Seeing is a Process - Mark 8:22-26
Notes
Transcript
As many of you know, I grew up in the Chicago area. Several you lived in the North East, so I know you likely had similar experiences to me as far as snow fall goes. Every year there would be several feet of snow that would fall over the course of the winter, and sometimes, there would be those more severe snow storms that would drop several feet of snow all at once.
Down here, no one really does much by way of snow shoveling, and I’ve lived on streets here that the city doesn’t even bother plowing because if there is any amount of snow accumulation, it will all just melt in a day or two and we can all get back to our lives.
That is not the case up north. That snow isn’t going anywhere for weeks. Places where snow tends to stick around often have dedicated snow removal crews. People hired kids like me to clean their sidewalks, and there was decent money to be had.
I remember when I upgraded from a shovel to a snowblower. I learned that there are two kinds of snow blowers or snow throwers.
There are single stage blowers, and two stage blowers.
A single stage blower has a single mechanism for throwing the snow. There is an auger at the front, and that auger is designed to not only scoop up the snow and feed it into the chute, but to do so with such force that it also throws the snow in the desired direction.
A two-stage blower has an auger that scoops the snow and feed it into the chute, but then there is a secondary auger in the chute itself whose sole job it to propel the snow that it has been fed as far as it can.
As you can imagine, two stage blowers are more expensive, but also more efficient and more powerful and can handle larger amounts of snow, because the design of the stages allows it to accomplish more than the single stage could all on its own.
As we look into the Word of God day, we are going to find a two stage miracle unfold before us. The fact that Jesus does this miracle in two stages has been a source of confusion for many.
Why did Jesus have to lay hands on him twice? Was he not powerful enough to do it in one shot?
It’s a bit of crude analogy, but just like our two stage snow blower is able to accomplish more with adding a second stage, so Jesus’ two stage healing is designed to accomplish more than just one purpose.
When we put this miracle in its context, we find an incredible connection to what comes right before this miracle and what comes after. This miracle, just like the rest of the book, should never be read in isolation, disconnected from the surrounding context.
Often this makes it difficult to decide where to begin and end for a sermon, like last week when we covered 21 verses. This passage is very connected to that passage, as we will soon see, but it is also closely connected with what follows. We’ve talked before about the concept of intercalation, or a bracketing of sections of the text.
Mark is famous for his intercalations within intercalations, and here we are about to begin another one. One the one hand, this helps wrap up the previous passage, and could be argued to be inside that intercalation. On the other hand, the healing of the blind man begins a new section bracketed by this this healing on the front end, and the healing of blind Bartimaeus in chapter 10, right before the triumphal entry of Christ into Jerusalem.
But then there is also the thematic connections between what Jesus just said to the disciples in the immediately preceeding passage. This section bridges the sections together so well.
Our main takeaway from this text today is that gaining eyes to see is often a process. Gaining eyes to see if often a process.
Let’s read our text together this morning.
22 And they came to Bethsaida. And some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him.
23 And he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village, and when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, “Do you see anything?”
24 And he looked up and said, “I see people, but they look like trees, walking.”
25 Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.
26 And he sent him to his home, saying, “Do not even enter the village.”
There are a few incidental details in the text that are worth noting. First, there are ways that this miracle is just like every other miracle Jesus has performed throughout this book. There are similar patterns here.
First, notice that “some people brought to him a blind man”
So often through this book there are individuals who desperately need the healing touch of the Savior, and it is the friends of those individuals who bring them to Jesus.
Think about the implications of that.
I’m reminded of Romans 10:13-14
13 For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
14 How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?
People have to be brought to Jesus. Think of your testimony. How did you come to faith in Christ. You were not individuals with no knowledge of the Gospel who just woke up one morning and said “you know what, though I’ve never heard of Jesus before, I know I need to repent and place my trust in His life, death, burial, and resurrection for my eternal salvation”
No. The Gospel was communicated to us in some way. I am grateful to have been raised in a Christian home where I heard the Good news. Others of you heard the Gospel later in life. Some of us heard it for years before coming to the point of faith, so maybe we cannot say how we were first introduced to the Gospel, but we can say with certainty that it was communicated to us somehow.
That’s what has been done for you. You were like a blind man and someone brought you to Jesus.
Who can you bring to Jesus? Who can you share the truth of the Gospel with?
Second, we as this paragraph ends, we see Jesus telling the healed man “do not even enter the village”
This reminds us of the regular habit of Christ to try to keep things somewhat quiet for a time. Scholar often call this the “Messianic Secret”. I just want to remind us that Jesus instructed those whom he healed to be quiet about things because He has a plan and purpose for how His ministry is to be revealed and unfold. As he will be explaining in the coming paragraphs, Jesus has come to suffer and die, and He is going to reveal that in his time. The instructions for silence that we have seen so often are designed to help safeguard the mission.
Those are some of the similarities with other healing miracles.
What makes this healing stand out is one major difference:
It takes Jesus two “tries” to heal the man!
He spits on his eyes. Why? That’s unclear.
He touches him and asks in vs 23 “Do you see anything”
Look at verse 24
Mark 8:24 “24 And he looked up and said, “I see people, but they look like trees, walking.””
Things were still blurry for this man. He can see now, but his sight is not clear enough to make out what he is seeing.
I have a dry eye condition that requires me to lubricate my eyes at night with a gel paste. When I put it in, my eye sight is incredibly blurry for the next thirty minutes or so, and I don’t even bother trying to do anything after that because I cannot really see. I usually will just go to bed and go to sleep.
I imagine that my post-gel eye sight would have been similar to what this man could see after this first step in the healing process for him. He could see, but not clearly. He saw people, but they weren’t clear enough to be distinguished from tree trunks walking around.
So Jesus touches him again.
Look at verse 25
Mark 8:25 “25 Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.”
Notice the stacking of terms here. He opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.
The repetition highlights for us the complete restoration and clarity of his newfound sight. Jesus didn’t heal the man but he might still need glasses. No. Everything was crystal clear to him. Today we need lasik surgery for that kind of clarity, and even then results are guaranteed, right? Here this man was completely and utterly restored to perfect vision.
As someone who has need glasses since I was 10 or so, it’s hard not to be a little jealous of that.
But that’s the episode. What’s the point?
As we’ve learned in our Sunday School time, we need to ask some good questions of the text. The most pressing question is the one that I believe gets us to what is going on in this text:
Why did it take two “attempts” for Jesus to heal this man?
Did he not have enough power to heal him in one shot? That cannot be correct. We have not seen Jesus struggle to heal anyone. There were hundreds who were healed just by touching the hem of his robe! The issue could not have been an issue of power.
Some have suggested that this was designed to show that Jesus can heal even the most difficult of cases.
But is blindness really representative of the most difficult of cases? Jesus has already cast out a demonic hoard from one individual, cured a women no physician could help, raised a dead girl back to life, and cast out demons without even being in the general vicinity of the affected person.
Why would a two-stage healing communicate something about hard cases that hasn’t already been shown?
No, there has to be something else going on here.
One of our foundational Bible Study principles is to always consider the context, and in this case I believe it is the context that really helps us grasp the intent behind this miracle.
Remeber back with me to last week. What happened?
Jesus fed four thousand and took up 7 baskets of leftovers.
Then there is the interaction with the Pharisees who demand to see a sign, never mind the fact that Jesus has been healing the whole countryside of every affliction, and never mind that he just fed thousands. They want a sign.
Jesus then issues a warning to the disciples: beware of the infectious leaven of the pharisees, which has the disciples feeling called out because they forgot to bring bread.
And so Jesus has to challenge them, look at vs 17-21
Mark 8:17-21 “17 And Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? 18 Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember? 19 When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?” They said to him, “Twelve.” 20 “And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?” And they said to him, “Seven.” 21 And he said to them, “Do you not yet understand?””
Having eyes do you not see? Do you not yet understand?
There is so much that the disciples saw. There is so much that they experienced. And yet, for all that, they still didn’t get it. They only saw partially, as though they were looking around at men who looked like tree trunks, or like someone who put gel in their eyes at night.
They still cannot see clearly.
In the following paragraphs that we will see in the coming weeks has Jesus spelling things out to his disciples. Look ahead real quick at vs 31-32.
Mark 8:31-32 “31 And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 And he said this plainly.
Jesus is helping the disciples to see clearly.
And so sandwiched in between Jesus challenging the disciples on their lack of sight, and then plainly speaking to them about his mission, we have this miracle, which functions as a living parable before their eyes.
They did not see clearly at first, but with time they will see clearly. Jesus will help them see clearly in the end.
So much of the Christian life is like this, is it not?
Few people respond in faith to the Gospel the very first time they hear it. I know I did not. Even though I made a profession of faith when I was five, I don’t believe it was until I was 14 that I understood and trusted in Christ for my salvation. My sight was not yet clear.
So much changed for me, though, when I was saved. Even at that young age I remember how caught up I was in sin and even despaired of life because of how hopeless it felt to try to fight it.
But when salvation came, I found a new power and strength through the Holy Spirit. I wasn’t perfect, by any means. I still struggled in many sins, and still do. But my relationship to sin was forever changed that day.
Even though I knew the truth for years, I did not place my trust in Christ until that day. I had heard about how Jesus died on the cross for my sins. I heard about about my own sinfulness and the reality of hell for those who reject Christ. I head heard that I needed to place my trust in the finished work of Christ and when I did God would no longer look on my as a sinner, but he would look on me as though I had the righteousness of Jesus Christ Himself. I knew that everyone who trusted in Jesus would be saved. But it wasn’t until that day that I saw clearly enough to trust.
It wasn’t until that day that God opened my eyes, as Paul says in 2 Cor 4:6
6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
I heard. I knew, but it was some time later that I believed.
Such is the case for many. Think on your own testimony. You likely did not believe the first time you heard the Gospel. But over time you came to the place of faith in Christ.
This is the case with the disciples, themselves throughout this book. Mark does not paint the disciples as super saints. They are slow to understand. Peter in particular says some dumb stuff. But Jesus, ever so patiently, leads them along. He teaches them. He opens their eyes. He helps them understand. They eventually will get it!
Which gives hope for people like you and me.
Because the reality is that it is not only our salvation experience that takes time, but the entire Christian walk. Once we come to faith in Christ, we are saved. United to Christ by faith, sealed by the Holy Spirit unto the day of redemption.
But that doesn’t mean we are instantly perfect.
So often we walk through the Christian life with our eyes half closed. We can be blind to unhealthy patterns of sin, we can turn away from truth about certain things. We can grieve and quench the Holy Spirit, who desires to refine us and conform us to the image of Christ.
The Christian life itself is one of process. Praise God I’m not the person I once was. God has freed me from patterns of sin that were crippling. But I’ve got a long way to go!
Praise God the he isn’t finished with me yet! He who began a good work in me will be faithful to complete it until the Day of Christ, Phil 1:6!
Seeing is so often a process. We don’t see clearly. The Word of God comes to us and begins to open our eyes. Even then we don’t always see fully. But over time the Spirit of God uses the people of God and the Word of God to transform us into the renewed image of God, for the Glory of God.
Seeing is a process. Seeing requires the healing touch of the savior. Seeing requires the patient teaching and instruction of our Lord.
So I close with this today:
Sometimes we are blind because we don’t know what we don’t know.
The Spirit of God uses the people of God and the Word of God to transform us into the renewed image of God.
Are you willing to be humble enough to let others who may see more clearly than you shine light on your blind spots?
Sometimes we are blind and its a willful ignorance. We don’t see because we don’t want to see. Like a child closing their eyes and plugging their ears we can so often go “la la la I can’t hear you, I can’t see you”
The Spirit of God uses the people of God and the Word of God to transform us into the renewed image of God.
The Word of God is so often in front of our faces and it speaks directly to our issues, if we are willing to see it.
The temptation right now is to have our minds on someone else. “Man, so and so really needs to hear this right now”
Don’t let your mind go there. We so easily default to speck removal surgeon while having that plank in our own eyes, do we not?
One final exhortation. The process of seeing is the work of the
Growth implies process
Growth implies stages
Growth implies change
The Eyes of faith come to those who are brought to Jesus
The Eyes of faith often come through gradual processes
The Eyes of faith come through the teachings of Jesus
Spiritual sight requires
Spiritual sight is often a gradual process
Spiritual sight comes from Jesus
Coming to faith often requires the leading of others
Coming to faith is often a gradual process
Coming to faith requires the supernatural power of Jesus Christ