Jesus Helping The Blind To See!

SERMON OUTLINE:

physical sight (vs 22-26)

spiritual sight (vs 27-30)

SERMON BODY:

Ill:

• Garage door covers & illusion pictures.

• Email me for a copy – gcurley@gcurley.info)

Ill:

Eye facts - Did you know...

• That an eye is only 2.3 centimetre long on average?

• The eyeball of a human weighs approximately 28 grams.

• That the retina contains 120 million rods for "night vision",

• And 8 million cones that are colour sensitive and work best under daylight conditions?

• Your eyes can process 36,000 bits of information every hour.

• People generally read 25% slower from a computer screen compared to paper.

• The cornea is the only living tissue in the human body;

• That does not contain any blood vessels

• All babies are colour blind when they are born.

• It is impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.

• Around the pupil is a coloured muscle called the "iris."

• Our eyes may be BLUE, BROWN, GREEN, GRAY OR BLACK,

• Because that is the colour of the iris.

• About half of our brain is involved in the seeing process?

• Humans are very much visual animals.

In case you haven’t guessed our theme for this morning’s sermon is ‘seeing’

• And we have before us in the passage (Mark chapter 8 verses 22-30);

• Two types of seeing!

• Physical sight and spiritual sight.

• i.e. Physical sight – a man is healed and goes from blindness to seeing.

• i.e. Spiritual sight – Peter discovers just who Jesus really is!

(a). Physical sight (vs 22-26):

”They came to Bethsaida, and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. 23He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man's eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, "Do you see anything?"

24He looked up and said, "I see people; they look like trees walking around."

25Once more Jesus put his hands on the man's eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. 26Jesus sent him home, saying, "Don't go into the village."

• Only recorded by Mark in his gospel records this short story that we have read;

• It is actually quite unique among the miracles of Jesus.

• Because it is the only healing of Jesus that occurred gradually, rather than instantly.

Note:

• The four gospels record the healing of at least seven different blind men,

• And what they show to us is that Jesus healed people in a variety of different ways.

• But apart from this man - the other six blind men received all their sight instantly;

• Only the blind man in Mark chapter 8 received his sight in two stages.

• Therefore he is unique in the miracles of Jesus.

Note:

• We are told in verse 24 that the man recognized men and trees;

• This would suggest that he had not been born blind;

• But that he had probably been blinded by accident or more likely disease.

TWO QUESTIONS COME TO MY MIND AS I READ THE STORY:

• (1). Why spittle?

• (2). Why partial healing?

(1). Why spittle?

Answer:

• There was at the time of Jesus two codes of conducts,

• Two laws that you were required to live by,

• First: Was the Law of Moses (Torah – written Law).

• Second: Was the Rabbinical, Oral law (Teaching of the elders).

• Note: Jesus never, ever broke any of the ‘Laws of Moses’.

• But he constantly, deliberately broke the Rabbinical, Oral Law.

• Jesus took as his authority always from ‘The Law of Moses’ & the O.T. writings

• The Pharisees took as their authority, primarily from ‘The Oral law’.

Ill:

• The oral law was meant to be a hedge safe-guarding the ‘written law’.

• e.g. Treated God’s name – (Matthew’s Gospel – mainly to Jews).

• Never said; “Kingdom of God” they always spoke of “Kingdom of heaven”.

• Point is if you didn’t use God’s name then you could not blaspheme it.

• So the oral law was meant to be a hedge safe-guarding the ‘written law’.

• But in time it had become just as important, sadly to some more important!

Note: One of the Oral Laws was to do with a person’s eyes was this one:

"Wine is prohibited so far as being injected into the eye, but it may be applied to the eyelids, but spittle is forbidden even on the eyelids".

• Jesus chooses to deliberately disobey these man made rules,

• Think of the more obvious ways Jesus could have healed the blind man:

• i.e. By Speaking.

• i.e. Or by laying his hands on him.