The Man Born Blind Teaches us About Faith

from yesterday’s gospel

There is a study of people born blind who gain their sight for the first time. When people gain sight they never had before, it is terrifying. Their world was built on a darkness that had become comfortable; all of a sudden their whole way of perceiving the world has changed.

When you have known nothing else but blindness, you don’t know what it is like to have sight.

The man born blind may have been unsettled by Jesus healing him, but we are not told that in this story. He may have been scared of this new world, but we don’t know. He could have cursed Jesus for changing his whole way of life. Here he was sitting with what he knew, his blindness. It may not have been the most comfortable world, but he was used to it.

His response to the encounter with Jesus is to not worry about who Jesus is, only to focus on the fact that he is now able to see and that Jesus is the man who healed him. He did not analyze how it happened; he did not try to argue with the Pharisees; he didn’t gripe that his life was no longer comfortable, he only told the truth about his encounter.

This story of the man born blind says to me that our faith is not based on what parts of the Nicene Creed we utterly believe, but how we encounter Jesus. Our faith is not about our understanding about what happens to the bread and wine in Eucharist, but how Jesus comes to us whenever we approach the altar. Our faith is not about how healthy we think we are in our relationships and everyday dealings in the world, but about how open we are to the healing power of Jesus in our lives.

Our faith is built on our openness for Jesus to enter and give sight to those blind spots, to shake up our comfortable life, to put light where there was darkness and cause us to see ourselves and our world with the eyes of Jesus.

Whenever Jesus heals, Jesus gives us access to the divine in ourselves. Jesus heals to give us part of his own divinity, to pour out the love of God. When we are filled with God’s love, it’s easier to see. It’s easier to put away the darkness and look honestly at our lives and how we can love those around us.