In our readings today we have several examples of people who think they can see but cannot see as God sees. In the first reading the prophet Samuel seems to judge that Eliab is the Lord's anointed on the basis of his appearance. He has to be led by the Lord not to choose on that basis but to instead keep looking for what he would not have found on his own. In the Gospel we first have the disciples who saw the blind man and assumed the presence of sin. They had to be led by Jesus to see the man in a new way and understand his situation differently. His blindness was not about sin, but was rather to serve a purpose greater than himself in manifesting the works of God to the world. He who had every appearance of disadvantage would prove to be one for whom and through whom God could do great things, reversing the normal order of expectations. The crowds were not able to see beyond how things appeared to be. They defined the man by his blindness and so, once he could see, it was as though they themselves could no longer see him, as others said, "No, he just looks like him".
Some of the Pharisees who were with him heard this
and said to him, “Surely we are not also blind, are we?”
The Pharisees, who in virtue of their position as teachers, ought to have seen the most clearly of anyone, were in fact the most intractably blind. They assumed that Jesus was a sinner and therefore could not have performed the healing miracle attributed to him. They refused to see what was in fact the case based on the preconceptions. They ought to have recognized that Jesus was, more than David, the Lord's anointed. But they were so invested in the belief that he was not that they already had a rule in place "that if anyone acknowledged him as the Christ, he would be expelled from the synagogue". They claimed to be disciples of Moses, and therefore implied that they could not be disciples of Jesus, since they did not know from where he came. But this fact, which they saw as a strike against him, was really the whole point that they were missing. They did not know where he was from, since he himself was the Word of God who had been sent by the Father and become incarnate. The word of revelation of from Father that Moses had delivered to the people was now standing before them in human form.
Jesus said to them,
“If you were blind, you would have no sin;
but now you are saying, ‘We see,’ so your sin remains.
Blindness itself is never a problem for God. The problem is an obstinate and willful refusal to recognize one's blindness in order to be healed. The blind man was sufficiently vulnerable before Jesus that he not only had his physical blindness healed but also his spiritual vision. He gained a more accurate insight, a clearer view, into the identity of Jesus than either the crowds or the Pharisees possessed.
“You have seen him,
the one speaking with you is he.”
He said,
“I do believe, Lord,” and he worshiped him.
People who had every appearance of vision proved to be the ones who were truly blind. The one who was truly blind was revealed to see things with absolute clarity. Thus continued the great reversal Jesus came to bring about, in which the proud were humbled, and the humble were exulted.
You were once darkness,
but now you are light in the Lord.
Live as children of light,
for light produces every kind of goodness
and righteousness and truth.
Our lives do not end when we are enlightened at baptism, but rather begin. We must then choose to live on the basis of that new reality. We attain clarity about what is truly of the light and what is not. But we must learn to think and act in a way that is in keeping with the light. As new creations in Christ we must no longer be people who feel the need to hide in darkness to conceal the shameful nature of our deeds. Rather we should try to live in such a way that the light feels like where we belong. We do this by trying "to learn what is pleasing to the Lord". The more this is our chief motivation and the basis of our actions the less we will want to slip back into the darkness. In some ways it is easier to live in the darkness, but it always leads to disappointment. It's works are always fruitless. But the light, is, as it were, inevitable. And for those whom the Lord enlightens, and those who abide in that light, there is no greater joy.
No comments:
Post a Comment