Handicap of blindness, starts and completes his journey from the ‘blindness of disbelief’ into the ‘spiritual light’ of Faith.
6. The Pharisees had a much simpler opportunity to Journey in Faith. After all they said ‘WE CAN SEE’. Yet when it came to Spiritual Sight, they could NOT SEE. They could NOT believe in Jesus the same way the Blind Man did. In fact their journey took them AWAY from God. To the Pharisees, in their Spiritual Blindness…
-Jesus did not have the POWER to WORK MIRACLES.
-Jesus did not have the APPEARANCE to be a PROPHET.
-Jesus did not have the LOFTY stature to be the MESSIAH.
-Jesus was NOT GOD.
7. And even though they ‘could see’, the Pharisees did not See what Jesus saw in the Blind man. The Pharisees were hampered by age old beliefs, that the blind man had to be a sinner…because he was Born blind. They didn’t want to see the ‘Stance of the Heart’ of the Blind man. Jesus saw something special about this man. And he gave him the opportunity to respond.
8, Total blindness is a rarity. Even with out my contacts, I am not blind. But I do need corrective lenses to function safely and correctly I think total spiritual blindness is a rarity. But I do think many, many people do need Corrective Lenses. I think Lenten Prayer, Fasting, almsgiving and the Sacraments, are just such corrective apparatuses. It’s not to late to respond, Can you SEE WHAT I AM SAYING?
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