St. Luke 18:31–43
Catechesis gives sight and is the Way on which the Teacher leads you.
Catechesis gives sight and is the Way on which the Teacher leads you.
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
There is a terrific irony in our Gospel reading this morning: the twelve disciples who can physically see are really blind and the man who is physically blind can really see. Jesus directs His disciples to the Scriptures: everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. And He spells out in great detail what will be accomplished: He will be delivered over to the Gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. And after flogging Him, they will kill Him, and on the third day He will rise. But they understood none of these things. Jesus almost highlights their lack of understanding by beginning with that great attention–getting word: See! Behold! Pay attention to this! But they don’t understand. They don’t really see. These twelve disciples have watched Jesus for the past three years, they’ve seen His miracles and listened to His teaching. But seeing is not believing.
The blind man has not seen Jesus, but he has heard the Scriptures and he has heard reports about Jesus. When people in the crowd tell the blind man, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by,” he knows who that is. He has heard about this Man who claims to be the Lord, who teaches with authority, and who heals the sick and raises the dead. So, he starts crying out to this One he’s heard so much about: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” And that means he also knows the Scriptures. He knows of the promised Savior, the Son who would sit on David’s throne forever and reign with righteousness and salvation, mercy and peace. This blind man has what the disciples have: they both have the Holy Scriptures of the Old Testament. Jesus had just directed His disciples to the writings of the prophets. And the blind man really has less than the disciples because they got to see and know Jesus, and all he has been able to do is hear about Him. But this blind man believes. He sees for real. He understands and trusts. Seeing is not believing, but believing is seeing. Physically seeing something doesn’t mean you believe. But believing means you really see, you perceive the truth of things. Believing opens up the eyes of your mind and heart. And so, Jesus’ miracle reflects that. By first believing, the blind man comes to see Jesus. Or as Jesus said it Himself, "Your faith has made you well."
But even though the disciples don’t see or understand at this point, we should notice that their blindness is cured after Jesus’ resurrection. This really comes out with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. On that first Easter afternoon, the risen Jesus comes up to two disciples walking out to a village, but they don’t recognize Him. And so just as He said before, He explained that everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets was accomplished. He said to those two, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into His glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, He interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself (Luke 24:25–27). He had a Bible study with them, as they walked on the way. And only later, after coming to the house where they would stay for the night, having heard the Scriptures and having come to grasp their meaning, then when He was at table with them, He took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized Him (Luke 24:30–31). Believing made them see.
And Jesus did the same thing for the rest of the disciples that same Easter evening in the upper room: He said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in His name to all nations… You are witnesses of these things” (Luke 24:44–48). They came to really see Him by first hearing and believing the Scriptures, and hearing and believing what happened to the Christ, His suffering, death, and resurrection. Then, believing, they see Him as He is and they become His eye–witnesses.
That’s all farther down the road for those disciples. For today, we’re on the road leading up to Jerusalem and to the cross. But in either case, what we have here is an analogy for catechesis—that is teaching the faith. It’s no accident these catechism classes happen on a road. Jesus is the Way. Christianity is the Way. Learning means following a certain teacher on a certain way. Disciples are followers, walking with their teacher along the way. And the teacher wants to take his students somewhere, and not just anywhere. The purpose of teaching is to lead the student to the truth, to guide him on the way he should go. So, the disciples follow Jesus. The blind man meets Jesus on the road and follows Him. Jesus does His epic Bible study with those two disciples on the road to Emmaus. And the prophet Isaiah proclaimed this Way that would be made known when the Savior came. Not only would He heal the blind and deaf, but a highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Way of Holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it—which means, it’s not a way you can go if you are going to persist in your sin. It shall belong to those who walk on the way;—those who actually want to follow Jesus—The redeemed shall walk there. And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing (Isaiah 35:8–10).
Following Jesus, walking in this Way—this is the Biblical language of learning the faith. Like the disciples, like the blind man, we hear from the Holy Scriptures. And we hear the report about Jesus, we hear about what He did in His suffering, death, and resurrection. We get that report in our Creeds and in our Catechism. All these words, from Scripture, Creed, and Catechism, teach us and lead us on the right Way, the road that leads us to the truth. So, we read and hear these words, we memorize them, we confess them and sing them, we internalize these words so that they become more and more a part of us. They get sunk into our hearts and minds. And gradually our minds are opened. These words open our minds so that we can be shown how all the Scriptures speak of Jesus. These words lead us on the Way to knowing Him as He really is.
Like the blind man, like the disciples, by learning the Words we come to see and understand and believe. Believing is the real seeing. And this means that when we close our eyes (so to speak), when we tear them away from Jesus and we look elsewhere, we are not believing. When we stop listening to these words, when we forget them, our belief will get weaker, our sight will get dimmer. The Apostle says, Faith comes by hearing the Word of Christ (Romans 10:17), and that means if we’re not hearing the Word of Christ, then we’re not having faith. Faith is like eating. You can’t just eat once and call it good. You have to keep eating to go on living, and you have to keep getting food from outside of yourself. Faith is like breathing. You can’t just breathe once and then be done. You have to keep breathing, keep bringing in air from the outside, in order to go on. Faith comes by hearing the Word of Christ. Not just one and done, but all the time, feeding on it, breathing it in. Faith means always receiving, always hearing the Word.
The blind man was the one who could really see. He was the wisest of all the disciples and he had the sense to call out, “Lord, have mercy! I am blind. I need You!” He received exactly what he needed and wanted from Jesus, but he didn’t call that enough and go home. He carried on with Jesus, following Him on the road, even though that road would lead to suffering and death. He wanted further understanding, better sight, and so He followed that Way that His Teacher was leading him, and he learned that eventually that road leads to the resurrection.
In a sense, our spiritual blindness is not fully healed yet. We obviously don’t see Him with our physical eyes, and even spiritually speaking, we do not see Him completely. We stumble on the way and our sight grows dim with sin and doubt. This is why we have Lent. Lent is a time for repentance, for correction, for turning around if we’re going the wrong way. Lent is a time for catechesis, for learning and following Jesus on the way that leads to a holy death and an everlasting life. Lent is a time for more hearing and seeing, more hearing and memorizing those words, more confessing them and singing them, more engraving them into our hearts and minds by having them in front of our eyes and on our lips. Lent is time to be like the blind mind who was healed. He recovered his sight and followed Jesus, glorifying God.
Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame (Hebrews 12:2). Out of great love for His Father and for sinners Jesus went the way of His cross. So, we walk that way with Him, paying attention to His Words as we follow. See! We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets is accomplished. For He was delivered over to the Gentiles and mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. And after flogging Him, they killed Him, and on the third day He rose. Lent is a time to follow on the Lord’s highway, the Way of Holiness. It’s the road that Jesus walked for our redemption. It goes up to Mount Calvary and to the cross, but it goes on to the empty tomb and to Mount Zion, the eternal city. The redeemed shall walk there. And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
In the Holy + Name of Jesus. Amen.
Artwork Copyright (c) 2010 Edward Riojas. Used by permission.
