He looked up and said,“ I see people; they look like trees walking around.”
Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’ s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. Jesus sent him home, saying,“ Don’ t even go into the village.”( Mark 8:22 – 26)
In ancient times, blindness would have made this man’ s life very difficult. This man couldn’ t fish like all his neighbors. He couldn’ t work the land to farm and provide food. He would have been fully reliant on others. Maybe he was a beggar. On top of this, his culture associated sickness and blindness with sin. People believed that hardship was punishment from God. This blind man was an outcast.
But he wasn’ t without support. When news
reached Bethsaida that a healer and prophet named Jesus was in town, some friends scooped up the blind man and led him to Jesus.
I want friends like that, don’ t you? I need people in my life who, when they see me hurting, don’ t leave me or judge me but get me closer to Jesus. Friends can hold us, but only Jesus can heal us.
Every time I’ ve read this, I’ ve wondered what reference this man had for trees. Maybe he had seen trees before as a child and lost his sight later in life. Who knows? What we do know is that after Jesus’ first touch he could see some but not completely. He could’ ve lied and told Jesus,“ Yay! I can see!” and moved on. He had the option to accept only partial sight and say,“ Good enough. This is so much better than what I had.” But he didn’ t. He was
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