Healing Those Born Blind

Christ is risen!

If we weren't blind, we'd be able to see signs of the presence of God all around us. If we weren't blind, we would look around in church, and see the saints and the angels gathered to worship with us. The saints have seen wondrous things. Young children, in their innocence, sometimes see angels close at hand. We might see them, too – but we can't, because we're blind.

Part of the problem is that we think we can see. The fact that we can see the material world around us using the eyes of our physical bodies fools us into thinking we are not blind. That's unfortunate: We aren't going to ask to be healed, because we don't know that something is wrong with us.

The man we meet in the reading today from the Gospel according to St. John the Theologian knows that he is blind. He knows he has a problem. His problem is solved when our Lord finds him, and gives the man his sight. The way in which this miracle is performed can teach us in several ways.

Think back to the account of the creation found in the book of Genesis. "In the beginning," it says, "God created the heavens and the earth." How does God create? He said, "Let there be light"; and suddenly there was light. Throughout the entire act of creation, God speaks into being all that exists, with one significant exception. When it comes time for the creation of humanity, God says, "Let us make man in our own image"; and rather than giving a command, as He had given to the water, that it might bring forth fish and all the creatures who live in the sea, and as He had commanded the air, that it be filled with birds and all flying creatures, and as He had commanded the earth to bring forth living creatures, in making mankind God formed Adam from the dust of the earth. In a way, we might even say that God got His hands dirty when He made us; He was actively and deliberately involved in making us who we are; and having formed a body, He breathed into it the breath of life, and man became a living soul.

Now we come back to the man born blind, and the miracle of his receiving his sight. How does our Lord Jesus Christ work this miracle? He takes once more the dust of the earth, and moistens it from His own spittle to make it a paste, which He then applies to the man's eyes. He then commands the man to go and wash away the mud in the pool at Siloam. When he obeys the command, his sight is given to him.

Brothers and sisters, those of us who have been baptized were not merely blind. We were dead. Yet, in our baptism, we were buried with Christ in His death; and, raised up out of the water of the font, we were raised with Him Who has arisen from the grave, trampling down death by His death. So, as the blind man washed in the pool of Siloam, we have been washed in the water of baptism. We need to understand this if we are to see truly, if we are to see with new eyes, if we are to see more than just the material world, for we who are made in the image and after the likeness of God do not live only in the material world – we live in the realm of the spirits as well.

There were two parts, two activities in the healing of the man born blind. The first was the act of our Lord, Who made the dust of the earth into a paste with His spittle, and then this being put on the man's eyes. The second part was the action of the man going to the pool, and washing himself there. Our Lord Jesus Christ, in the miracle of His Incarnation, has taken for Himself a material body, made of the dust of the earth, just as we have been formed of the dust. It is the same body in which He lived, and worked miracles. It is the same body in which He Who as God cannot die, suffered death on our behalf, to set us free from death. It is the same body with which He rose from the grave to a life that has no end. It is the same body with which He ascended into heaven, and in which He is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. He shares Himself with us, in order that we might become like Him. Having been washed, we must go forth in faith we must do our part, we must live according to the way of life we learn in the Church: praying, as did our Lord Jesus Christ; fasting, as our Lord did; struggling to overcome the passions by which we are tempted to sin, as the Lord did during His forty day fast in the desert, following His baptism. We must give from all that we have, and give of ourselves, as our Lord gave Himself for us all on the Cross.

When we pray; when we fast; when we struggle; when we give; when we love; when we are humble; when we forgive – then we are doing our part, as the man born blind did his part by going to wash in Siloam's pool. By desiring and working to show the life of Christ in our own lives, we are being transformed; and one day, perhaps even in this life, we will see God, and the rich life of the spiritual world of the saints and angels who are all around us. We have already been healed. May God grant us grace, so that we may see!