2020 Vision

Transcript below if video does not play

I find it ironic how drastically my vision, my physical eyesight, has changed in the year 2020.  It’s getting harder and harder for things to come into focus.  I’m having to extend my arm further and further to be able to read words on a page.  I’ve had to take things to my older children and ask them to read it for me when my eyes could not.  It’s the year of perfect vision, 2020, and mine is anything but.  I do foresee progressive lenses in my future.
But how do we progress forward in a year where so much has changed for us all?  As I write this, today is Friday, November 13, 2020.  Historically, all Friday the thirteenths are seen by some as cursed.  Many people already feel the entirety of 2020 is cursed.  So it’s kind of like we are holding our breath today praying nothing bad happens….. in our homes, in our communities, in our country or in our world.  And if something terrible does happen today, we will say “I’m so done with 2020!”
We know the things that scare us about the year 2020.  We have realized them, lived them and been tossed upside down by them.  They have shattered us, displaced us and plagued us.  We can’t seem to escape the reality of some of our worst fears coming true.  But what if…. Just what if…. This year which we thought would bring clarity and perfect vision is actually the year God is using to restore our vision?
But how?  We feel we were blindsided…. Caught unprepared…. Attacked from an unexpected position.  And the hits keep coming.  The waters have truly been muddied this year.  I’m talking about eyesight and mud.  Where else have we heard about eyesight and mud?  I’ve read about both recently in the bible.  Do you remember?
In the book of John, chapter 9, Jesus heals a blind man using mud.  2020 conjures up for us a vision of normal eyesight.  All the turmoil of this year with a pandemic, racial tension, a world shutting down, deaths of people we know, loss of jobs, chaotic elections…. This all conjures up a vision of a muddy mess.  But what if this muddy mess is the concoction God is using to heal and open our eyes to the truth?
One day Jesus and His disciples were walking along and saw a blind man who was blind from birth.  His disciples, wanting to understand, asked “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”  Do you remember what Jesus said?  “Neither this man nor his parents sinned.  This happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.”
What about us?  Think back before March of this year when the world shut down.  What all was going on in your life?  For us we went straight from soccer season, to basketball season to baseball season.  Our 4 kids were in 2 different schools.  My husband worked an hour away and he always felt like he was rushing from one thing to another between his work schedule and our kid’s extracurricular activities.  We were flying blind most days.  In a frantic rush to get from one thing to the next.  We rushed out the door in the mornings and rushed through the quickest or closest drive-thru in the evenings.  We weren’t doing anything for the kingdom of God.  We were just trying to survive each day only to find ourselves completely exhausted by the end of each day.
Then BAM!  We were on this Damascus road rushing to the next thing, when we were blindsided by a pandemic.  Who does that remind you of?  Yes, Saul.  God blinded him so that Saul could truly see God’s glory.  Saul became Paul and we have book after book in the New Testament that shows us the work of God displayed through Paul’s life. 
Let’s go back to the blind man from birth.  Jesus said “This happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.”  I’m going to take a few liberties here, please keep reading.  What if 2020 is our mud on our eyes.  After Jesus rubbed the mud on the man’s eyes, He told him to go wash in the Pool of Siloam (this word means Sent or one who has been Sent).  God is sending us…. Out into the world as the Great Commission states. 
We are guilty of our complete unawareness of our spiritual blindness and need.  We are guilty of others complete unawareness of their spiritual blindness and need.  Let’s not overlook God’s gift to us of a special year in 2020 to prepare our eyes to be opened and no longer blinded.  The mud has covered our eyes these past 8 months.  Now, He’s given us clarity of what it looks like to live in a world without the hope of a Savior.  So many around us are hopeless.  God is sending us.  Let’s share the hope we have found in Jesus with others.  He has used 2020 to put mud on our eyes, now He’s asking us to go wash so we can see and then be sent.  See a world that needs Jesus and He’s sending us to lead them to Him.
I pray your Thanksgiving and Christmas brings you plenty of opportunities to share with others what all Jesus has done in your life. 
Thank you, friends!  Jesus loves you.