"Right" Blindness

Continuing my thoughts about the final days leading up to Jesus' crucifixion, there is a moment of confrontation that occurs following the table-tossing episode at the temple. The chief priests and elders - who are none too happy about this attack on their well-run and personally beneficial system - challenge Jesus, asking him what authority he has to do such a thing. Jesus turns it back on them, promising to answer their question if they first answer the question of whether or not John the Baptist was of God. The chief priests knew full well that the people viewed John as a prophet, but they themselves had rejected him. With that realization, and being the political and self-serving weasels that they were, they weren't about to answer the question.

Jesus made his point. These guys refused to acknowledge authority, even when it was clear. They could not see truth, even when it stood right in front of them. So really, there was no point in answering their question, because regardless of the answer, they would refuse to accept it. The chief priests would defend their position at all costs and against any argument. They were right, period, and no other possibility would be allowed.

It's interesting that in our debates and conflicts, we naturally assume that the other person must be the one who is misguided. Others are negatively shaped by their culture and experience; others water down the truth for the sake of personal convenience; others champion wrong interpretations, based on distorted perceptions and rewritten history. Blindness is always the other guy's problem, and we refuse to hear anything that would suggest otherwise. Desperately holding on to the notion that our understanding or interpretation of absolutely everything is absolutely correct, we reject all else as complete error. And those who happen to view things differently are, at best, dismissed as misguided souls or, at worst, rejected as heretics.

It's sad that the followers of Jesus spend so much time and energy arguing with one another, mostly over non-essential things. What makes it more devastating is our unwillingness to even acknowledge that our understanding might be imperfect. Rather than finding resolution by listening and learning from one another, we become more divisive and entrenched. Insistent that blindness and error must always rest on the other side of the issue, our opinions become convictions and our convictions become certainties. I'm not saying that convictions are wrong or that certainties don't exist; I'm suggesting that our pride too often carries us beyond what is essential and crosses the line of spiritual arrogance and blindness. And this lack of humility can keep us from seeing what God is doing right in front of us.

If you think it doesn't happen, just ask the chief priests who could not recognize the Truth that stood right in front of them.