John 9:1-41 A man who is no longer blind.
One of the sports that I participated in as a young bloke was caving, the Nelson region has some amazing caves, and I had a few adventures with the Nelson Caving Club. Plus, we would do a few caving trips just as a group of friends. One thing that I remember vividly about caving, from my first experience is just how dark it is when you turn all the lights off, or when your carbide lamp goes out. You can’t see you hand in front of your face, you are totally blind, until a light gets turned on.
As we approach Easter in 2023 we will engage in a series of sermons that give us an understanding of Jesus as Lord and an understanding in part of his journey towards the cross. His final journey to Jerusalem.
New life in Christ, healing both physical and spiritual, what importance do we place on these? While the physical healing is a wonderful gift, it is spiritual healing that lasts...new Life in Christ what a wonderful thing!
I’d like to relate an encounter in Bible that tells us something about God’s power to heal, well actually there are a fairly good number of them but this one is about a bloke who was born blind!
There are a couple of key verses prior to this passage that I would like to refer to:
They are in John’s gospel chapter 7:1, John relates this, “After this (this being Jesus being deserted by many disciples) Jesus went around in Galilee, purposely staying away from Judea because the Jews there were waiting to take his life.”
That is the first verse but as the feast of Tabernacles approached, they went to Judea.
The other verse is this from chapter 8:12 “When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.”
This man in chapter 9 , was blind, he’d been born that way, now when Jesus was asked why he’d been born blind; Jesus answer was not because of anyone’s sin “but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.” (John 9:3) You see back in the day if someone was born with an infirmity it was believed that it was due to someone’s sin. A wee bit further on in the passage, verse 5, Jesus makes a bold claim about himself, “While I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (echoing his words in John 8:12). Then he spat on the ground made a bit of mud and put it on the man’s eyes! Jesus then told the blind muddy faced man to head off to the pool of Siloam and wash the muddy salivary stuff off his face. An interesting coincidence here or is it that Siloam in English means sent. The name originates from the water beig sent through a conduit cut through rock to the pool.
The miracle may have already occurred while Jesus was with the man, but what we see is that this blind man went to the pool, washed and went home seeing!
For a person born blind to be healed involved an act of re-creation of that person’s ability to see, something that required healing of the eyes and the brain, those parts of the person that had never been used. For in the case where a person is born totally blind and who lives in darkness, the eyes that don’t see in the first few months of life will never see.
There are other accounts, I know of five, of Jesus healing the blind, some of whom were beggars. They would have had a spot where they were taken at the start of the day sat in one place and people would have dropped spare change in their beggars bowls This man was a beggar used to having what he needed come to him while he was restricted to one spot, his life was that of a beggar. He was probably regularly taken to is spot to beg by his parents, he had no prospects, or employment, he had no social status, would never marry, now this occurred, Jesus gave him a directive after he had applied the saliva and mud to his eyes…’go and wash it off!’
Was he just washing off mud and saliva? Was he washing away his blindness? He was washing away his blindness, but also washing away the restricted future that he previously had lined up for him. With the washing came complete life change, a new life story, his whole narrative changed, those things that were not available to him became available. His life would now have meaning, he now had a future. The glory of God’s healing power meant that he now had a life that could be lived in the light not the darkness.
How often in life have you been in a situation where you knew that you could find help to change that situation, be healed of some spiritual or physical thing that restricts you , that holds you back?
Like the man born blind we are required to do something, to get the cogs in motion, the grace of Jesus saves but we must be willing to accept it, we to have to be willing to wash the mud and spit from our eyes, receive healing and see. The main theme of this chapter is wrapped up in a question, are we ‘open to Jesus or closed to Jesus?’
Are you open to Jesus, The Light of The World?
The man born blind was open to Jesus and in being open realised who Jesus was in steps:
Chapter 9:10 He is Jesus.
Chapter 9:17 He is a prophet.
Chapter 9:22 He is the Christ (the man’s parent’s realisation and fear) Interestingly from his Bar Mitzva, around 13 years old a boy was of age and considered a man. That is why his parents said he was of age and could speak for himself.
Chapter 9:33 He is from God
As we see in John’s depiction of events the Pharisees were not at all happy that this man was healed by Jesus, that is because from this point of these theologians and religious leaders were more than just a little ticked off. Think back to chapter seven verse one, these people were looking for a way to end Jesus life, an excuse to bring him to what they believed was justice, this is part of the journey towards Easter, towards Jesus death and resurrection, the first record of public opposition to Jesus ministry.
We see the interrogation of the man by the Pharisees we see his expulsion from the temple and we then hear of Jesus re-entry into the story, as he challenges the spiritual blindness of these learned people.
The Pharisees had decided Jesus was a sinner because he had healed on the sabbath. What, as under the law, a person could not heal on the sabbath; creation and destruction were not allowed on the sabbath. The healed man countered their argument from, verse 30: “The man answered, ‘Now that is remarkable! You don’t know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly person who does his will. Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.’” At this point the Pharisees threw him out of the synagogue. He was open to Jesus, and they were not.
Jesus then hears of this believer’s persecution. Then the formally blind man because of Jesus’ discussion with him goes from a place of respect for Jesus in that he calls him ‘Sir’ in verse 36. But once Jesus declares he is the ‘Son of Man’ the formally bind man believes in him as Lord and worships him.
Jesus following words sum up the whole chapter, “For judgement I have come into this world, so that the blind may see and those who see will become blind.” To which some Pharisees who hear respond “What? Are we blind to?” They were as they were not open to Jesus.
There is an interesting thing with humans, and it is this that in knowing Jesus, the more we get to know him the more we develop an understanding of who he is of his perfection and divinity, if we are open to doing so. The Pharisees were not open.
The man born blind, now seeing understood that Jesus had healed him, declared this, was persecuted for his understanding and then worshipped Jesus.
We have an opportunity to receive from God a remedy to our spiritual blindness, to counter the spiritual blindness of others, too come to a place where we are set free from bondage and to live a life that is not just abundant, but a life that brings glory to God and an understanding of our having a place in his kingdom as heirs to his promises.
For those of us who are living in the grace of God we to continue to live in that place seeking after the will of God, acting as he would have us act, “Loving God passionately, loving and serving others and living a culture of honour”, for that is what He requires of us.
Like the man in this description, we can come to understand Jesus not just out of respect for his being a great man, but once the mud and spit is removed from our spiritual eyes we can see him as Lord and Saviour as we continue our through life, knowing him as Lord.
Open to Jesus or closed to Jesus? Our life stories take on a new direction and meaning when we are open to be mended, to be healed, to rescued, to be filled, to be pardoned. To be made new and whole in Christ. If you have any emptiness, we have a place of prayer-the mercy seat.
