NOTES for Luk 18:35-43

All the Gospels are full of stories about healings. At times such fullness seems somewhat excessive: after all, even a few stories of people healed would have been enough to prove the fact that Jesus is able to heal. But judging by the care with which the memory of all the healings was preserved, we have to think that the point was not only to prove something to someone.

Indeed, Jesus does not treat people the way doctors have done and still do; He heals those who draw near to Him, giving them a share in the Kingdom He brought into the world. And in the Kingdom, where there is no place for either evil or sin, naturally there is no place for illness either, so those who come into contact with the Kingdom recover in a natural way, receiving that fullness of life which is accessible to them in an untransformed state. But in order to come into contact with the Kingdom, it is not enough merely to be physically near the Savior; one must also trust Him and follow Him. And this is where all the details of the healing stories become important.

Who met Jesus, and how? Some met Him like the blind man, who had nothing to lose. In a certain sense, it is always simpler for someone who has nothing to lose: without looking back, he hurries to where even the smallest hope shines for him. He does not care what those around him think either about him or about the one who gives him this hope. So it is with the blind man in the Gospel story: he had heard that this strange Teacher, or perhaps Prophet, heals everyone ready to trust Him, and he runs to Him for healing. And he receives what he desired. Together with the Kingdom, about which he perhaps had not thought very much before, but which has now become for him the most real and obvious reality.