Sight Seeking

Go ahead and find Mark 8. We will be in verses 22-26. The title of the sermon today is Sight Seeking. We come today to an account of Jesus healing a blind man. I am going to be very honest with you, one of the difficulties of preaching through one of the gospel accounts is that it can seem repetitive. We have a blind man, and what seems to be another miracle. But, this is not just another miracle. This is something more. Because if we look at just the miracle part of this passage, we are missing something much greater. Today, we are going to look at the miracle of healing the blind man, but we will also tie it into the greater story happening in Mark, which is focusing on the disciples.

Let’s read God’s word and then break it down together.

Mark 8:22–26 ESV

22 And they came to Bethsaida. And some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him. 23 And he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village, and when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, “Do you see anything?” 24 And he looked up and said, “I see people, but they look like trees, walking.” 25 Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. 26 And he sent him to his home, saying, “Do not even enter the village.”

Prayer

In our passage today, we do have this underlying journey of a man seeking to have his sight restored. But that is not the main theme of this passage. The whole book of Mark so far has not only been about Jesus and his miracles. But it has also been primarily about his disciples. Our passage today is no different, but in fact is even more about the disciples than other times. Because it is pointing to the disciples gaining sight of who Jesus is.

As we go through our passage, we will be looking at the singular man who has his sight restored. But, within that, we will be taking a look at the journey of the disciples and all that they are going through as well. The man is seeking sight, the disciples are seeking sight, and my prayer for you today is that you are here seeking sight as well.

(intro illustration)

Just like many of you here, I have to wear corrective lenses to be able to see clearly. When I was in elementary school, I can remember going to the eye doctor and them prescribing me glasses. It wasn’t much longer after that when I got frustrated with them and thought that they made me look stupid so I went without them. For many years after that, I would have to squint if I wanted to see anything. When I was in my early 20’s though, I finally broke down and went to the eye doctor and ever since then, I have worn glasses.

Every single morning, the first thing that I do when I get out of the bed is put them on and before I go to bed every night, the last thing I do is take them off. It is a crutch to me. Just like someone who is deaf needs hearing aids, I need my glasses to function as a normal human being.

But, could you imagine being blind to the point that glasses would be of no use to you? When I first came here to pastor, Ms. Helen Parker came pretty regularly. And she was blind. But she had adapted and knew who I was just by my voice. That has nothing to do with the sermon but it was a good memory of mine from the early days here. But I cannot imagine being blind.

With my bad eyes, I have considered saving the money that it would take to have corrective surgery on them. So I can only imagine that if I were completely blind and someone told me of a man who could make me see again, then I would want my friends to take me to this man. And this is how our passage begins today.

We Seek Healing in Jesus

So I just want to set this up somewhat before we break down this verse. In the verses prior to this, Jesus and his disciples were in a boat. They had previously fed the 4,000 and had taken up an abundance of leftovers. Then they got in the boat and forgot the leftovers and were hungry. Jesus used this situation to try to teach them about understanding what is going on but they were not able. In verse 18, he asks them if they have eyes to see and ears to hear. This question was not a mistake as the healing miracle recorded before this is a deaf man and the one after is a blind man. So the author here is bookending the question to the disciples with Jesus actually giving people the ability to hear and to see.

The underlying truth is that the deaf man and the blind man represent the disciples. They are both blind and deaf to the truth of who Jesus really is. There will come a time when they are spiritually healed, but that will come later. Jesus is foreshadowing this with a physical healing.

As we get into the verses for our passage today, they arrive at Bethsaida.

Mark 8:22 ESV

22 And they came to Bethsaida. And some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him.

Bethsaida is not very far from the place where Jesus fed the 5,000. So we should not be surprised that people in the area knew Jesus and knew what he could do. This is still the region of the Gentiles. Much of Jesus’s ministry has been focused in the Gentile region. This is to represent the fact that the Jewish people have hardened their hearts to the coming Messiah and Jesus is available to all people, not just the Jewish people. So a group knew what Jesus could do, and they knew that this man was blind. So they brought him to Jesus.

Growing up, there is this desire to fit in. I believe that it is in every child. I know it was in me and I see it in our daughter. I believe that there is this slippery slope with this mentality. This is what we are trying to teach in our home. Because when you compromise who you are to fit in with the crowd, you compromise the quality of your friends. And quality friends mean a lot to the believer.

This man had quality friends. I think back to the man who was paralyzed who had friends who loved him enough to rip the roof of a house off to lower him down so that he could make it to Jesus. This mans friends are just as loving. They took this man to Jesus. This is the kind of friends we need. And this is the kind of friend that we need to be. We need to be the kind of friends that will pick up people in need and take them to Jesus.

It is our job to take people to Jesus. We don’t have the ability to do this physically like the friends of this man did. But there are ways that we can do it. First of all, we can take people to Jesus in prayer. We should all have a list of friends that we regularly pray for. And yes, we need to pray for Aunt Sally’s knee. But we should also be focusing on the salvation of those who are lost. Of the spiritual healing of those who are lost. Of the spiritually blind getting their sight. And if you don’t know someone who is lost, then go and strike up a conversation with a neighbor, because they are there. So we have prayer. But we can also take people to Jesus in a conversation. This is evangelism. We are using our words to share the gospel with someone. And each and every one of us are tasked with this. This isn’t a matter of whether or not it is your calling, because it is a mandate to all believers.

When is the last time you took someone to Jesus? (Pause) This is a serious question. When is the last time that you knew someone was blind and could not spiritually see, and you took them to Jesus. We need to prioritize this. It is our mission as believers. It is our mission as a church, to build the kingdom and impact our community, to see people know Jesus, grow in Jesus, and go for Jesus. We have the hope of the world and we are in a world that needs to hear it. So be the mouthpiece of God in our lost world.

We take people to Jesus and we seek healing in Jesus.

We Seek Sight in Jesus

We will take the rest of our passage today to unpack how we seek sight in Jesus. He is the main place where we go to seek spiritual sight. Just like you go to the eye doctor when your vision gets blurry, when people have no spiritual vision, Jesus is where they need to go. And we continue to do that as we grow in Christ. We continue to seek sight in Jesus. There are some odd things that happen here and this is why it is important for us to understand the context of the book and who were are supposed to focus on to be able to understand all that is happening.

Mark 8:23 ESV

23 And he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village, and when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, “Do you see anything?”

There are some similarities of how Jesus is treating this blind man as to how he treated the deaf man in the chapter before this. He was very compassionate with this man. We are told that he takes the man by the hand and takes him somewhere private. What he was about to do, he didn’t want to be out there for everyone. There were aspects of the ministry of Jesus that were public. We have the feeding of the 5,000 and 4,000. There is no doubt that those miracles were very public.

But Jesus also took extra care with things that were sensitive. Just like he separated the deaf man from the crowd, he does the same with the blind man. And then he does something that we would consider nasty. We are told that he spit in his eyes. Now, this could mean that he spit on his hands and rubbed them in his eyes, but either way, it is not culturally acceptable today. Remember though that there are great similarities to the deaf man when he stuck his fingers in his ears. He is symbolizing the healing that is about to take place. But just like I said about someone sticking fingers in my ear, the only one who could get away with it with me, is Jesus.

So Jesus takes the man and spits on his eyes. When we look back to the deaf man, he was also mute. Jesus used spit and put it on his tongue to loosen his tongue to be able to speak. We can look at it in the same manner. There is no reason given as to why he used spit, but we just know that he did. But we do know, that as readers today, it is something that is very impactful for us to read. And then he laid his hands on him and asked him what he saw.

Mark 8:24 ESV

24 And he looked up and said, “I see people, but they look like trees, walking.”

We don’t know this mans backstory. Maybe he had an incident that caused him to be blind or maybe he was born this way. But, there is a good chance that when Jesus spit and put his hands on this man, that he opened his eyes and saw for the very first time.

Stories of people doing something for the very first time can be very emotional. Maybe you are someone who was blessed by a wonderful spouse like I have been. I bet that you can remember the first time you laid eyes on them or the first date that you went on. This brings up wonderful emotions. Sight is a big driver on our emotions. Seeing things for the first time and being able to remember things.

I am not sure that we could verbalize words for the emotions that this man is possibly feeling in this moment. To be able to see for the very first time. But yet, what he sees is not normal. And he seems to know this too. He tells Jesus that he sees men walking around and they look like trees.

I have heard many interpretations about this. But I do not believe that there is anything prophetic about this vision. I think we need to look past what he sees to the fact that he only has a partial healing. I want to be careful with the term partial healing though as well. Because the last thing I want is us thinking that the power of Jesus in our lives is not enough. Because it is. But what we see here in this verse is that this mans vision is not yet fully healed.

And this is not because the man didn’t have enough faith either. What Jesus is showing us as the readers here is foreshadowing that the disciples will have their eyes opened soon, but only partially. In the passage after this, Peter will declare that Jesus is Lord. But then after that, they will still not have full vision as to who Jesus is. So in the underlying tone of what is going on with the blind man, we need to be looking at the disciples.

See, Jesus, through the healing of this man, is pointing to the eyes of the disciples being opened. Just like this man, their eyes won’t be opened fully the first time. It takes a second touch

Mark 8:25–26 ESV

25 Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. 26 And he sent him to his home, saying, “Do not even enter the village.”

Jesus had asked him if he saw anything and he said yes, more than I ever have been able to. But things aren’t quite clear yet. In verses previous to this, when the disciples were in the boat and discussing about the amount of bread they had, even after they had witnessed the miracles of Jesus, Jesus asked them a question.

Mark 8:18 ESV

18 Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember?

The answer was no, they did not. But they would. First though, in the verses that follow, we see a partial unveiling. This miracle here was a sign for what would happen with the disciples. They would soon confess Jesus to be Lord but still miss the mark. They would require a second touch just like this man.

I know that we could focus on the physical part of this passage. It was a great miracle that this man would have his eyes opened. But the greater miracle is eyes being opened to the truth of Jesus. We can resonate with the disciples in Mark in our lives. You can probably remember back to a time when you believed that Jesus was Lord, yet there was still a lot of work to happen. You still needed to be touched by Jesus.

In Chapter 9, we will read of a man who believes in Jesus yet has unbelief. He says I believe, help my unbelief. Maybe you are like this man. You have been touched and you believe yet you aren’t sure what you believe yet. I want to take a moment to speak to you if this is you.

You are here today because God has sovereignly orchestrated you being here to hear this message. This is no accident. God has you here so that he can touch you through the preaching of his word. Now, it is up to you to believe and confess this. Just as Peter is going to do in the next verses, you have admitted that Jesus is Lord, but maybe there is something that is still missing. We are called to a complete surrender, not partial.

So I am calling you to respond. You have heard God’s word, you believe that he is Lord, it is now time to fully surrender yourself to him. Give him the unbelief, the hatred, the hard feelings, the gossip, the addictions. Fully surrender to him. He is the one who will give us full sight.

For each and every one of us, there is a level of surrender that we can still do. We have not reached the endgame of our walk with Christ here on this earth. So when we read this verse and see that there is still more healing that can take place, what do we need to lay at the feet of Jesus.

For anyone who calls themselves a Christian, we need to have the same experience that the main receiving sight has had. While his is physical sight, ours is spiritual. Maybe you are thinking, “well how do I know that I am like the blind man who received sight?” To be a Christian, Jesus tells us that we need to repent and believe. To hear the truth, turn(repent) to Jesus, and believe the truth. When this happens, your life will change. You will become a different person because you have received sight, you have gotten a new heart. The things that you once loved and desired will change. You will now live your entire life for Christ.

So we need to ask the question, have we done this. Have we turned to Jesus, have we sought out Jesus, and has Jesus given us sight. In verse 25 of our passage today, we see 3 things happen. The man opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. Have you done this?

If this has happened to you today or recently, we want to know about it. This is only the first step in your walk with Christ and we are here to walk with you. So pull me aside or write on the side of the bulletin how I can get ahold of you to talk to you about this.

We want to celebrate this with you. So that we can all sing in unison the famous song that we are about to sing together. Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.