Wednesday's thoughts

"Seeing is Believing; or Is It?"
Eugene Lowry had a session with us preachers on Monday morning. We learned a great deal from him at the three hour session, but one of the most important things he told us about preaching had to do with the Biblical text.

He told us we needed to pay attention to aspects of the texts that were overlooked. We needed to ask questions we never asked before and we needed to do things we never had. If for example we were most comfortable preaching sermons behind the pulpit we ought to come out from behind the pulpit and preach without notes. If, on the other hand, we tended to walk around without notes, we ought to get behind the pulpit and write our sermons word for word.

He told us to look at certain parts of the Scripture. For example, when preaching on the Adam and Eve in the Garden ask where God was when they were eating the forbidden fruit. When doing a sermon on Jonah and the wale ask about the disposition of the crew on the ship and why they didn't immediately throw Jonah overboard since he was the primary reason for the storm that threatened the voyage. And, at the end of the story, ponder the fact that Jonah was the only one in the story who didn't repent.

I am preaching on how Jesus healed Bartimaeus as he was leaving the town. Based upon Lowry's method I am forced to ask the question, "Why did Jesus stay in Jericho such a short time?" Mark 10:46-52: "They came to Jericho; and as he was leaving the town, with his disciples and a large crowd, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus, a blind beggar, was seated at the roadside."

Jesus came to Jericho and did not stay long. Jericho was the place where an important event happened. It was a miracle, in fact. Joshua blew the trumpets and "the walls came a tumbling down."

Jesus was struck with awe at the place of the miracle. He pondered the wall and where it was. He thought about the trumpet and what it took to take down the wall. He was transfixed by what he saw. It produced faith for him; seeing was believing.

When we are in the presence of magic and we see it it is difficult to gather up skepticism to call it into question.

Seeing is believing. Jesus saw and he believed and then he left. He was transfixed.

Have you ever seen something like that? Have you ever been transfixed by what you saw to the point that seeing is believing?

What was it?
How did you handle it?

What things require us to believe before we can see? How does that cause us to be transformed and how does that make us want to linger for a long time?

Seeing is believing and we are transfixed but we do long linger. Believing is seeing and we are transformed and we never want to leave a place like that.

What do you think?

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I look forward to hearing from you.


Charles Schuster