preached at St Francis Episcopal Church, Houston, Texas, 27 October 2024

Jeremiah 31:7-9
Psalm 126
Hebrews 7:23-28
Mark 10:46-52

If God asked you, “what do you want me to do for you?” what would you say? 

I’m struck by what seems to be the immediacy of the blind man’s response – “let me see again.” he says. No waffling around, no mumbling or equivocating, not even an “if you please,” or a “could you possibly.” This man knows exactly what he wants and he isn’t afraid to ask for it. 

Indeed, we see earlier in the passage that when he hears Jesus of Nazareth is walking by, he starts shouting – he’s asking boldly, he’s got no pride, he’s not ashamed of putting himself out there or even begging. When people say, “hey, have some dignity, man,” he just shouts all the louder! 

I wonder what I’d shout about. I don’t have a major disability, I have a home and family and work. Maybe I don’t really need anything from God. I don’t want to burden him, and I’m doing okay on my own. I don’t need to use up his resources, his prayer-bandwidth or whatever. 

But don’t we all need God? For some of us, our physical maladies grate at us like an ill-fitting shoe, or maybe they feel like a millstone around our necks that we carry everywhere. For others of us, our family situation or close relationships strain at us every moment of the day, sapping our energy, feeling like we are walking through a swamp with every step. For still others, we have plenty of energy but our professional lives or other circumstances stoke a fire of frustration that causes us to kick against those goads and spend our energy fighting the thing that exists to keep us in line. 

Is there something in your life that is taking up all your headspace? What is the thing you think about the most? What would it look like to be relieved of that? 

I am struck that what the blind man asks for is something we could all ask for, really: let me see again. What might be blocking your vision? What thing will we not look at that’s actually making us sick? 

This reminds me of another healing story, one from the Old Testament. Way back in Exodus, the people of Israel are wandering around in the desert, and they end up – you guessed it– grumbling, and they are bit by a bunch of snakes for their sins. So now they’re all hobbling around camp, dying of snake bites, and they’re repentant and beg Moses for an antidote to the bites. God tells Moses to put a bronze snake up on a pole in the middle of the camp and that the people need to look at that snake, and then they’ll live. Let me see again. What might we be healed of if we could only see it? What are we suffering under right now that we can’t even see? Or what are we suffering under that we maybe don’t want to see? Is there something we’re refusing to look at, a possibility we don’t want to consider? And here’s the scary thing, friends, what if looking at it, the thing that is killing us, is the way to be healed of it? 

What a bold thing to ask: “let me see again.” Would you dare to pray it? Do you dare to see, again? To see the things you’re missing, or the things you’ve pushed away? Gosh that doesn’t sound good to me. I’m almost preferring blindness now. Do I want to walk through what might be required of me if I can see? 

This past week, I taught the Parable of the Prodigal Son to my 6th graders, and I have to tell you, the 11 year olds really identified with the older son. They resonated deeply with the dutiful one who didn’t get enough accolades. We talked, too, about the way the parable taught us about family, and I tried to lead them to imagine what varying consequences emotional versus physical distance might have in a family – if the younger son went off physically and was blind while he spent all the money, but then his eyes were opened and he came back physically and also had emotional closeness with his father. But what about the older son, I asked them. He had the physical proximity, but did he seem emotionally close? Did it seem he and his father loved one another well? Was the older son blind? Did he want to see? 

The psalm tells us, “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like those who dream,” and the psalmist begs, “Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like the watercourses of the Negev.” As the younger son had his fortunes restored to him when he regained his sight, Scripture promises that we will, too. 

The sticking point is, of course, that the younger son was literally sitting in a pig sty when his eyes were opened. The bump in the straight path to healing is that the Israelites had to look an image of their would-be-assassin in the eye. One might even say that the older son had to swallow his pride and stop keeping score to gain his family back. “Let me see again.” 

But here’s the good news, brothers and sisters. Whatever the pain and difficulty, whatever the destruction or weight you carry, the psalm also tells us that “those who sowed with tears will reap with songs of joy,” and “those who go out weeping, carrying the seed, will come again with joy, shouldering their sheaves.” 

Just like the cross, our pain is not, is never, the end of the story. When we can see again, we can face the truth of our situations, and find that God is in the middle of it already. God has already been calling to us, God has already asked, “What do you want me to do for you?” And we might even be inspired, then, to follow him on the way.