Key verse:  As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man . . . John 9.1

How is your vision?  Oh, I don’t mean ‘do you need reading glasses, or should you consider contact lenses, or anything like that?’  I mean how do you see people?  Do you look long enough in other people’s eyes to see that they are hurting, or are you always in a hurry?  Are you mostly consumed about thoughts of yourself, your needs, and how you feel? 

Do you suppose that Jesus was busy … rushed … pressured … stressed?  Well, sure, you know that his disciples tried to pull him this way or that; you know that the religious leaders were a constant source of criticism and fault finding.  Surely those things affected him!  Surely they did, but Jesus kept his own ‘day-timer’; Jesus said and did what the Father had him say and do, and did not give in to the external pressures around him.  As a result, we do not get the impression from the gospels that Jesus was rushed or busy; Jesus always had time for others.

Note to self:  am I too busy to take into account how others are doing? 

One of the things that set Jesus apart when he walked the dusty roads of Palestine, was his seeing.  No one ever saw like Jesus.  Others walked by blind beggars like the regular roadside fixtures they had become, not Jesus.  Here in in the ninth chapter, John records that Jesus was walking along, and saw a man who had been blind from birth.  The disciples asked Jesus the cause of the man’s blindness—his sin or his parents?  Notice—they did not give alms to the man, they did not inquire as to his needs, or seek after his welfare.  Yet Jesus saw him as an individual, created in his image.  And though the man asked him for nothing, Jesus saw him and healed him.  Jesus responded with mercy, with compassion.  Let us see and be similarly moved to inquire, to touch ~ with mercy, and with compassion. 

“Lord God, help us to see better… to see individuals who might be in need … of love, a hand up, a kind word, food, clothes . . . let us see and be moved.

Christine