Jumping Blind Series

I would like to start with a little activity tonight and to begin I need everyone to stand up. I would like everyone to close their eyes and listen carefully to the description I am going to read and imagine living life that is being described.

Your alarm goes off at 6:00 AM as it is time to get up for school. You quickly turn over in your bed and hit your alarm clock to stop the annoying noise. You lie there on your pillow wishing it was Saturday, wishing at least just a few more moments of sleep. You drift off again but then are awoken by the snooze alarm going off. It’s time to get up. You reach over and turn your alarm clock off and open your eyes to complete darkness.

You hear the birds outside singing and you can hear your Mom getting breakfast ready downstairs in the kitchen but you can see nothing. There is no difference between having your eyes open or closed. As weird as this way seem to others, you have gotten used to it since you were born blind and have never known anything different.

You climb out of bed and slowly make your way to the bathroom and get ready for school. Over the last few years, you have been able to memorize where everything is in your house – how many steps it is from your bed to the bathroom, what corner of the sink your toothbrush is on, and where your towel is. You climb in the shower and begin to wash and realize that your younger brother didn’t put the soap back again. It takes you a few minutes but you eventually find it and finish your shower.

While you were in the shower, you heard your Mom come into your room and set out clothes for you. It’s kinda weird to think that you are almost 16 and your Mom still picks out clothes for you. You pick them up and begin to put them on wondering – What do they look like? What colors are they? You have no idea if you look good or bad or whatever.

You head down stairs, grab a quick bite to eat, say goodbye to your Mom, and head out for school which you don’t really look forward to. You hate sticking out like a sore thumb because of being blind and needing a cane to get around. Your friend greets you at the bus and helps you like they always do. You wonder again what they look like? It’s weird having friends but yet never seeing them…

That day at school is the annual art exhibit by the seniors in the art classes. The whole school is buzzing with excitement about it…an excitement that you can’t relate to because you can’t see the art. You feel left out and sort of secluded. Here is everyone else enjoying the beauty around them and you are left in darkness. Your friends are describing the pictures to you but as they explain that yellow part vs. the blue lines, you have no idea what that means or looks like. Days like this are getting more and more frustrating, “Why God,” you ask, “did you have to make me blind?”

You guys can open your eyes and take a seat. What was going through your minds as you heard this brief description being read? What do you think it would be like to really be blind for your entire life? After imagining all of that, how would you feel or act if one day you were healed by God of your blindness and were able to see for the very first time? Excited? Overwhelmed? Telling everyone? Probably all of the above.

It would be a miracle if that happened to someone. Life would never be the same – never again would you open your eyes to total and complete darkness. You could see your friends and family. You could enjoy the beauty of creation and art. It would be amazing as you saw the world for the very first time. No doubt, there wouldn’t be a single person for miles and miles that would not hear about what had happened.

Well, this is exactly what happened in the text that we are going to look at tonight, Matthew 9:27-31. Let’s open our Bibles and take a closer look at this story as we ask what this idea of being once blind and now being able to see has to do with those of us in this room.

***Read Matthew 9:27-31***

If you guys remember from two weeks ago, we talked about two miracles that Jesus preformed right before this text. One was the healing of a woman that had been suffering from constant bleeding for 12 years and the other was raising a young girl of a religious leader from the dead. Verse 26 tells us that the report of these two miracles began to sweep throughout the entire countryside.