In God’s Eyes

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“Your faith has saved you.” It’s probably the last thing the Samaritan expected to hear after his astonishing encounter with Jesus. No doubt, he was stunned—who wouldn’t be? After all, how did this happen? He wasn’t a Jew; on top of that, he had a disease that most people found repellent. He was an object of scorn. He lived in the margins, often in the shadows. 

But Jesus saw someone else. 

He saw a man to bring out of the shadows and into the light. And so Jesus gave him what he hungered for. Healing. Wholeness. Dignity. He gave a scarred and disfigured man a new body, a new start, a new life. 

Among other things, this episode reminds us of the extravagant generosity of Jesus’ love. Jesus isn’t selective. He doesn’t pick or choose who is worthy of being made whole. 

To him, no one is out of reach or out of bounds. What matters is trust. Belief. Sincerity. The desire to be whole. 

In other words, faith. 

So many of us live with our own kind of leprosy—scars or wounds that are sometimes invisible but that we believe make us unworthy of being loved by God. But this Scripture tells us otherwise: in the Lord’s eyes, we are all people of possibility, dignity, and hope. Every one of us. 

Know that—and have faith! 

That is what helps us to be healed. 

And, yes, to be saved. 

© Liturgical Press.

Deacon Greg Kandra

Greg Kandra is a Roman Catholic deacon serving the Diocese of Brooklyn, New York. Author of The Busy Person’s Guide to Prayer, he is an award-winning broadcast journalist and maintains The Deacon’s Bench blog

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