Remembering Blind Sam

My buddy Sam read the Bible with his fingers.

Sam had been born blind and had never seen anything at all. Yet back in the 1970s he learned Braille, graduated from college, got married, and became the pastor of a small rural church near Jacksonville.

Sam became interested in a method of evangelism I used in a rescue mission where I volunteered and in street preaching. It involved drawing stick-figure paintings to illustrate Bible stories.

Sam asked me to teach him to draw pictures.

A man born blind drawing pictures!

Impossible!

But with God all things are possible.

After much prayer, we had an idea.

I got a long, wide wooden board out of a dumpster, painted it white, and tacked small white nails in a pattern of a picture illustrating a Bible verse along this board. The nail heads protruded about a quarter of an inch.

Thick lengths of different colored knitting yarn were fastened at anchor points at the bottom of the board.

Sam learned the sequence of weaving each strip of yarn among the nail heads to draw a Bible picture. His skill at this amazed onlookers and several watchers turned to Christ on hearing the blind man’s message.

With God, all things are possible.

Here is an old photo (taken about 1972?) of people paying attention to Sam’s preaching on a street corner while drawing with yarn:

The Bible verse Sam is illustrating is Romans 6:23 — “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord”.

Speaking of sin:

Once a bunch of us guys were standing around talking, as Christian guys are wont to do, about temptation — especially as it relates to ogling sexy women.

One of the guys teased Sam saying it must not be a problem for him since he, in spite of being married, had never actually seen a woman.

“It’s worse for me than for you guys,” he said. “When a woman walks by, you can see if she’s a dog or not. To me, every time I hear any woman’s step or voice, in my mind I see her as a raving beauty wearing a filmy silk negligee. Every woman!”

“How do you know about filmy silk negligees?” a guy asked.

“Reading the Bible is not the only thing I can do with my fingers,” Sam said.

———

As I scanned Barbara White’s columns into my computer Thursday, for some reason I got to thinking about Sam….

After I wrote the above journal posting, my friend Wes came over to take me to breakfast. We talked about plans and friends and family… When he asked about my youngest daughter and we talked about things that happened years ago, a crying jag struck me and I could not stop crying for the longest time.

Utter damn wimp! Or maybe my sleep deprivation led to my crying jag. Or maybe something else was at work.

I’m ok now. Maybe I’m just cracking up.

I know the Lord Jesus is the Prince of Peace, and He is my Lord, but I’m experiencing darn little peace at the moment.

That phrase “Help of the helpless” does mean something —not sure what right now.

Victory in Jesus - I can do all thing through Christ which strengthens me - we shall overcome — and all that jazz.

Isn’t that how faith is supposed to work?

But as Job said, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him”.

So I weep a little.

Big deal.

I’ll survive.