Then he sent him home and said, “Do not even go into the village.” ~ Mk 8:26

Today, I’m speaking based on the Gospel of Mark chapter eight, verses 22 to 26.

In this episode, people bring a blind man to Jesus. Jesus takes the man out of the village and cures him. He has to touch him twice.

The first time, the person sees something but it is not clear. Jesus touches him a second time and he sees clearly. Then, Jesus gives a goodbye sentence stating to go on and don’t even go back to the village.

Why does Jesus do that?

Most likely, he doesn’t want the attention. Maybe, it’s at a time when a lot is going on and he’s trying to keep his secrecy, crowd control, or cool off some of the attention from his actions so he can keep doing his mission.

Two things that caught my attention: the two-touch healing and the goodbye directive.

Firstly, the healing happening in multiple touches instead of a once-and-done deal reminded me of situations where I had to go through the challenge multiple times to learn the lesson.

I’ve heard it and said it, “life will continue giving you that until you learn the lesson, you will continue to do something until you see there’s a better way. There’s something you need to learn. It’s gonna keep happening until you see the insight. Otherwise, you cannot move on.”

It’s recognizing I need to go through a process. It’s not a right-away thing. There’s a time for an idea to germinate, simmer, to develop. Then, you and I can move forward with whatever it is.

Secondly, the directive of not returning to the village reminded me of the concept of not going back to where you and I have been. We can now see so let’s not bother going back to what it was.

This prompts a comparison between what was life before and what it can be.

Now that I can see, the past life served its purpose, and there’s a new place for us to go.

Don’t even bother thinking about what worked in the past.
Don’t bother about what happened before.
Don’t focus too much on reliving those experiences, and
Continue to do things the way that you have always done them.

With this new perspective, new insight, and a new way of seeing the entire situation, go forth and try something new. Go forward and experience life anew.

The encouragement I got from the reading relates to seeing progress. There is a need for progression. Sometimes we need to relive a lesson so that we finally arrive at the insight we need to let go of what no longer serves us.

It’s the new stage of life that will take us to a greater expression of who we are.

Thanks for reading!

In peace,

~Juan