Vision Check

Of all my parents, my father, who died when I was only eight, is the one whose faith I knew the least. He was a non-practicing Roman Catholic, like so many others I know, and I cannot remember him speaking of his experience of God even once during my young life.

Yet, my mother tells me that in the years before he died, she would find him sitting at our old computer in the family room of our house (it was an Apple IIgs, for those who can remember that far back), trying to memorize the words to an old beloved hymn. He appeared as weary wanderer in the dry desert, searching for something to quench his thirst.

…I once was lost, but now I’m found; was blind, but now I see.

Sight is such a fragile thing. Physically there are any number of things that can take it away so easily. We can lose it with time and with age. Or, far worse, we can be born without the basic sense entirely.

And yet, that is not the only sight, now is it?

This weekend, we continue our Lenten journey with a rather famous story of Jesus healing a blind man from the gospel of John. Now, Jesus healed quite a few blind people over the course of the different gospels. However, this one is given a full chapter near the end of Jesus’s life.

It is also connected to one of life’s great questions: do bad things only happen to sinful people?

There is a great debate happening around this healing, about whose sin actually caused the young man’s blindness from birth. Then, once he is healed, the debate expands to include how could anyone who follows God do such a thing in a way that might break one of the great laws.

In reality, while the young man is healed from physical blindness, the real quandary we face in this passage is about the inability we all have to really see in this world.

See God. See as God wants us to. See the reality of what God is doing in our midst.

So come to worship and get a little vision check as we head towards Holy Week.

Blessings, Pastor Janie