Jesus and the blind man

Looking for something new in this familiar story, I found some helpful insights in a book by Trench, The Miracles of our Lord. Trench points out that the man was brought to Jesus by others, which might have meant his own faith was not strong. How often when we turn to the Christ for healing is our own doubt part of the challenge. Will God, or our understanding of Christian Science, be able to heal this?

This man was accustomed to being led by others. Jesus reaches out and takes him by the hand and leads him out of the town, away from the watchful eyes and beliefs of those who knew the man and the idly curious. Perhaps to help this man with his lack of faith Jesus used a simple remedy of that day to start things off. He used saliva and onionted the man's eyes. He also put his hands on him, as we might reach out to a friend in need or distress, a comforting touch. Then he asked him if he could see anything. At this point the man looks up. Metaphysically speaking, he begins to raise his level of thinking by looking upward to heaven. Physically he was raising his sight from the ground. He does see moving forms. If this man had been blind from birth he might not have known what people look like so it may be that this blindness was the result of some disease or accident. So Jesus repeats his actions by putting his hands on the man's eyes. The man's faith must have greatly increased, his expectations about this healing improved with this first evidence of returning sight. Jesus again instructs him to look up and now he finds his sight restored, another indication that it might have been somehow lost.

What this tells me is that we need to approach every healing with the understanding that the Christ can and will restore whatever appeared to be lost whether it was health, supply, employment, self respect, or peace. Just what are we expecting to happen when we pray or ask for Christian Science treatment? Let there not be a doubt or fear that God is not up to the occasion. He is. And so are we.

Jesus led that man away from those who were holding a false picture about him or the Christ. When the healing was complete he told him to go home but not to return to town, not to go back to the past. Let's not relive the lie but rejoice in what has been revealed as the truth.

If you choose to turn to the Christ for healing, if we call upon a practitioner to support us in prayer, we can expect to feel the healing touch of divine Love, the power of God's law of everpresent good operating on our behalf, removing any false belief and bringing the truth of our identity as God's perfect image and likeness. This improved understanding, this clearer perception about God and His child, becomes clear and we 'see' it. Healing follows.