I read a story in the news recently about a woman named
Marion who has lived all her life with a severe hearing impairment. Then, in
her 40’s she began losing her vision too. At first, she was devastated, but
then she decided that since she was still alive, she would start dancing.
And then she started teaching other visually
impaired people to dance. She leads classes of blind people, like herself,
where they learn to do line dances. Most of them are over the age of 60. Like
their teacher, Marion, they began losing their vision later in life, so they have
memories of seeing. Like Marion, they have learned to find other ways of
seeing. Dancing together is one.
For anyone who was born blind, like the
young man in this gospel story, other ways of seeing are the norm. I wonder if
that is why this young man is able to see things that others cannot see.
To read the story in John’s gospel you
have to suspend judgment and just hear it. Because the people in the story are
offering starkly different narratives about what’s going on. In the beginning,
John does tell us, plainly, what happened, so let’s begin with that: Jesus
approached the blind man, made some muddy paste and applied it to his eyes. He
instructed the man to go wash it off and when he did he was able to see. So,
that’s clear enough, right?
But that’s only the beginning of the
story. Because then the neighbors and the Pharisees enter and they tell their
versions of the story.
The neighbors say: This man who was
blind but now sees? He is not the man you might think he is. He is not the
young man we all knew as blind. Because that is not possible. This must be a
different man.
The young man, however, continues to
insist he really is himself. And he is not backing off his story about the guy
who came along, put mud on his eyes and healed him. This young man won’t be
gaslighted by anyone; he persists in speaking the true as he experienced it.
Which seems to make trouble for everyone else.
Then the Pharisees are asked to weigh in,
so they begin to interrogate the young man about how this happened. They are
looking for the flaw in the young man’s statement, and they find it.
Aha! The man who healed you performed
this act on the sabbath. So he is clearly a sinner. Therefore, this cannot be
an act of God. Case closed.
What that means about his ability to
see is not clear, but at least it’s a distraction.
Meanwhile, the neighbors go to
question the young man’s parents because now they seem to think now that the
young man and his family have been playing them for fools all these years,
pretending that he is blind. Because if he can see now, then it is not possible
that he was ever actually blind.
This is a story about a whole lot of
seeing people refusing to see what is right before their eyes. The only one in
this story who can see clearly turns out to be the one who was born blind.
It is a story that asks us to look
beneath the surface level and really examine what it means to see – to perceive
– truth. And for all of us, regardless of what kind of vision we have, it
involves going beyond what we think we already know. It involves being able to see what we have never seen before.
In these last few weeks, we have been
asked to envision a reality that we have a very hard time imagining, let alone
believing could actually happen. Several weeks ago, an official from the CDC
addressed the public and told us to be prepared to have our lives seriously disrupted.
She said we should expect to have schools closed and work interrupted, and all
kinds of normal activities stopped for a period of time.
When she said this, just a few weeks
ago, none of us wanted to believe it. Many of us denied that it would happen.
Why? Because we had never seen it happen before.
But it did happen, didn’t it? And yet,
throughout these weeks, while we have seen one disruption after another, many
of us still insisted that it was overblown. That people were overreacting. That
the virus was really no worse than the common cold. That the flu virus kills
many more people than COVID-19, just look at the statistics. We have insisted
that what we are hearing is not real. Why? Because we can’t see it yet.
Our eyes are not trained to see what might
happen. We see only what is before us now, and we can only imagine what we have
seen before. Like the neighbors of the young blind man who tried to make sense
of things by deciding that the young man was never actually blind. Like the
Pharisees who are trying to get a grip on their lives by picking out holes in
the logic so they can deny the truth that is standing before them.
They focus on the technical problems
rather than the miracle standing before them.
When I say this, I do not mean to
infer that COVID-19 is a miracle. It’s not. It’s a disease that has upended our
lives completely. It has increased our stress levels dramatically. People who
struggle with anxiety are finding themselves challenged to stay calm and
present. People who struggle with depression are faced with the challenge of
keeping themselves lifted up and functioning while their routines are deeply
disrupted. People are alone and lonely. People are afraid – of all kinds of
loss. The loss of health, of life, of our loved ones, of our security. We are
seeing things happen now that we have not really been able to imagine happening
to us before.
Covid-19 is not a miracle. It is not
an act of God. People of faith, we do not believe God intentionally inflicts
us with pandemic. But we do believe that God is present and active in every
trial we face.
How can you see God at work here and
now?
Yes, we are being asked to see beyond
our ordinary ways of seeing.
We are re-imagining how we do
everything. How we work, how we learn, how we stay in touch with loved ones,
how we care for one another. How we hold and even strengthen the bonds of
community. We are grateful for the internet in a whole new way. And,
surprisingly, we are rediscovering the beauty of neighborhood.
In my old hometown, musicians are
taking their instruments out on their porches and providing live music for the
neighbors. Neighborhoods are holding singalongs as they open their windows or
get out on their front stoops and sing and dance.
Here and other places, neighbors are
checking in on one another, making sure people have what they need and that
they are okay. And right here at this church, a few people have been getting
together every day to give sack lunches to anyone in the neighborhood who comes
to our parking lot to get one. And there is so much more.
Maybe you are calling people you don’t
normally call, just to hear their voices and tell them you love them. It’s a
good idea. Maybe you are rediscovering the art of letter writing, to reach out
to people far away with something they can hold in their hand. It’s a good
idea. How many ways can we find to love and care for one another in this time
of COVID-19?
In this era of social distancing how
can we connect?
The message of the story that I hear
today is this: sometimes you need to find completely new ways of seeing in
order to avoid total blindness. Like the blind woman Marion who dances, and all
those who dance with her. They can’t see one another the way we normally see.
But dancing together they see one another differently – without fear, without
inhibitions.
The message for us, living in a time
of pandemic is this: let us keep our hearts open, our ears open, our minds
open, as well as our eyes open. Look to see how God is with us through all of
this, guiding us to love our neighbors and ourselves with the same love God has
for us.
Photo Credit: Kira Fischer, Family Zoom
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