Christ is risen!
You know, it’s a funny thing: the man born blind knew he was blind. Now, because he had not seen, and then lost the ability to see, I suppose if no one had told him he was blind, he wouldn’t have known; he would have accepted the world in which he lived as one without sight. He was in darkness; but if he had not known that he was blind, he would have accepted darkness as a natural condition; and probably would have assumed that everyone else lived in the same way. His blindness did not keep him from learning; and among the things he learned was that the Messiah would come. He went to the pool of Siloam to wash with two things that each of us would do well to develop and practice on our own lives: obedience; and faith.
Here’s a tragic thing: Because we have eyes to see the world around us, we don’t know that we are blind. What, you don’t think this is true? Tell me, have you seen God? (I know I haven’t.) Yet we live in the world God created; and we are gathered here in His presence – so we should be able to see Him, right? But we don’t. We are in darkness; and because we don’t know we are blind, we accept our spiritual darkness as a natural condition, and we live our lives accordingly, and assume that everyone else lives in the same way. But because we see in the physical sense, we do not think we are spiritually blind; and so, unlike the blind man, we do not learn. We are not obedient to the teachings of the Church; and we do not have the fullness of faith.
After all, if we truly believed that the Messiah has come, we would not live according to the ways of the world; we would not live according to the desires of our flesh. If we truly believe what we say we believe in the Symbol of faith, we would begin to see the things of the spiritual realm, and come to desire these more than any earthly powers or pleasures. We would pray and fast, in order to be closer to God; we would give, and struggle against our sins, in order to be set free from this world. We would love one another, even those who hate and wrong us, in order to more closely resemble the God Who loves us, and Whom we should love with the fullness of our being. But we are blind to these truths; for, if we were not blind, we would not sin. The evidence of our blindness is our persistence in our sins.
Brothers and sisters, we do not need to wait for the Messiah to come. He has already come, and is risen from the dead, raising us to new life in Him as well. We have already been to Siloam; we were washed in the water of our baptism, empowered in our chrismation. We should see, where we were blind; but we choose instead to close our eyes, and blind our souls, thinking that we see. But now I have told you (and told myself): we are living blindly, although we should be able to see the glory of God, and the image of His beloved Son in each and every person we meet. Let us be disobedient no longer; let us confess our sins, and be washed clean once more. Let us go forth in love, caring for each other and all who bear the image of Christ; for then do we truly worship Him. In loving do we truly serve Him; and in serving Him, we will come to see Him; to the glory of God, and the salvation of our souls.
Christ is risen!
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