A reading from Stan:
Jesus had been curing people’s ailments for the last few days. His dad, God, said that he needed broader appeal, so he had tasked Jesus with doing some public outreach. He’d started with some seminars on a few mountaintops. He kept those pretty simple. It was mostly stuff to get his feet wet like, “Don’t kill other people, don’t beat your children, don’t mix leather and cloth.” Boilerplate stuff.
People seemed to be pretty receptive to his material, so he started getting more gigs. There had been a wedding where he got everyone fish. That had been a big hit. Jesus didn’t understand how they had planned a wedding and hadn’t made sure there’d be enough food. But Jesus told them he did not hold it against them, “People make mistakes, and you just had to forgive them.”
That was kind of Jesus’ whole thing. Or at least on the surface. In reality, Jesus fucking hated when people would do something stupid and just assume he’d fix everything for them. Like, take accountability for your lives.
But the heavenly father had said Jesus needed to represent the family business, so Jesus had to put his customer relation face on. That got tougher once he started taking requests.
“Excuse me, Jesus, wash my feet.”
“I would love to sir,”
“Jesus, I fell off the wagon again.”
“I forgive you, my child,”
“Jesus, heal my leprosy.”
“No problemo, I do not care at all that your skin is disgusting and makes me want to barf. Let’s heal you up.”
“Thanks, Jesus.”
“How’d you get leprosy by the way?”
“Somebody dared me to let a leper spit in my mouth.”
“That will do it.”
All of those people, Jesus toiled through with a smile on his face and kindness in his eyes. But one day a scraggly little vagabond bumbled into Jesus’ square. He stood facing a wall. The man was covered in dirt and wore only a burlap sack as an outfit. In one hand he carried a strange jug. In the other, a cane.
The old man croaked; “I’m blind!”
Here comes another one Jesus groaned internally; “Hello my son, let me cure your blindness for you.”
The old man flinched away, cane held in a protective guard, “What?”
Jesus sighed, “I am Jesus, the son of God, I can cure your blindness.”
“Oh really,” the old man “and why is that?”
“Because I am the son of God”
“Who?”
“The creator of all things.”
“Isn’t that nice.”
“It disturbs me that you care so little about this revelation” exclaimed Jesus. He contemplated casting a pox onto this man and his family, then he gathered himself, there were people around after all. “We are getting sidetracked. Do you want your blindness cured or not?”
“How much?”
“Well, you don’t pay anyth–”
The blind man looked suspicious, “If you try to stick anything in my mouth I’ll bite.”
Jesus is thoroughly taken aback, “No, good man, I don–”
“I’ve bitten men before. I’ve got sharp teeth. My eyes don’t work but my teeth have sliced many a man’s pr–”
“No!” Jesus roared, cutting the old man off from his disturbing anecdote, “I don’t require anything from you. It is simply a gift from God. A miracle.”
The old man ponders this new information before finally saying, “Alright. But if you try anything, I’ll nip you good!”
Jesus cured the man’s eyesight at that point, and the little man opened his eyes. He looked at Jesus. Then he looked around. Realization set in.
“Yippee!” The old man said and did a merry jig. Then he raised the jug to his lips and took a hefty gulp, wincing as he swallowed.
“Never gets any easier,” the old man said, offering Jesus the bottle.
“What is in that?” Jesus asked. He took a tentative sniff before rearing back, nostrils stung by the pungent elixir.
“Moonshine of course,” the old man said, then he took another swig.
“No thanks,” said Jesus, “I’m more of a wine guy myself.”
The old man peered over the rim of his bottle at Jesus, “Fair enough. This stuff can make you blind anyway.”
Jesus paused for a moment.
“Is that how you went blind?” He asked.
“Almost definitely.” The old man responded.
“And you’re going to keep drinking it?” Jesus asked dumbfounded.
“Well, I figured what are the odds it makes me blind again?”
Jesus had no response to that, so he let the formerly blind man continue on his way. After a while, Jesus forgot about the man. He was busy, and he met so many people with so many stories, that the moonshine guy just kind of faded away.
About an hour before Jesus figured he’d head home; a figure came stumbling back into the square. It took Jesus a moment to recognize him since it was dark, but it was clearly the old man. Jesus recognized two things immediately,
- The man was belligerently drunk.
- He was blind again.
The man shuffled around a bit, using his hands to stop himself (unsuccessfully) from ramming into different stalls and oxen.
“JESHUS” he called, “JEEESHUSH, where are yoush buddy, I wanna, I wanna talksh to yoush.”
“I’m here,” Jesus replied. “What happened.” Jesus wasn’t really asking. He didn’t really care. But protocol was protocol.
“I’m blind again Jeshus.” The old man said.
“Moonshine?” Jesus asked.
“Yesh.” The old man said. He even managed to look a little sorry. But he mostly just looked blind. And drunk.
Jesus cured the man and sent him on his way. Jesus hoped that would be the last time he saw that man. But it wasn’t.
The old man visited Jesus twenty-seven more times over the next fortnight. Every time, the man was either blind drunk, blind and drunk, or blind and soon to be drunk. Jesus healed him every time. Paralleling the repetitive healings was the meteoric rise in Jesus’ notoriety. As Jesus’ fame grew and grew, one could potentially say the fame got to his head a bit. As his ego grew, so did his annoyance for saving this random drunkard. There were other people to save, you know?
Well eventually, Jesus was captured by the Romans, I’m sure you know the details: Last Supper yadda yadda, Judas yadda yadda, Pontius Pilate, yadda yadda and then there was the trial. Your usual (lame) bible probably won’t tell you this, but at the trial, they asked Jesus for somebody to step forward on his behalf.
“Prove to us your followers Jesus, and we will anoint you king of the Jews.” The counselors said. Well of course they had done away with all of Jesus’ followers and apostles, but they had forgotten to get rid of the old man. Or they just didn’t know about him, he was a strange little man so there’s a good chance he just floated under the radar.
Jesus saw him from the corner of his eye and pointed to him. He finally recognized why he had to deal with that idiot the past few days! He raised his eyes to the heavens in sudden recognition of his father’s wider plan.
“There!” Jesus said, “He surely believes in me.”
“Whosh?” the old man said. He was blind again.
“Blind man,” the judges said, “do you believe in Jesus, the son of God?”
The blind man looked disoriented. It was completely possible the guy had wandered into the chamber by accident. He mumbled some slurred words.
“What was that?” The tribunal asked, their patience running thin.
The blind man steadied himself and spoke; “I think I’m an atheist.”
So, they crucified Jesus. But they burned the blind guy alive for heresy, so I guess it could’ve been worse.
Adam Rimland's Portfolio 