✦ Lenten Meditation and Prayer – Week 4 ✦ Father Ron Keel
Renewal
Reading Reference: John 9:1–41
Meditation
The man born blind never asks Jesus for a miracle. He does not even know who Jesus
is. And yet, in a moment as ordinary as mud and water, his life is changed.
What follows is not simple gratitude, but disruption. Healing brings questions. Renewal
brings resistance. Those who are most certain struggle to accept what has happened,
while the one who was blind grows steadily clearer—not just in sight, but in courage.
Renewal often works this way. It is rarely neat or convenient. God’s renewing work can
unsettle familiar patterns and challenge long-held assumptions. But it also opens new
ways of seeing—ourselves, others, and God.
Lent invites us to consider that renewal is not only about fixing what is broken.
Sometimes it is about loosening what has become rigid. Sometimes it is about seeing
anew what we thought we already understood.
In a world weary of conflict and tired of change, this story reminds us that God’s
renewing work is not meant to preserve comfort, but to restore life. Even when it costs
us certainty, renewal offers freedom.
Questions for Reflection
Where might God be inviting me to see differently?
What assumptions or habits may need to be gently loosened this Lent?
How is renewal already at work in ways I may not yet recognize?
Prayer
Renewing God,
Open our eyes to your healing work among us.
When change unsettles us, give us courage to trust your grace.
Restore our vision, reshape our hearts, and lead us into the freedom of lives made new.
Amen.
Father Ron Keel
