Yesterday on the Orthodox liturgical calendar was the Sunday we remember the Man Born Blind the great story from the 9th chapter of St. John’s Gospel.
The story goes like this, Jesus encounters a man blind from birth. A discussion starts about who sinned him or his parents. This is the old story of we are sick because of our sins. Well as I shared during the sermon we are not sick just because of our sins. Anyway, in this story Jesus bends down and spits on the ground and makes a paste and puts it on the mans eyes and send him to wash it off. Jesus actually did something in this story. Usually he just speaks a word and the person is healed in some stories the person does not even have to be present for the healing to take place but in this story he actually does something. Christ in action.
I recently heard a story, I shared this yesterday, about a church in Europe that was being repaired after the war ended. In the church was a statue of Jesus, arms outstretched with the inscription “Come Unto Me” carved in the base. The problem, the hands were broken off. Try as they may the folks could not get the hands to stay on the statue. So they carved another inscription below the one already there, “Be My Hands.”
That is the entire Gospel message. We need to be the hands of Jesus. The hands that heal, that clothe the naked, feed the hungry, visit the sick, bind up wounds and so on. Christianity is a verb, not an adjective. We are people of action! Just a Jesus made the past to heal the man that’s what we need to do, we need to follow his example and get to work.
Are hands are amazing things. Our hands can create wonderful masterpieces that can be seen by millions in museums. But our hands can also destroy those very same masterpieces. Our hands can wave and say hello, but our hands can also wave, with not all of our fingers up, and say something else. Hands can bring peace and hands can bring war. What are you using your hands for?
Are we going to be like the blind man and use our hands to grope around in the darkness? Or are we going to use our hands, like Jesus did, and bring some comfort and relief to many. The choice is yours.
