Miracles of Healing, Metaphors of Discipleship

I've begun to suspect that Jesus' miracles of healing are actually meant to be metaphors of discipleship.

When Jesus heals people unable to walk, perhaps it is an example of how Christ empowers us to walk in God's way, which we are unable to do of our own power. "I will make them strong in the Lord, and they shall walk in his name, says the Lord." Zechariah 10:12; nrsv

Jesus opens the eyes of the blind for the purpose of allowing us to understand God's love for ourselves and others we have condemned as unloveable. "I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness. I am the Lord, that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to idols. See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them." Isaiah 42.6-9; nrsv

Jesus cleanses the lepers might be understood as cleansing hearts and consciences of sin and its concomitant shame and guilt. "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me." Psalm 51.10; nrsv

Jesus opens the ears of those who cannot hear that they may hear what God is speaking. "Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, to his faithful, to those who turn to him in their hearts." Psalm 85.8; nrsv

Jesus heals a woman who's back is bent and unable to stand up straight, (Luke 13.10-17). There's always a since that those who suffer are being punished by God and that it would wrong to do anything that might go against God's judgment. Yet the Apostle Paul asks: "Who are you to pass judgment on servants of another? It is before their own lord that they stand or fall. And they will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make them stand." Romans 14.4; nrsv

Most profoundly, Jesus raises the dead. Those who are dead (in sin) cannot praise God (Psalm 88.10, Psalm 115.17), so God raises the dead that we may sing and rejoice in what God has accomplished.