Reflecting on Mark 8:22-26
“Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes.” (Mark 7:34)
As a Jesus follower, I find this story intriguing.
Not just that He heals this blind man, but HOW He heals Him.
And not just that He uses spit when He prays for His eyes.
But that He needs to lay hands and pray twice for it to work.
Is this a matter of: ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!’?
Some people explain this healing in stages as intentional.
They compare it to how we are all healed, in stages.
When we come to Jesus, we do not see clearly at first; it takes time.
There is definitely truth to this, for sure in my experience.
I still need more spit-n-prayer healing, I still don’t see clearly.
As I reflect on it, it seems that Jesus is not sure Himself.
‘Do you see anything?’ (Mark 8:23) suggests Jesus doesn’t know.
I used to think that Jesus performed miracles because He was God.
Yet when Jesus became human, He emptied Himself of His ‘Godness’.
“Christ Jesus, Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to His own advantage; rather, He made himself nothing (literally ’emptied Himself’) by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death — even death on a cross!” (Philippians 2:5-8)
Jesus did not heal, or walk on water, or multiply food, using His God power.
Jesus humbled Himself to human limitations, fully dependent on God.
Jesus performed miracles like Moses and Elijah, and His own disciples.
As a human just like us, limited and totally dependent on God.
This story seems to show us Jesus’s humanity, His human limitations.
We see this reality also when Jesus’s teaches His disciples.
God has the power to convince, convict and change human minds.
Yet again and again Jesus fails to make the disciples understand.
Jesus does not just snap His fingers, and they fully understand.
Jesus is limited by His audience, limited in what He can do.
There are places where Jesus cannot perform miracles (Mark 6:5).
He is dependent on God’s timing, God’s intervention.
He doesn’t just call His angel army; He depends on God’s help (Matthew 26:53).
He prays for rescue from the cross, but God says no.
Jesus says that we will be able to perform miracles like Him (John 14:12).
Not because we are God, but because God helps us, like God helped Jesus.
We are limited too; sometimes miracles happen, often they don’t.
Or not in the way or timing that we pray for.
I’ve prayed for the same person multiple times.
Seeing Jesus humbled as a human encourages me in my limitations.
Like Jesus, I am weak and limited and dependent on God.
Yet God uses me, sometimes immediately and often over time.
Sometimes in a visible way, often in a hidden, invisible way.
It is Jesus’s humble weakness that reveals God’s strength and power.
It is not by human strength, but by the Spirit of God that Jesus wins.
The same is true for us.
“Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Corinthians 12:7-10)
The weakness and limitations of Jesus reveal God’s power.
The same is true for us – God’s grace is sufficient for us too!
As a Jesus follower, ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!’!
Our confidence is not in our power or success or faith to perform miracles.
We are weak, we are human, we are like Jesus – fully dependent on God.
PRAYER
Lord Jesus, my weakness is obvious to me. I am encouraged that You were limited too. Help me to keep going and keep trying when my efforts for You seem to fall short. Help me to trust that in God's time and way, He will do greater things through me.