Jesus, The Sight Of The World Series

“Jesus, The Sight of The World”

Pastor V. P. Oliver

John 9: 39 (1-41)

“And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind.”

In the preceding chapter of the Gospel of John Jesus has been giving a discourse on His declaration to be the “Light of the World.” Because He claimed that He is God, the Jews wanted to kill Him. John 8:59 says that Jesus “hid” Himself as He went out of the temple, “going out through the midst of them.” This was done to escape the angry crowd that would have surely killed Him, but His time had not yet come.

In chapter 9 we see the Master moving from teaching that He is the “Light of the World,” to demonstrating this fact with the healing of the man born blind. A parenthetical note: (Every now and then the teacher needs to leave the comfort of the classroom and put theory into practice.) In this sixth miracle Jesus demonstrates not only is He the “Light of the World,” but that He is also the “Sight of the World.” And that’s what I want to talk about today; “Jesus, the Sight of the World.”

You will recall in the Gospel of John, when Jesus turned water into wine, it was by His Word. When Jesus healed the nobleman’s son, it was by faith. And when He healed the impotent man, it was by grace. The last four signs show the results of salvation. The feeding of the 5000 brought satisfaction. Jesus walking on water and stilling the storm brought about peace. And the miracle in our text today, Jesus healing the blind man demonstrates how salvation brings light. Today I want to look at the CONDITION, the CURE, the CONTROVERSY, and the CONFESSION as Jesus gave sight to the man that was born blind.

1. THE CONDITION

First, lets observe the CONDITION. The Bible tells us in the first verse of John 9 that Jesus came upon a man that was blind from birth. That was his CONDITION. He had never seen the light of day. From the onset we need to understand that this miracle was not simply Jesus restoring this man’s eyesight, the fact is, this man had never seen before. His was a congenital condition, meaning he was born blind. Right away we begin to see that there is more to this miracle than meets the eye (no pun intended). In order to heal this man of his blindness, Jesus first had to heal his eyes. Now, the medical doctor will tell you that the eye is an organ of the body containing an optic nerve that sends signals to the brain. It is the brain that takes that information from the optic nerve and translates it into a vision or picture that we see. So it is our brain and not so much our eyes that helps us to see. If you don’t believe me, just ask a doctor how he checks to see if a person is brain-dead, and he will tell you that he first looks into the person’s eyes for movement. When the brain is functioning, the eye automatically reacts to movement or light. As infants when we first started to use our eyes to see, our brains began the process of being trained to automatically translate and relate that information into a vision. It is a natural, involuntary function that our bodies learned at a very early age. So the magnitude of this miracle is fully realized when we recognize that this man’s brain had never before received a message from his optic nerve, because he had eyes that could not see. And when Jesus healed this man of his blindness, He not only healed his eyes but He also instantly healed and trained this man’s brain to receive messages from an optic nerve that had been dormant and nonfunctional his entire life.

Before the blind man could see, his eyes needed to be healed. They had to be conditioned to receive light and sight. There needed to be a receiver as well as a sender of the light. The lack of light does not mean that light is not there. But light reveals the condition of the eye. Eyes that function properly react to light. (Somebody knows where I’m going with this.) Without Christ in our lives we are like this blind man, we are living in spiritual darkness. An unregenerate soul is in darkness. Jesus, Who is the Light of the World, reveals the CONDITION of the soul. Even though you may have eyes, like this man in our text, until you encounter Jesus, you will nevertheless be blind. Jesus was concerned about this man’s CONDITION, because as He passed by this man, the Bible says that He stopped. Its good to know that, no matter what our CONDITION may be, the Savior will never pass us by. The disciples demonstrated their concern for this man’s CONDITION with the question that they asked Jesus about this man who was blind from birth. They wanted to know who was the cause of his CONDITION, the man himself or his parents. Jesus responded by informing them that it was neither, but that this man’s CONDITION represented an opportunity for the works and the plan of God to be demonstrated.