In Your Face!

Matthew 9:²⁷ After Jesus left the girl’s home, two blind men followed along behind him, shouting, “Son of David, have mercy on us!”

 ²⁸ They went right into the house where he was staying, and Jesus asked them, “Do you believe I can make you see?”

   “Yes, Lord,” they told him, “we do.”

 ²⁹ Then he touched their eyes and said, “Because of your faith, it will happen.”

I have read this passage twice recently, and both times I have felt God nudge me to say something about it.


Don't you find it odd that despite Jesus being on a roll with the miraculous - he has just raised a little girl from the dead moments before these verses - he doesn't immediately heal the blind men? Jesus actually seems to ignore them and goes on home. How rude! I wonder how this made the blind men feel? Discouraged? Angry? Embarrassed?


Sometimes it feels like God doesn't respond to us either. Ever feel like those blind men?


But what do they do? Do they quit? Do they bad-mouth Jesus and go away resentful? No, they follow Him and get right up in Jesus' face. They actually enter the home where Jesus was staying - uninvited - and approach Him with their request. Now Jesus can't ignore them. Now they have His full attention, or more importantly, now Jesus has their full attention.


I wonder if this story is a little bit like the Lover in the Song of Songs who hides from the beloved to draw her to Himself more completely.  She has to pursue him, and put some effort into finding him, at a personal cost too, to have that wonderful experience of finding Him and be united with Him.


Here, in this passage from Matthew, the blind men also have to pursue Jesus. They have to endure the journey to the place where Jesus was staying.


Are we prepared to make the journey to where Jesus is staying? 'The place where Jesus was staying' is an interesting phrase. What does this mean in our individual contexts? Where can we see Jesus residing? Can we follow Him there?


When the blind men get to Jesus, they have a more intimate exchange with Jesus than they could have done if Jesus had healed them from among the crowds following Him. It is worth it to press in, to persevere in our pursuit to find Jesus, because maybe the very fact that he is staying away is because he wants to draw us in more deeply. 


Hang in there and press in - God has got something for you, you just can't see it yet.