THE REAL EYE OPENER
by Gill Newham Missionary to Mongolia
Naturally curious, the Mongolians often ask us why we don’t have any children or, why I have coeliac disease. My replies are seldom clear as I don’t have clarity myself which tends to lead to further questions as people try to discern why things are the way they are, and who is responsible. But the questions never bring resolution. In fact, they can leave me, if I allow my thoughts to wonder in that direction, asking whether these things are the result of my sin.
In the parable of the man born blind, I seem to remember Jesus’ disciples took a similar line of questioning when they passed by the blind man. “Who sinned,” the disciples asked Jesus. “This man or his parents?”
Who, what, why questions hotly seem to pursue suffering. If life is hard, then there must be a reason. Something or someone must be to blame. After all, we reap what we sow. Such attitudes sound a note of pride in those of us who, with abandonment, observe hardships in others. But stop! We are just one small step away from the false assumption that whispers, we live pain-free because we are good people.
Suffering is no respecter of persons. Undoubtedly, we do sin and we have a responsibility to confess and repent from those sins. But there is also suffering in this world. Suffering that God did not create, that came as man turned his back on God and the world ceased to function in the way that He had created it. Sin’s entrance ushered in pain and sorrow. Sometimes we experience pain because of our disobedience but there are times when the pain comes because we live in a broken world.
There’s a certain irony to the healing of the blind man in John Chapter nine. The Pharisees, with their intellectual brilliance and expertise, failed to see beyond their natural eyes. Their repeated interrogations yielded no revelations that opened their hearts and minds to the realities of their sin; and God’s grace gift, Jesus the Saviour, remained hidden to them.
But the blind man was a beggar. Unable to run his own life and dependent on others, he knew that he needed rescuing. After Jesus touched and opened the beggar’s eyes, the man saw. He saw God. It wasn’t something the beggar had to make himself do, God did it. With open eyes the man believed and worshipped God in the beauty of His grace.
The ‘why’ questions remain unanswered. But worshipping Jesus clears my spiritual sight and brings a satisfaction that nothing else can match. And, to the degree that I’m able to give myself to God, my blindness continues being healed until I see that He, the measure of my worth, is the answer to all the questions. On the Cross my sin blinded Jesus to God, so that my spiritual blindness might be ended. He did that for me and He did that for you.