I sleep with a face mask on and with earplugs in. I try to muffle the noisy craziness and shut out the startling fireworks of the day. Tuning out and turning off helps me to gently fall asleep and wake up with a revitalized outlook.

Recently, I re-read the story of Jesus healing the blind man in John chapter 9. I’ve always concentrated on the physical miracle of this story. It never occurred to me that Jesus could have caused the blind man to become even blinder as a pre-amble to healing.

Jesus covered the man’s afflicted eyes with a paste made from spit and dirt, shutting out all semblance of minuscule sight differentiation he might have had. People who are totally blind can perceive some light. Although they cannot see shapes or colors, they can tell a lot of difference between light and dark (The Chicago Lighthouse).

For this blind man to be healed, he became completely blind to the world. He had to shut out any preconceived ideas in order to see clearly his way forward. I know that when I try to decipher, to search for an iota of discernment in the jumbled circumstances in which I might find myself, I tend to publicly narrate a story based on my faulty vision. I put my story’s characters and their intentions in a favorable light to suit the script already running in my head. It is uncomfortable to be accountable for the consequences of my own faulty decision making. I would rather use snippets of reality and edit my circumstances to tell a different story, one that fits my established prejudices.

In John chapter nine, Jesus had the blind man become totally and completely blind to the world before he could see his truth right in front of him. He progressed in his sight-ability from seeing Jesus as “a man” in verse 11, “a prophet” in verse 17, a person worth “following” in verse 27, to the ultimate revelation of “one from God” in verse 38. 

What skepticism, disbelief, prejudice, or culpability are you blind to?