How do you see something you have never noticed before? How do you hear that for which you have never listened before? Within the great religious traditions of the world spiritual awakening is all about seeing and hearing that which has been there all along but not noticed.

There is an advertisement on TV these days of a woman hurrying along with a bag of groceries in each arm. The bag breaks and the oranges fall out. As she stoops to pick them up she notices the lovely flowers along the path. And she stops. She stops, puts down her bags and takes a moment to see, smell, and enjoy the flowers. No doubt she has hurried along this same pathway many times before and no doubt laiden with her bags and the preoccupations of her life. But she has never seen the flowers before. Not until now.

Sometimes coming to faith is as simple as that- the first realization that life holds more for us than we presently know or feel. A moment of grace

In the New Testament such moments of grace are called miracles: a suddenly, often unexpected event or experience, of the visible and invisible worlds becoming one. Faith comes, like a veil being lifted, allowing us to see differently what we have so often seen before And God`s world and our world become one.

The famous Canadian literary and biblical scholar, the late Northrop Frye, maintained that the Bible doesn`t think of the invisible world as the superior one; rather, it is through the invisible world that the visible world is manifest. The invisible world allows us to see the visible world for what it truly is.

Take air, for example, we can`t see it. In fact, when we can see it we become alarmed because we know it may be poisonous for us. When the air is visible, because of smoke or fog, we can`t see anything else! The invisible allows us to see the visible.

If someone where to ask me what is the essence of a spiritual person I would say that a spiritual person is one who strives to see the invisible in the visible. Great spirit persons, like Jesus, can see what all of us see and yet see more- indeed, they are able to see the very face of God.

Jesus places a child in the midst of his disciples in the gospel reading this morning when they are embarrassed as all get out when Jesus overhears them arguing about who will get the important cabinet posts when he takes over the rule of Israel. Jesus places a child in their midst and says, using my words, "do you see this child?" This is what greatness is all about. On another occasion, in the midst of great religious controversy about religious purity, sparked by an unclean woman anointing his feet with oil, kissing them, and wiping them with her hair, Jesus says to the Pharisees and to Simon, "Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed by feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love" (Luke 7.36-49)

"Do you see this child?"
"Do you see this woman?"
"Do you see the person whom you call your enemy?"

Because when you truly see them you will know them to be a stand-in for Jesus. And when we are able to see them as stand-ins for Jesus we begin to understand both the crucifixion and the Resurrection; that is, both the extent of our brokeness and the extent of God`s grace.

One of the great sorrows in the lives of many is the sense that no one really sees them. We cast people aside because we see only the crucifixion in them. We see only their brokeness and the responsibility they bear for it. Sometimes that is all we can see in ourselves as well.

But you know, God sees beyond the crucifixion. God sees the resurrection in us. That`s the miracle. That`s the invisible defining the visible. Invisible- not only that which we are unable to see but that which has yet to be realized.

Jesus placing a child in the midst of the disciples was not a photo-op. It was not a cleverly conceived but insincere campaign spin- and we know all about that these days in Ontario. Nor is it a romanticizing of children, for which he may be forgiven since it is not known that he had any of his own. Children are not pure and innocent. From the earliest age they are manipulative and self-centred- even if it is a cute kind of way.

Initially, a child approaches life with open-handedness, unaware of power, status, ability, and it is vulnerable, unable to survive unless someone choses to cherish it. And strangely, a child accepts all of this without guile or guilt, even gratitude is not something naturally there. I believe that it is this freshness that Jesus wanted his disciples to see as the time approaches for them to assume leadership.

The child amidst the disciples was the way Jesus tried to prepare his disciples for what lay ahead. In our gospel passage starts this morning, Jesus says to them, " The Son of Man is to betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed he will rise again." ( MK 9:31). And the bible then says, " But they did not understand what he was saying."

The problem Jesus faced was this, how to prepare them for what lay ahead. How could he enable them not to fall apart when the killing started? The had to develop the capacity to see beyond the crucifixion to the resurrection.

Each child is like starting the world all over again. Each child is like seeing the world the way God sees it, with resurrection eyes. Each child is like a new thought from God. Jesus placed the child in the midst of his disciples, and in our midst, to refocus our eyes to see not just the crucifixion, the evil and brokeness of our world, but the resurrection.

And that is what faith is all about. Never losing sight of the resurrection. Standing in the midst of crucifixion and seeing the resurrection. Allowing the invisible define the visible.