John 9:13-18, 24-25) Gifts of Life Ministries 3-10-02
Fourth Sunday in Lent
?Can We See??
There?s a story of a blind man who was on his deathbed. The man had been born blind but that didn?t stop him from serving the Lord. He was very active in his church, always giving, never asking for anything in return. Everyone loved this old man. Children ages 6-60 came to him for his straightforward, good Christian advice and counsel. You may say he was the epitome of what Jesus talked about in Matt. 7:16. ?You shall know them by their fruits?.
Well one day the pastor of the church came to pray and to talk with him. The pastor when he approached the man?s bedside said, ?everything?s going to be fine?. The old man responded, ?I know everything?s going to be fine. I?m not worried at all. Matter of fact, ?I?m real happy right about now?. Well, this kind of threw the pastor for a loop. Here is a man on his death bed and he is reassuring the pastor that everything is going to be all right, and to top things off, the sick man claimed that he is real happy right now.
After that exchanged both he and the pastor were quiet for a moment then the old man spoke up. He said, ?pastor you know why I?m happy right now?? The pastor, with tears in his eyes about now responded, ?why?? The old blind man said, ?just think, I?m lying here about ready to die. And when I die, I?ll close my eyes for the last time, because the next time I?ll open them, I will be able to see. And you know what? The first person I will see ever in my life will be Jesus Christ.
Now I don?t know whether this story is true or not but it really doesn?t matter. For you see, the story serves as an illustration. One may argue that this old blind man had been given sight a longtime ago, sight that really mattered. Sight to see things not in the natural but in the spirit, and his focus was still, as it always had been, on seeing Jesus Christ.
I came to ask us this morning, ?when did we first see? Do you remember when your eyes opened up? Who or what did you see? Now I?m not necessarily talking about being saved. For you see, some of us were saved when we were 8, 9, 10 years old, and been in church all of our lives. But we have grown up and we have experienced more things about ourselves, others, and the world which in part changed our views on how we approach, handle, and views things. When was it that you really saw and what did you see?
Was the first person we saw was Jesus and how Jesus has been a part of our life inspite of? Did we see how he had brought us? How he has kept us? How he still loved us after all of our idiotic and insane decisions we made?
Did we see how he protected us, comforted us, cared about us? Did we see how he gave us chance and chance again? Did we see how Jesus was still working in our lives despite the objections to the help that was provided? Did we see and recognized Jesus working in our lives?
Or did we see ourselves? Did we see a broken down beat up shell of a person desperately searching and seeking serenity? Did we see our lives as an un-orchestrated orchestra out of tune with the dark, damp and destitute realities of life? Did we see the broken relationships, shattered dreams, and unfulfilled desires that led us to be this meandering wonderer wondering through the desert of despair? In other words, did we see ourselves just going through the motions not living but just surviving? When we saw for the first time what did we see?
Did we see the injustice and all of the problems the world throws at us? Did we see the homeless and any marginalized and ostracized person, not just as another bum in the street or someone that?s sick and deranged, person but as a person? Did we see, as Lord Acton puts it, how ?power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely?? Did we see how many of our children are failing and flunking out of school? Did we see where we can find money for this project and that program and for those people, but yet our children still go hungry, our schools are not adequately funded, our neighborhoods are in disarray and our belief and faith systems are gone. What did you see when your eyes were opened?
However, sadly, there are people who cannot see. There are some people who just don?t get it. Some people can?t see the forest for the trees. They can?t see any light at the end of the tunnel. God has manifested God?s presence again and again in their life, blessing them, delivering them, shaking them up, bringing them through, giving them friends and family members who love and care for them, showing them a better way, but they still refuse to see.
They still live their lives in a maze, clouded with convoluted ideas of happiness, which in the end not only destroys them but can destroy others around them as well. These people may hear the word, the may even see the word through scripture reading, they see the results of the word even tasting the fruit of the word, but their eyes are still not open. ?The reason I am so successful?, they say, ?is because I did all this for myself and by myself. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time. I told you that I got the hook-up. It was just a coincidence that I am where I am?.
But I tell you my brothers and sisters that it was not just a coincidence, or incident, it was God?s providence that carried you through. We may have gone to the right schools. We may have come from the right family. We may have a strong sense of determination and self-esteem. We may even have the connections and the hook-ups, but if God decided right now to withhold air from our bodies, it wouldn?t matter who we knew, where we came from, what we have, or where we were going, all things as we know would stop! Because in the final analysis, God has the last word and we need to understand and see this fact.
I came to remind somebody that they need to open their eyes and see. See what the Lord is doing with you. See where the Lord has brought you. See where the Lord is taking you. See what the Lord is doing for you in your life. See through many dangers, toils, and snares, we have already come. Open your eyes and see God?s magnificent, magnanimous, majesty at work.
Because with Christ in our lives, we can see clearly now since the rain is gone. With Christ in our lives, we can see all obstacles in our way. So if you?re tired of living your life being hoodwinked, bamboozled, ran amuck, led astray, tricked and trapped, tired of people leading you down a wrong path, do like Paul did and take the scales off your eyes so you can see!
Once you start seeing you become a better person than you were before. Things that you use to say, you don?t say anymore. Things you used to think about, you don?t think about anymore. Things that tripped you up, you walk around them now, you can step over them now, you can go under them now, or you can put your hard hat on and go through them now! It?s the power of Christ Jesus in your life that makes it possible for you to see. So I came to ask somebody this morning, can we see?
This is what we find in our text. A man who was born blind that wanted to see. The man in his physical ailment was reduced to being a beggar, hanging around street corners looking for the day?s handouts. In Jesus? day, you were considered a nothing, a nobody, an incomplete person if you had any physical ailments. So you were shunned by your community and by family members. You were called unfit and unworthy. You had no one to protect you and no one to call to help you out. Sometimes the money that you made begging, especially for a blind man, was taken away by someone else. It was a tough life for people who couldn?t see.
And it is at a tough life for those who cannot see today. And I am not talking about physical blindness, even though I imagine that being physically blind is tough at times. But I am talking about people who can see, but yet they are still blind. They come in all shapes and sizes.
They are the big business professional who can only see joy and happiness if they are making money. They are the people who can only see happiness and fulfillment in a spouse or someone special in their lives. They are the people who can only see fulfillment and contentment in some high paying job. They are the people who see that the only way to elevate their position is to bring you down. These people claim to see but they really don?t see. And sooner or later they become like the man in our text, reduced to living life on the outside, hanging out on the many sidewalks of life begging and starving for true love and affection that they thought they were getting from the objects of their desire. In this vain search for wholeness and truth, they eventually become trapped with the trappings they so desire and find no peace.
You see Jesus had no business even stopping and talking with this man because as custom in Jesus? day, a person who was higher in status than you didn?t talk with you, especially if you were a religious authority. You see, it was the whole system that reduced people to insignificant individuals that Jesus rallied against. You see Jesus went to places and talked to folks that many of our good church folks wouldn?t go or speak to.
Thank God, Jesus is still going up into folk?s mess that sometimes we good church folk don?t want to get into. Oh, we as church folk sometimes don?t want to witness and help out like we should. We don?t want to talk with the lost children, the lost souls of the world. We don?t want to talk with the drug addicts, dope fiends. We don?t want our churches opened on Sunday Night, Friday Night, or any other night. Any old excuse will do when we don?t really want to do something. But Jesus will go anywhere we are and if you called his name, you can be delivered and set free.
As we read the text, Jesus does heal the man and he receives his sight. However, I believe the man quickly learned 3 lessons about seeing. When you are truly touched by the Master, He?ll open your eyes and you will see these 3 lessons.
The first lesson that you learn is that when you open your eyes and see you can always see the Master working. You see it doesn?t matter what day it is, the Savior is always working. You see, the ecclesiastical social club of Jesus? day interpreted the 4th commandment, ?remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy? as a day when absolutely no work was to be done. However, Jesus had already told them in Mark 2:27 that the Sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the Sabbath. In other words, human needs and conditions come before any rule, rite, ritual, or regiment.
And he follows up that statement by saying that the Son of Man is Lord even over the Sabbath. In other words, I am not bound by your tyrannical traditionalism. I am not shackled by your wicked ways. I am not hindered by your botched beliefs. I am not held hostage by your inept interpretations, human needs and love for all humankind comes first!
What this also tells us is that the Master is always working on any day of the week. It doesn?t matter if it?s Christmas, Labor Day, Arbor Day, or your birthday. Any day is the Lord?s day. We can call him up anytime day or night, darkness or light. In the morning or in the evening
People want to talk about the right time, the appropriate time and place, but when you are drowning, wallowing in your own self-pity, you need help and help right now! Jesus doesn?t take time off, go on vacation, take sick leave or show up for work late, because we all know that He?s right on time!
And when we can truly see, we may not understand what?s going on. It might not sound like a good plan to us. We still may be a little confused. We may wonder how are we going to get out of this mess, but if we can truly see, we can see the Master is always working it out!
The 2nd lesson I see here is that when you can see, you see people for who they really are. It?s only after your eyes have been opened can you see this truth. All his life he has only heard the religious leaders as they talked about God. He held them in high esteem. He believed that they had his best interest at heart. But now since his eyes were opened, he was seeing another side.
In the man?s happiest hour, he was being questioned and interrogated because Jesus came into his life. The religious leaders didn?t want to believe this miracle. They didn?t want to believe that this man who had been born blind was now seeing.
But maybe the real reason that they didn?t want to believe this miracle was that Jesus had something to do with it. For you see, they had already threatened anyone who confessed Jesus as the Messiah with expulsion from the synagogue. In other words, support this Jesus fellow, talk about him in a positive way and be kicked out of the place you have learned to love. No wonder the man?s parents when questioned said, ?that we can testify that he was born blind, but we don?t know how he is able to see?. By even mentioning Jesus? name they would have been kicked out of church.
What the man was hearing and seeing now didn?t sound like the love and fellowship that these leaders preached all those years when he wasn?t able to see. And in this we learn a valuable lesson. When we are touched and healed by the Master and are able to see, some people will believe that your new vision is phony. They won?t believe that you are sincere. People will question your motives. They will wonder what you have under your sleeve. Some people have a hard time, believing you have changed. Instead of being happy for you they question you and your purposes.
You see some people are more comfortable with you in your pathetic positions in life. Some people feel more comfortable if you stay down forever. People wanting to hold you back, dismissing you, destroying you, deterring you, stealing your song, busting your blessing, carjacking your comfort, jumping your joy, hijacking your hope, trying to leave you for dead.
But all I came to tell somebody is that you don?t let a weeklong devil disrupt your Sunday joy! I hear Jesus saying, ?the thief comes to steal, kill and destroy: I come that they may have life and have it more abundantly?. In other words, just keep on keeping on. Don?t let anybody stop you. Don?t let anybody dislodge us from our position. Don?t let anybody break you up or break you down. Stand on the promises of God. Stay rooted in scripture. Just keep on hanging in their because the best is yet to come.
The 3rd and final thing you se is that after you see Jesus working, after you see people for who they are, you must see to it that you give credit where credit is due. In other words, keep on praising.
You see the Pharisees were still arguing and whispering among themselves whether or not this man was telling the truth. They were just arguing not over the truth, but some other mess that had no place in the conversion. If the Pharisees would have stopped long enough to see they could have marveled also at the wonder workings of God, but they could not see.
There?s a lot of blind folks out there debating and deciding on stuff that really doesn?t matter. They are arguing with one another saying what you have and what you see isn?t real. They think it?s going to wear off. Some people are hooked up to other things that they believe can help them see better. But when you can truly see, you see all of your critics for what they are. You know how to handle them and you keep on worshipping Jesus Christ.
When someone comes up to you and say, ?you religious experience is hogwash and you are just a fake?, you just tell them like that man said in the text ?Where as I was blind, now I see.
You tell them, ?I probably can?t tell you all the intricacies of an immovable, immutable and insurmountable God. I don?t understand what God is doing all the time. I may not be able to quote scripture like some others. I haven?t walked the ivory halls of a theological seminary. I may not be able to preach like Paul and I may not be able to tell you, homiletics from hermeneutics or exegete a text of scripture. But you can call me crazy if you want to, say I?m losing my mind, whereas I was blind, now I see!
So you go tell those people you can evaluate, illiterate, pontificate, postulate, narrate, abbreviate, delegate or mandate all you want, but I see what I see, I know what I know, If feel what I feel, I have what I have and whereas I was blind now I see!
All I know is that God has been good to me. God has brought me from a mighty long way. God has brought me from darkness into the marvelous light. Every now and ten when I?m all by myself, I just have to say thank you!
Thank you, Thank you! I can see! I can see! Jesus in your life, Jesus morning, noon, and night! All Jesus all the time. Jesus like visa, everywhere I want to be. Jesus, like AMEX, I never leave home without him. Jesus, like bounty, He is the quicker picker upper. Jesus, like a Timex, He took a licking, but kept on ticking. All Jesus all the time and I am so glad Jesus opened my eyes, because whereas I was blind, now I see.
Amen
