Two Touches (8:22–26)
Israel’s prophets gave sight to the blind a particular meaning. When Isaiah looked ahead to the day God would come to save his people, he described it as a healing of sensory organs.
Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped (Isa 35:5).
To open blind eyes was the work of God, and one of the signs that the new Exodus had begun. So when Mark sets a healing of blindness at the seam of his Gospel, he is not merely recording a cure. He is reminding us of the true meaning of Jesus’ ministry.
Every other healing in Mark happens at once, but this one takes two touches. After the first, the man sees, but not clearly; figures move at the edge of his vision like trees. Only after the second does he see everything plainly. Mark slows the miracle down and makes us watch sight arrive in stages.
He does this intentionally because the men following Jesus have the same problem as the blind man. A few verses earlier, Jesus had pressed them with the prophets’ own indictment of a hard-hearted people: “Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear?” (8:18). The blind man at Bethsaida is the enacted solution to the implied answer to that question. The disciples may see in part, but they do not yet see completely. They need their blindness to be supernaturally healed.
This particular miracle, along with the healing of blind Bartimaeus (10:46–52), frames what is known as Mark’s Way Section. Mark began his Gospel by announcing a road: “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way,” joined to Isaiah’s cry to “prepare the way of the Lord” (1:2–3, citing Isa 40:3). Then the word mostly vanishes.
Then it returns at 8:27 and saturates the next two and a half chapters. In the Way section, Jesus tells his disciples plainly three times that the Son of Man must suffer, be killed, and rise (8:31; 9:31; 10:33–34). Three times they fail to take it in. Each time, Jesus answers their blindness the same way: whoever would come after him must deny himself and take up a cross, whoever would be first must be last and servant of all. The way of the Lord, promised in Isaiah, turns out to be the way to a cross, and he is calling his disciples to walk that path with him.
The Way of the Cross (8:31–9:1)
Peter gets the answer right. When Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” (Mark 8:29), Peter responds without hesitation: “You are the Messiah” (Mark 8:29). Full marks on the title. But within moments, Peter pulls Jesus aside to rebuke him, because the Messiah he has in mind bears no resemblance to the one standing before him. Peter knows the word without knowing what it means.
So Jesus teaches him — plainly, Mark says, not in parables:
And Jesus began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again (Mark 8:31).
The word “began” is important. This moment isn’t just a simple correction; it marks a key turning point in Jesus’s ministry, indicating that his teaching intentionally shifts toward the cross. It’s no accident that this change occurs exactly where it does in Mark’s Gospel. From this point forward, through the end of chapter ten, the word hodos — “way” — is repeated throughout the story. Scholars call this the Way Section, and the theme connects back to the beginning of Mark, which quotes Isaiah 40:3: “prepare the way of the Lord” (Mark 1:3, quoting Isa 40:3). The path Jesus takes to Jerusalem symbolizes the Lord’s return to his people. The Way of the Lord is now the way of the cross.
This truth means that when Jesus gathers the crowd and speaks the following words, he is inviting his disciples to join that same journey.
If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me (Mark 8:34).
Following Jesus has always come with a cost. It cost the disciples their livelihoods, reputations, and ultimately their lives. The way that cost manifests differs for each of us, but the call remains the same — to deny ourselves, to take up whatever cross he sets before us, and to walk the path he walked.
This is worth reflecting on, especially during times of self-examination. What have you given up to follow Jesus? Is he asking you for more?
I love doing this each morning, knowing others are doing the same. Reading the Gospels with interpretations is so very helpful. Thank you so much.