{"id":5201,"date":"2014-03-25T08:00:44","date_gmt":"2014-03-25T13:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/?p=5201"},"modified":"2014-03-20T08:45:08","modified_gmt":"2014-03-20T13:45:08","slug":"march-30-2014-was-blind-but-now-i-see","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/march-30-2014-was-blind-but-now-i-see\/","title":{"rendered":"March 30, 2014–Was Blind But Now I See"},"content":{"rendered":"

Contributed by Dennis Sepper, Tacoma, WA<\/p>\n

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Warm-up Question<\/h3>\n

Have you ever seen a miracle happen?\u00a0 What was it and how did it change you or your view of God and\/or the world?<\/p>\n

Was Blind But Now I See<\/h3>\n

At 14 years old, Lisa Reid and her family had a hard decision to make.\u00a0 Lisa had a cancerous brain tumor that was causing her headaches, vomiting and loss of coordination.\u00a0 Her only choice was a delicate operation to remove the tumor and save her life.\u00a0 However, as a consequence of the surgery Lisa\u2019s optic nerves were damaged and she became blind.<\/p>\n

\"shutterstock_110721512edit\"<\/a>Deciding not to let her blindness hold her down, Lisa became a poster child for children with cancer.\u00a0 She appeared on television shows and in documentaries across New Zealand.\u00a0 She also made promotional appearances to help raise money for the organization that trained her seeing-eye dog, Amy.<\/p>\n

Ten years after her sight was taken away by cancer, Lisa tripped and fell hitting her head on a coffee table and on the floor.\u00a0 She got up, as she had done before, and went to bed.\u00a0 The next morning when she opened her eyes she could see the white of her ceiling.\u00a0 Looking around she saw light shining through the curtains and then she looked and saw her beloved dog Amy.\u00a0 Lisa\u2019s sight had come back, not perfectly, but it was back.<\/p>\n

The doctors were skeptical.\u00a0 There was no medical explanation for how Lisa regained her sight.\u00a0 Her optic nerves, which have no power to regenerate themselves, were still damaged.\u00a0 The doctors tried to explain her sight by saying that Lisa may have recovered from a blindness that had been more psychological rather than physical from the start.\u00a0 \u201cI don\u2019t believe in miracles,\u201d said Dr. Ross McKay.\u00a0 That doesn\u2019t matter to Lisa, all she knows is that once she was blind but now she sees.<\/p>\n

In this week\u2019s gospel text we meet a man blind from birth who is given back his sight by Jesus.\u00a0 The religious leaders are skeptical and try to find excuses for the healing.\u00a0 However, the man knows that it was Jesus who healed him and he knows, like Lisa, that once he was blind but now he sees.\u00a0 His only response is to worship Jesus.<\/p>\n

\u00a0More on Lisa Reid’s story<\/a><\/p>\n

Discussion Questions<\/h3>\n