A couple of blind men, siting on the curb, hoping to be heard by someone rumored to be an itinerant healer, yelled, waved, flailed, and in spite of being told to shut up, brayed all the more, shouted for mercy. And as the story goes: “Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes. Immediately they regained their sight and followed him.”
Our moments of faith and grace don’t come to us in these biblical ways. Not mine anyway. I’ve seen no burning bushes, witnessed no angels buzzing. Nor have I seen healing in New Testament ways. I’ve not seen crippled people leaping out of their warped frames, or eyes blind from birth suddenly open.
But like you, I have seen “conventional miracles,” or graces. This year, in two operations separated by a couple months, my mother had cataracts removed from both her eyes. In her generation’s way of stoically managing things, she had lived with them for too long. Almost becoming accustomed to the dulling of her sight. But the pain and growing shadows finally moved her to seek help. That and some persistent nudging from her children.
There was no yelling or shouting for healing, unless my mother did this inwardly–something I’ve personally turned into an art form. But knowing her, no, I don’t think so. But I know she would have prayed before her operation, as we all did.
After the first operation my sister-in-law chauffeured mother to her check-up. Beth said, “She almost had a bounce in her step!” (Which I think is great for a somewhat arthritic 85 year old.) “She has no pain at all, and was quick to relate to me that when she looks with her right eye closed things appear kind of yellow. But when she closes the left eye and looks only with the right eye–the one that was operated on–things look much brighter, no yellow tinge, things are not cloudy, edges are sharper and colours are much more natural. She rather enjoyed looking at the scenery en route.”
Conventional grace is still grace.
