For Better Vision

“For Better Vision”
The Rev. Dr. Fred G. Garry
October 23, 2022

Matthew 20.29-34

As they were leaving Jericho, a large crowd followed him. There were two blind men sitting by the roadside. When they heard that Jesus was passing by, they shouted, “Lord, have mercy on us, Son of David!” The crowd sternly ordered them to be quiet; but they shouted even more loudly, “Have mercy on us, Lord, Son of David!” Jesus stood still and called them, saying, “What do you want me to do for you?” They said to him, “Lord, let our eyes be opened.” Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes. Immediately they regained their sight and followed him.

            Irene Leveck was a slip of a woman who was a ball of energy.  In her seventies you could spot Irene around town maintaining one of the many whiskey barrel planters she created making Pataskala look like a quaint All-American place to live.  The front of Irene’s house was always decorated for the season, her red and white geraniums were of legendary status, and her yard was manicured. She did all of this.

            What really inspired people about Irene was not just her energy, but how she lived.  She lived quietly and she kept going despite her losses.  Irene lost her beloved husband Jack to a light plane crash a few years before I met her, and she herself was a cancer survivor more than once. Irene was courageous.

            I can remember sitting in her living room which mirrored her lawn and porch: both immaculate and both decorated perfectly.  The woman had taste and style.  She wore a silk scarf to cover her once again bald head; she showed me to make me laugh.  The cancer had returned.

            Irene assured me she was going to make it.  Life was hard sometimes, but you don’t give up.  You keep going.  “Things just take a little longer right now,” she said.  She was embarrassed that the chemotherapy didn’t allow her to work at breakneck speed or work as long in a day as she would like, but she’d get it done.

            I was there to check on Irene, and I was also there to see how we could help her help others.  One of the many jobs Irene did for others, did without return or pay, one of her jobs was to decorate the sanctuary for weddings.  I will never forget the first time I walked into her transformative work.  What was once a Spartan, sturdy house of worship was now a delicate garden, enchanted, a space where a bride’s dress would not seem out of place.

            But this took hours without the drag of chemotherapy, and people were concerned that Irene would not ask for help or be realistic about how much pain she was in.  So, they sent me in.  “The ladies are worried,” I said.  “They love you and they are worried that you will have no ability to stop.”  Irene valued the frankness and the care.  “I am just going to do it over the course of a week,” she started.  “I’ll just do as much as I can each day.  I won’t push it.”

            This was not what I was hoping for, but at least I had something to report.  And the report was true.  When the next wedding came, Irene started on Sunday and came in each day until the sanctuary was complete on Friday.  What would have taken her “a good day” was achieved by coming every day.

            Friday afternoon, I stood with Irene as she looked over the transformed sanctuary.  It took enormous energy, but it also gave it.  I could see the power she felt from her work.  Everything was set for the wedding tomorrow.  Someone’s big day was going to be beautiful.

            But there was a problem. No one told the sexton.  She thought the wedding rehearsal was the wedding because the decorations were complete, and people came and left.  When I arrived early Saturday morning, I found the sanctuary was stripped bare.  Late the night before, all the decorations came down and were now gathered into trash bags.

           Calls were made.  Tears flowed.  The sexton was beside herself and Irene cried with her, comforting her, telling her, “How could you know?”  With hours to go, friends came with irons and ironing boards, spouses were brought in tow, and soon the crumpled ribbons were pressed, the delicate ivy restored, the runner back in place, and all was set just as the florist arrived. No one would ever know it was lost and then restored.

           I can remember early on, maybe a few months after coming to Pataskala just out of seminary, I can remember coming home for lunch one day and turning to Kathy and saying, “I am really shocked. Living people are interesting.”  Kathy nodded and concurred allowing me my epiphany.

           You see, up to that point in my young life, I had only dealt with dead people, at least in terms of fascination.  I earned a degree in history and quickly added two more where I spent most of my time in the sixteenth century.  It had just never occurred to me that people who are alive could be as fascinating as people who died long ago.  “Who would have thought,” I said.

          Irene was one of those people.  She fascinated me.  What sticks with me most is her combination of humility and courage.  Often people are one or the other.  The meek support; the brave lead.  That is an oversimplification, but it does scan. Yet, here was a person for whom grief should be engulfing her, here was a woman who should be raising her fist at God or struggling with bitterness, and yet, she was quietly, humbly, holding onto joy, creating beauty, laughing about her jaunty scarf. 

          There were so many life lessons I was given in Pataskala, so many gifts given to a young pastor shaping my character.  Yet, Irene is someone who not only shaped me, but also lives in me.  My times with her made an indelible mark, and the impression is this: be both humble and courageous.  Be sure to hold onto both.  Be meek, so your courage is not arrogance; and be brave, so humility does not make you timid.

          Our reading today from the Gospel of Matthew is the end of a long lesson in humility.  Up to this point Jesus roamed and was free.  As he roamed, he taught and lived compassion all with the simple message: humility is how you find the kingdom of God. 

          But all that is about to change.  Our reading is the last moment he is free.  From this moment forward Jesus enters the last week of his life, in Jerusalem he loses his freedom. 

          Matthew, Mark and Luke all record a final healing of blindness in Jericho.  The healing is to say, Jesus’ ministry finds a fitting end with one last moment of compassion. 

          Again, this is the theme, the thread that runs throughout the life of Jesus.  He had compassion.  He stopped for the broken.  It’s hard to see this, but a key to our story is to imagine how the enthusiasm of heading to Jerusalem is brought to a hard stop by his mercy.  The crowds were all whooped up and heading to Jerusalem; they were going to take the city.  Then Jesus stops and says to two blind men, “what do you need?”  He was still free to come and go, start and stop, to give mercy.

          This is the long narrative of the gospel.  Compassion leads us to sacrifice ourselves for others, compassion causes us to put others first, to be last, in compassion we learn to put down vengeance, anger, and fear.  This compassion creates in us the ability to walk humbly.  It is fitting for Jesus to stop and have compassion just as he always did.

          This long story of mercy is the common account of Matthew, Mark, and Luke.  True, they each have their own version of a shared story, but their common account of mercy corroborates one another.  They are the same.  For this reason, when they veer off, when Luke describes Samaria, or Mark makes all things immediate, when there are differences in their accounts, we need to stop and be curious.

          Our reading today is a common story of Matthew, Mark, and Luke.  Yet, each of them tells it differently.  They all record this as happening in Jericho, but Mark and Luke have one person who is healed, Blind Bartimaeus.  Matthew, if you remember, has two blind men.  For Matthew and Mark, this is the last moment before Jerusalem, the crowd is heading out of town and comes to a stop.  Luke describes this healing as something that happened just before Jericho, not so much of a final moment, but one of the final moments.

          The difference of the second blind man is the most intriguing.  Did Matthew get the story wrong?  Did he have a different tradition?  Before or after Jericho is interesting.  But a second blind person changes the story.

          Some suggest this is Matthew’s signature.  Each of the gospels have moments where scholars believe the evangelist signs their work.  Matthew could be inserting himself here, saying, I am Matthew; I am like a blind person who can now see. I like that.

          Yet, what I believe, why Matthew inserts the second blind person, is to announce the next lesson, the next theme of the gospel, the second restoration of sight.  In the life of Jesus, in his ministry, we learned humility.  We saw what it meant to live in meekness, trust compassion.  Our sight, as it were, was restored.  The first blind person.  The second blind person is the next lesson.  From this point forward, from Jericho onward, we are now entering the lesson of courage.  Beginning here Jesus will now show us what it means to face the limits of life and not back down, not run away— to have courage. 

          The Quaker writer and teacher, Parker Palmer, believes this message will save our democracy.  We must have humility and we must have courage he says.  We must have both and we must hold them together, to esteem them equally.  Parker believes our divisions and strife, our lack of civility, our inability to hear each other will be healed, restored if we can cross the wires of humility and courage.

          He may be right.  He is speaking the gospel.  The two lessons, the two blind men, the restoration of sight; this is the good news.  The power of the gospel can accomplish great things; the gospel can even do much more than restore democracy.  The gospel can bring the kingdom of God.

When I listen to Parker Palmer and read his books, I am always impressed by how he lives what he believes.  He reminds me of Irene Leveck.  Both humble and brave.  But more than his authenticity, what I truly admire is that, again like Irene, in his mid-seventies he is fighting, struggling, reaching for the life of joy.  He reveals to us me how each part of our life, each season, we need to muster the courage to face the darkness and find the humility to embrace the light. 

What really surprises me, though, is how clearly he is like Makayla.  Her new life is just like his old one: he needs love so to find courage and humility. No matter if we are newborn or quite worn, we are always a child in the eyes of God. 

We can see this so easily in Makayla.  We pray for her new life; we offer the parents’ prayer: this one, Makayla, will be strong and true and brave, but she will be free of arrogance, falsity; she will be humble, but not prone to fear.  To this end we will guide her with compassion, kindness.  You will show her strength without abuse; you will show her mercy with honesty.  You will do so, hoping and believing, that this will always be her life.  For this season and her next, when she heads off to college or makes her way, when she does this, she will be a person who is brave and humble.  That is our prayer.  We want her to have, to be, both.

How curious: this was my prayer and hope for Irene in the last season of her life.  That she could still be brave and meek. What I found with Irene is that the baptismal prayer and hope is for every season, every time of our life. 

May we always find such a prayer for each other as easily as we find it for Makayla today.  Amen.