Sermons

Introduction:

Being able to see clearly is so important to our well being. If we cannot see with our eyes, then we cannot take in the physical world as God intended. We need to see when it comes to spiritual truths as well. The eyes to spiritual truth are faith. In this passage, Jesus tells us what kind of faith we need to see the spiritual realm.



Sight is an important sense physically.

If you had to lose one of your five senses, which one would you give up? 

For my daughter Lydia, she might say her sight is the most important. About two years ago she experienced a temporary loss of sight when her eyelids were literally burned shut. She and two neighborhood friends had made their way into my ultraviolet (UVB) light box. This wooden box is three feet by three feet and eight feet tall with eight fluorescent UVB light bulbs. I use it for skin therapy. When we lived in an apartment we did not have a garage or storage area to place it. So I put it in Lydia's bedroom. Unfortunately, it did not have a lock. The kids probably received about two minutes of exposure, equivalent to being out at the beach on a hot summer day without sunglasses for more than a day.

Lydia's eyes were closed for about thirty-six hours. She experienced, for just a short time, what it is like being blind.

During that time we reflected on how important sight is to our daily function and way of life. When she was in bright light it hurt her eyes. So we kept the house dark. I remember trying to close my eyes for as long as I could to try to understand what Lydia was experiencing.

After seeing what my daughter went through, It is not surprising to me that the friends of the blind man in the story we read were so willing to help him (Mark 8:22-26). They were good friends who cared about this man's ability to see. We'll look at him more later.

My daughter learned from her incident with the light box that seeing clearly is vital and important. I think all of us would agree. For us to function well in this PHYSICAL world we need eyes that work well. There is more to vision, though, than just physical sight…



Sight is important in our picture of Ourselves

Have you had times when you dreamed or thought about your future?

Our Future Picture
We may speak of picturing or imagining ourselves in terms of:

• Family Relationships: dating, married, kids, grandkids
• Education and Career: graduation, degrees, position, retirement
• Financial/Material: house, car, techno-gadgets, clothes, security, stock
• Personal: running a marathon, good health, hobbies, satisfaction

Each of us is different, in different places in life. So that picture of ourselves will be shaped by many factors. Something we can agree on, though is that...

This picture is only a dream. We may have realized part of it, but surely not our ultimate dreams. Some of those we will have until the day we die!

So we work hard, hours and hours, toward the picture we have set up for ourselves. We order our lives around these priorities and set our watches according to them.

Disciples' Future Picture
The disciples of Jesus also had a picture of what they wanted to see for themselves and for their nation. They looked for someone called the Messiah, someone they thought who would bring an end to the Roman occupation.

This is happening even today in the same geographic location the Jews in the first century tried to win back. For contemporary Palestinians and the Jews they see the vision of what their nations could be. The Palestinians want to rule and govern themselves. The Israelites fought for that same privilege for centuries until 1948 when they finally were given nationhood.

When we have a picture or vision of what we may accomplish or become, we give up our life for it. We give our lives for whatever those goals are through hard work, focus, and discipline.

Coming out of High School
I had a picture of myself. My 12th grade English teacher made each of us write a letter to ourselves. We placed it in a self-addressed stamped envelope. He would send those letters to us after two years. What did I write? I looked into the future pictured myself studying Business or Economics, preparing myself for a life of making money. The route? I would have to order my new life at college to work hard and stay disciplined.

The disciples did the same to follow their dream for themselves and their nation. The Bible tells us their story:

Mark 1:16-20
16 As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen.
17 "Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men."
18 At once they left their nets and followed him.
19 When he had gone a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John in a boat, preparing their nets.
20 Without delay he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.

What were Simon, Andrew, and James willing to give up? The story tells us they...

• Left their Nets behind to follow Jesus--they left their jobs, the means for earning a wage and life.
• Left their Father in the boat--they left not only the family business, but they left the family to follow Jesus.
• Left their way of life--if you leave your family and your job you've totally reordered your life. That is exactly what these disciples had done.

How have we ordered our lives to reflect the aspirations and dreams we have?
Are the pictures and dreams we have for ourselves fulfilling and satisfying?

Every now and then we might truly wonder if that picture will ever be completely satisfying. We may achieve one piece of the puzzle to find that we need to yet achieve the next piece. We may have even put many of the pieces together, but wonder if that was the right picture to work for in the first place.

I wondered what it would take to be satisfied with my picture after I received that letter in college. Since entering college as an Economics major, I had changed to Engineering, and then again to Geography. Now I was desiring to enter into graduate studies in Theology. I had changed so many times and worked so hard that I wondered just what would give me a fulfilled feeling in life. 

All of us have a yearning to have fulfilling and satisfying purpose and goals in life. Yet, Is there any way this yearning for fulfillment can be satisfied?

To help us answer this question we can think about sight or vision is another way:

Sight can be used metaphorically, to connote clarity of understanding or perception of reality.

Let's look again at the blind man who was healed by Jesus. 

Jesus first spit on the blind man's eyes and then put His hands on him. When the blind man looked up, he saw people; but they looked like tree stumps walking around. He could see, but not clearly. For those of us who wear contacts or glasses, we know what our world looks like without our visual aids. For his vision to be functional, he needed further healing.

Then Jesus put His hands on him again, and the blind man's vision cleared up completely.

What does this story tell us about how we come to clarity of understanding? And, what does it tell us about Jesus himself? It shows us that we may not see Jesus clearly in our present understanding of Him.

This is true of the friends of the blind man. Those men wanted physical healing for the blind man. In the Bible we are told that Jesus healed the mute, deaf, and blind among others. He truly cared about those suffering physically and diseased. So it was natural that the friends brought the blind man to Jesus. To them, Jesus was a miracle healer. They were interested in his ability to heal the sick. So they went out of their way to seek Jesus.

This is not unlike looking for the best doctor or specialist to handle the toughest cases. Some people will travel all over the world to see a renowned doctor or surgeon who might give them hope of cure.

The friends of the blind man had a good intention to get help for their friend. But when we examine the story on another level we'll see Jesus had more in mind that physical healing.

Not Just Skin Deep
We ourselves may be suffering physically. Physical suffering causes us to feel the deepest emotional and mental anguish--for ourselves or for others. However, physical healing alone does not heal those scars. 

That Jesus touched this blind man is significant. I have heard that for a blind person, the other senses are heightened. The sense of touch is heightened even more so. It is likely that as a blind man, people in general would have shunned and avoided him. To have someone touch him addressed more than just the physical--it would have been emotionally healing.

No, Jesus was more than just a physical healer. Jesus wanted to touch the blind man more deeply than just the physical. He could have gone around the world touching the sick and healing them. But to what end? Those people would eventually get old and sick again. Even if He could go around to them over and over again, each one he healed would eventually die. Then what? 

This is not unlike looking for the best doctor or specialist to handle the toughest cases. Some people will travel all over the world to see a renowned doctor or surgeon who might give them hope of cure.

We also know deep down inside that even if we had our physical ailments healed, we would have to face our last breath, or our last disease one day in the future. The blind man could see, but death would come upon him sooner or later. In the quiet of our heart, perhaps at a funeral or in cancer or disease of a loved one, we also realize death will come. And we are not too sure what will come after.

Clarity of Sight in the Spiritual Realm: the Disciples
The followers of Jesus had their picture of what life was about and they thought they had found it in Jesus. But they only had a partial picture--just like the blind man who saw the people as tree stumps.

When did they see clearly the answer to suffering, the answer to the longings of their heart? It was when they finally saw who Jesus is and believed His message.

The disciples followed and lived with Jesus, but they hadn't seen Him clearly. They were looking for a political deliverer. But he was more. 

We may be like the disciples or the blind man in that we cannot see clearly when it comes to the question of who Jesus is. We may have heard of Jesus and may think of him as a great teacher or healer. But we are not sure. We may need to take a second look before we answer for ourselves.

That is what Peter, one of Jesus' followers, needed to do. After the healing, Jesus went to the disciples to ask them, "Who do people say I am?" (you can find that in verse 27 of the insert). Around that time some thought he might be a prophet like Elijah from the Old Testament. Others like the friends of the blind man thought he was a healer. Some viewed him as a great teacher because the words He spoke He spoke with authority.

Jesus asked the disciples directly, "Who do you say I am?" Peter said, "You are the Christ." Jesus did not disagree with Peter. He then warned the disciples not to tell anyone because He wanted people to find out about Him for themselves.

Then He told Peter that He would suffer and die, then rise again from the dead. What was Peter's response? He did not believe Jesus. Peter even began to reprimand Jesus! In Peter's mind, the Messiah or Christ that Jesus described did not match with what Peter understood. This is same man we looked at earlier whom Jesus called named Simon. He had given up everything to follow this Jesus. Now, Jesus did not seem to measure up to what Peter thought He should be.

Peter's response teaches us that to see who Jesus is clearly, we must use the eyes of faith, or belief. Peter did not believe at first, but it was only a short time later that what Jesus had said came to pass. Now Peter believed and began to even tell others about Jesus' suffering, death, and resurrection to a crowd of onlookers.

In Acts 2:31-33
31 Seeing what was ahead, he spoke of the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to the grave, nor did his body see decay.
32 God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact.

The people who heard this message wanted to know what to do. Peter said, "repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins" (Acts 2:38). 

Now he saw what Jesus had been talking about. Jesus did not only come to care for our physical or emotional needs. He came to care for our SPIRITUAL needs as well.
To be forgiven of our sin is to realize that before God, we know in our heart that we have committed wrongdoing. And we know that we need to make it right. That was Jesus' mission--He came as one to forgive our sins and wrongdoings before God. He did this through his personal suffering, death and resurrection. 

Peter told the people that they had to REPENT, or make a conscious decision to turn from their ways to follow God's ways. That is exactly what Peter had learned to do after being with Jesus for three years.

For Peter, finally seeing meant believing what Jesus had been saying all along.

This believing, or faith in what Jesus said, is the key to spiritual sight--to answering the questions of life. Here are some things Jesus and His followers said in the Bible:

• He is the Answer to true Satisfaction and Fulfillment
  In Jesus we have a new picture of fulfillment: John 10:10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
• He is the Answer to Suffering
  Rev 21:4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."
• Life eternal
  John 5:24 "I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life.

These are only a few of the many truths Jesus and His followers taught. In the Bible we are told of more spiritual truth. Whatever we think about what we have heard, there is one decision we need to make today. Do we believe what Jesus came to this earth to do and entrust our self to Him?

The Bible says: "Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God" (John 1:12). If we have never done so, we can receive Jesus today.

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