"Jesus spit on the ground ... "

Back in August, I shared how my eleven year-old son helped me get back into the practice of reading Scripture each night before I went to bed.  A couple of thoughts occurred to me last night as I read an acount of one of Jesus' miracles in the Gospel of John:  

[Jesus said,] "While I am in the world, I am the light of the world." Having said this, Jesus spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man [who was blind from birth]'s eyes. "Go," he told him, "wash in the Pool of Siloam" (this word means Sent). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing." (Jn.9:5-7)

 It is an amazing miracle - but what's with the saliva, right? Last night my mind traveled back to the Bible's earliest chapters:  "the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being" (Gen.2:7).  When Jesus healed the man born blind, it was as if He was perfecting what had been askew in the in utero development of this man's ability to see.  In this simple action of combining His saliva - the saliva of the God-Man - with the dust of the ground, the Lord was recalling the Creation Story.  And then He took it to the next level.

By sending the man to wash in the Pool of Siloam, Jesus gave us a sign of Baptism that raises us above natural life, to supernatural!  The waters of Baptism restore us to the dignity of Children of God - the gift given to, but lost, by our first parents.  They impart the supernatural life of the God-Man to our own souls and begin the process that will ultimately lead to the healing of all of our bodily ills as well, in the Resurrection!  Jesus' saliva mixed with the dust, the waters of Siloam - it all speaks of how God uses the things of this world to impart not just natural, but supernatural life!  It's the sacramental principle.

That's GROSS Lord!

Today's gospel reading and Jesus manner of healing this hearing impaired man always catches my attention:

He took him off by himself away from the crowd. He put his finger into the man's ears and, spitting, touched his tongue; then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him, "Ephphatha!" (that is, "Be opened!") And (immediately) the man's ears were opened, his speech impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly.

I gotta tell ya, as a speech-language therapist who has worked with the hearing impaired, if I caught wind of any of my colleagues doing this, I'd feel duty bound to contact the state licensing board. Combine that with the fact that I've always been a bit of a germ-freak, and you can understand my discomfort.
God didn't ask my opinion on the matter though (and frankly, I have no indication that He is going to start), but He's been in my life long enough for me to realize that's best. The way Jesus lived His life is a corrective to my own. God's not freaked out by things like saliva and ear wax - even if they contain bacteria. Jesus, literally, wasn't afraid to get His hands dirty. Unlike me, He didn't think of it as "dirty," or uncomfortable, or a bother. (I know there are a lot of moms and dads out there who can relate to this.) He takes hold of us human beings, with our imperfect and unsanitized bodies, just as we are. And He loves us - absolutely and unconditionally. And He touches us to communicate health - to our hearts and minds, and one day, ultimately, to our bodies as well.