The Man Born Blind; John 9

I wrote this sermon several days ago and present it here in its entirety. I will preach a modified version of it this morning at St. John the Divine.

The ninth chapter of John consists of one story: the miraculous healing of a blind man on the Sabbath. Jesus' disciples are looking for a simple theology of suffering, expecting Jesus to lay the blame of the man's blindness since birth on the prenatal sin of this man or his parents. Jesus says it is neither but is a work of God for their benefit, and what they should do is to look at him for understanding because he is the light of the world.

The Bible is clear that we live in a fallen world afflicted by sin, suffering, and death. The corona virus is the immediate example at hand. Occasionally, suffering is tied directly to one's sin. Yet here Jesus says the man was born blind so that Jesus can work a miracle and produce yet another sign of his divinity. This situation is like that of Job, where his friends try and blame him for committing some sin that led to all his misfortunes. Here Jesus will simply have nothing to do with this shallow theology that is more like the concept of karma in which a person has to work out the consequences of his or her actions. Instead he says to his disciples, "Look at and focus on me."

Having said these things, Jesus spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man’s eyes with the mud and said to him, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam.” So he went and washed and came back seeing.

Jesus heals the man born blind. Why he used dirt mixed with his saliva is unclear—he heals at other times and places with words—but perhaps he is somehow referencing the first man, Adam, who was created from the ground. Here in the power of God Jesus is recreating from the ground that which is marred by the fall, perhaps prefiguring our future resurrection.

Having put the mud in his eyes, Jesus, the one sent by God, sends the man to wash in the pool, perhaps as an act of faith. And he returns seeing for the first time in his life.

I was on a medical mission trip to Guatemala when a young girl, deaf from birth, received her first heating aid and heard sound for the first time. I expected her to say something or laugh, but of course she didn’t because she didn’t yet understand sound. What will the reaction of this man be to seeing for the first time?

Immediately the man is questioned about Jesus by those who see how different he is. In fact he does not appear to some to be the same man. When Jesus healed him more seems to have changed in him than just his eyesight. He appears as a different man. Many people over the centuries have had similar experiences after being healed by Jesus and coming to faith in him. People can see the difference. Ironically, the now seeing man cannot identify Jesus because he has never before laid eyes upon him.

While we do not know past the end of chapter 9 what happens to this man, we do know that Jesus has completely changed his life. No longer will he have to beg others for support but should be able to support himself by working. Again, when Jesus comes into our lives we are never the same again.

Unable to leave well enough alone, the neighbors take the now seeing man to the Pharisees, who interview him and his parents. Some of the Pharisees are so persuaded that they actually have a very high view of Jesus—“How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?” They seem to believe that Jesus is without sin. Yet for the others, that Jesus healed on the Sabbath is a huge issue that seems to deny the sign itself. To be holy, one had to keep the Sabbath. That Jesus healed on the Sabbath meant that he must not be holy. They are fixated on an incorrect interpretation of the Sabbath and not open to hearing from God himself. If they had really studied the issue, they would have discovered there is no law against healing anyone on the Sabbath.

With a division within their ranks, they turn back to the man and ask him to take sides. He calls Jesus a prophet. At this point the man understands Jesus to be more than a simple man. He must be a prophet, someone who stands in the very counsel of God himself. We can say that he takes the side of those who will not call Jesus a sinner and know that there is something supernatural about him.

People are still taking sides about Jesus today. Why are you on Jesus’ side? How did you get there? Who opened your eyes?

The skeptical Pharisees turn to the man’s parents. The parents agree to the miracle of their son being born blind and now seeing, but they are intimidated and will not agree to Jesus’s identity or knowing of him. They claim not to know exactly what happened to their son. Of course this is highly unlikely because they would have been the first to ask about the miracle and about who performed it. They encourage the Pharisees to ask their son because he is of age. “Of age” implies he is older than 13 and of the age to make his own living as a beggar and answer the Pharisees’ questions on behalf of himself.

Then we find out the real reason they will not talk about Jesus: they are under threat. If they say Jesus is the Messiah, they will be excommunicated from the synagogue. To be excommunicated meant loss of status in their society. It meant giving up privileges that they had. It could also be that now they have to support their son. Begging could be a fairly lucrative business and with that out of the picture they actually may have had disdain for Jesus. It reminds us of what happened when Paul healed a slave girl with a demon in Acts or when Jesus sent the demons in Legion into a herd of pigs, who promptly ran off a cliff and died, in Mark. They slave girls’ owners were irate as were the pig farmers even though both people were healed by miracles. In both cases there was a loss of income that negated the healing of suffering. The second thing we see is that Jesus has already stirred up great division and the authorities will do anything to keep him from gaining more ground and additional followers. We see this form of evil used throughout history by the powerful and privileged to try and neutralize anyone who looks like they may take power or status away from them.

The Pharisees want the man to acknowledge that Jesus is a transgressor of the law and disown him. The man’s response is incredible and deserving of a hymn! “I don’t know about him being a sinner, but I do know I was blind and now I see.” And then he pushes their button: “Do you also want to become his disciples?” This suggests the man may already consider himself a disciple when the Pharisees were working hard to stop Jesus from gaining disciples. They are incensed, and respond with a rededication to Moses and the law of Moses they know so well and work so hard to keep.

You do have to love the honesty of this man. The Pharisees are not going to intimidate him as they did his parents into denying Jesus. He has experienced the hands-on healing of Jesus. His healing is real and can only be explained by being an act of God. His faith is in a real person and his faith is experiential. Their faith is in a system of rituals and is theoretical in nature. His faith is humane; theirs is not.

The one who was blind has seen God face to face and believes while the ones who have always seen are blind to God when he appears to them in the flesh. They do not recognize his face as the face of God because Jesus does not fit their preconceived notions of God. Frustrated and infuriated by the man’s unflappable faith, they excommunicate him from the synagogue, accusing him of being steeped in sin from birth.

What a contrast we have in this story. The community of believers Jesus gathers is to be a hospital for sinners. The synagogue of these Jews was closed to those who did not think and act as they. Have you ever thought about how some Christian churches forget they are a hospital for sinners and instead pretend to be a holy gathering place of the nearly perfect?

This story is an acted-out parable of faith and unbelief. The once blind man has his eyes of faith opened to behold the Son of Man while the seeing Pharisees are blind to him. Isaiah (29:18) foretold that in the day of the Messiah the eyes of the blind shall see. Jesus is fulfilling the OT prophecies that predicted the work of the Messiah, yet the experts in the OT remain blind to his identity.

One of the keys to identifying the Son of Man is that people will worship him. The now seeing man worships Jesus, not as an ethical teacher or a social reformer but as his Savior. This man knows first-hand how he has been saved. The Pharisees could also be saved, but because they choose not to recognize Jesus they remain in their guilt. They have seen the evidence of a miraculous healing and reject it because it occurred on the Sabbath. Unbelievable! But then, that is the point: they are unable to believe.

Let us pray:

O God, whose blessed Son made himself known through signs and miracles, open the eyes of our faith, that we may behold him in all his redeeming work and share this good news with others; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

How do we deal with anxiety during these stressful days? If you are stressed because of our continuing social distancing and listening to all the disconcerting news on television, take time each day to say Psalm 23 out loud.

Psalm 23 King James Version The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul; he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his Name's sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies; thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.