John 9:1-41
Lead in #1: “Jesus spat on the ground and made a clay with the saliva.” Improvising on the fly, Jesus responded to a need and the blind was able to see. Every day we are faced with situations where there is no textbook manual to tell us what to do. So, like Jesus, we’re called on to improvise and take action.
Prompt #1: Reflect on a time when you weren’t sure how to respond to a situation. So calling on the Spirit, you improvised and took action.
Lead in #2: When Jesus heard by word of mouth that the religious authorities had thrown the man born blind out of the temple area, Jesus took time to seek out the man so he could talk further with him.
Prompt #2: Reflect on a time when someone went to bat for you by taking time to seek you out.
Lead in #3: When Jesus heals the man born blind, the man now sees Jesus not just physically. He now sees the deeper spiritual truth of who Jesus really is. In that sense, it’s the Pharisees who now are blind. In their blindness, they fail to see what the blind man sees in Jesus, the living God in whom he has come to believe. The man born blind comes to faith seeing with the eyes of the heart.
Prompt #3: As you reflect on your own spiritual journey, what does seeing with the eyes of the heart mean to you?
Lead in #4: When Jesus healed the man born blind, he was able to see for the first time a world that he’d never seen before. If we’re open to him, in just as radical a way, Jesus opens us up to see life in a new way, in a way we’ve never seen it before. We now see as God sees. We see life not as a test or something we have to fight, but as an adventure to be lived.
Prompt #4: As you reflect on your own spiritual journey, in what ways are you “seeing things differently” today than you once did when you were younger?
Lead in #5: One day, disciples were walking down the road with Jesus. They see a man born blind from birth. The disciples ask Jesus, “Who sinned, this man or his parents?” Jesus’ reply to the disciples infers that they’re asking the wrong question by looking for someone to blame. He instead encourages them to be open to how God can use them to be there for those in need.
Prompt #5: Instead of blaming others for how bad things are in the world, if you were to do one small act of kindness this week, who would it be for and what would you do?