Greetings, brothers and sisters in Christ and children of God,

A blind man sees in the dark regardless of whether there is light or not. He hears the sounds and voices, he smells the scents of the air, and he feels the gentle breeze and the warmth on his face. He sees without seeing. For him, vision is not a necessity, but he has vision. From the time of his birth, he has learned to see through the eyes of his other senses. 

Perhaps you have played a game where you are blindfolded and are forced to use your other senses. It can be most uncomfortable, but after you become used to it and learn to see the world in a whole new way, you can truly see the world. Often, our eyes are blinded when it comes to certain areas or issues in our lives. Maybe we choose not to see, or maybe we cannot see, for our eyes are blinded from the darkness of the unknowing. We don’t understand the circumstances in which we face, and therefore, we are blinded and cannot see.

John writes about an encounter Jesus had with a blind man in John 9. Jesus spat on the ground and made mud, and placed the mud on the eyes of the blind man who had been blind since birth. He then told the man to go wash his eyes in the Pool of Siloam. Some knew him, and some did not. He was asked, “How then were your eyes opened?”  “The man they call Jesus…”, he replied. The man was made blind so that the works of Christ could be displayed. His healing was the testimony of the power of the Lord.

In his thanksgiving and prayer, Paul wrote to the Ephesians about their faith and his prayer that God would give them the Spirit of wisdom and that the eyes of their hearts may be enlightened. The King James Version uses the words “eyes of your understanding”, which refers to spiritual understanding. Paul uses these words to paint a picture of a heart looking out with eyes that have been brightened with divine illumination.

We become accustomed to the darkness and learn to adapt to the unknown world around us through our other senses, but God has so much more for us to see. In our moments of darkness, when we cannot see or understand what is around us but can only feel the emotions within and the anxieties that surround us, we must call upon Jesus to rub mud in our eyes so that we can see. We can then testify to the power of Christ ourselves, of how He removed the blindness so that we can see.

We must pray to the Lord, whose understanding is above our own, and ask Him to open the eyes of our hearts so that we may see what He wants us to see. We cannot make ourselves see any more than the blind man in our story. We must rely and trust God, not only to be our eyes, but to open our eyes, so that we can truly see. May the Lord open the eyes of your heart to see the truth; to see the world in a whole new way.

Last week, the little lambs learned how to love one another through the Sermon on the Mount. We will continue to learn about the teachings of Jesus and the Sermon on the Mount next week, but this week we will take a step back into the Old Testament and explore the concept of doing what is right even when others do not, in our story of The Fiery Furnace.

I look forward to worshiping with you tomorrow with songs of praise and dancing before the one who makes the blind man see. If, for whatever reason, I do not see you, may the Lord bless you with love, peace, and joy, and may He comfort you, guide you, and heal you when you are in need.

God bless you,

Your brother in Christ,

Michael (aka Mr. Michael)