“Do not even enter into the village.” The Bible does not tell us why Jesus said this. Blindness did not make a person unclean, so that could not have been a reason. It seems therefore that the reason had to be personal; that the man himself had to have time to fully reflect on what had happened to him and not get swept away by an emotional crowd. Jesus’ healings were all personal, there is no set pattern to them. If this man needed time to fully appreciate what had happened to him, and also make plans for the future, Jesus would have wanted the man to make sure to take that time, and of course, rejoice with his own family.

Being able to see again would have given this man opportunities he had not had before, and it is certainly likely that loads of people would have had “good ideas” for him, but they were ideas that he and his family needed to work out without everyone else’s opinion.