Healer

After a quick reading of the gospels, it is undeniable that healing was a major part of Jesus' ministry on earth. Mark's gospel is drenched with accounts of Jesus healings. In Mark 8:22-26 Jesus encounters a blind man at Bethsaida with whom he begins an elaborate process of healing. Jesus begins by escorting him to the edge of town. He then spits on the man's eyes (notice it doesn't say he rubbed spit on the man's eyes - but literally spit on the man's eyes!). Next, Jesus put his hands on him and asked, "Do you see anything?" Is Jesus testing his work? Like the mechanic who starts the car to make sure the engine is running properly?

The blind man answers a yes or no question with, "I see people; they look like trees walking around." Seems like the car started and then immediately stalled. In fact, just as the mechanic would slide back under the car again to make some final adjustment, Jesus puts his hands on the man a second time - but this time on his eyes and his sight was immediately restored. The passage says, "His eyes were opened." Second time's a charm, I guess.

Or is it? The blind man had his sight restored temporarily. His sight probably still gave out as he aged. But there was more to this healing than the temporary restoration of sight. Often times before a healing, the gospel authors included the phrase, "and Jesus had compassion." Jesus looked at the directionless masses, at the threatened Pharisees, at the reticent disciples, and at the suffering blind man as whole people. It was not just their imminent physical or emotional needs that caused Christ's heart to ache. It was also their empty souls. He saw the people as sheep without a shepherd and had compassion on them. This is why so many of his healings are two-fold. When Jesus announced that the kingdom of God was near, he meant in both the physical and the spiritual sense.

And it was with this Kingdom that Jesus touched the blind man at Bethsaida. After Jesus touched him, the blind man - still in need of restored physical sight - saw people through the spiritual eyes Jesus had been using. As empty as hollow trees with legs is what the blind man saw. Now the blind man had renewed spiritual sight but Jesus wasn't done. He went back under the hood by reaching out and touching the blind man's eyes in order to bring the kingdom of God one step closer again. Having met God in flesh at every level, the kingdom was not near for the not-so-blind man… the kingdom was here.