John 9

Hello people!  John 8 is our focus for today.  This is one of my favorite miracles that Christ performs. At the beginning of the passage, there is a question and misconception.  The question is this:   "Rabbi, (teacher) who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?"  What a terrible thing to say!  Here is this guy begging at the gates (the only profession he was fit to perform in these times) and had been that way since birth!  Pretty bad.  To add insult to injury, it was probably not the first time he had heard it.  It was a common thought at this time.  It was widely thought that your sin or your parents sin caused illness and suffering.  So not only was this guy struggling through life because of his blindness he was also having to deal with people thinking he was a bad person or that he came from a wicked family.

I love what Jesus says here without missing a beat.  "It was neither" The disciples set up a multiple choice question for Jesus and said "Is it 'a' or 'b'?" and He answers "c".  Jesus was always blowing peoples categories up!  He goes on to say "but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him." Jesus makes it clear "This guy is blind because God can be glorified through that." Hard to fathom right?  He adds this "While I am in the world, I am the light of the world." This guy has been in darkness his whole life and he is about to experience true Light for the first time.

So Jesus puts mud in his eye (gross) and the guy washes off in a pool of water close by (Siloam).  He is healed at that moment.  His neighbors saw it and were shocked (v8).  They could remember this guy as a little boy struggling to get around and find his way and now, he could see?! The word then got out and got to the Pharisees or religious law keepers of the day.  They put this guy on trial!  On trial?  For being healed?  They had ignored this guy his whole life, accused him of being a sinner and now that he is healed he's on trial?

They begin to question him as to who Jesus really is.  The man answers simply that he is a prophet.  They didn't like that answer so they dragged his parents into it.  This is getting a little out of hand don't you think?  His parents were afraid of the Pharisees because if they sided with Jesus, they would be kicked out of their club.  But they still couldn't escape the fact that he was healed (v20-22).  So they drag this guy who had just been healed back in.  I love this guy! He doesn't have the theological skills to defend himself against these bullies but he just speaks the truth...with a dash of sarcasm. 

They ask him again about Jesus but turn the heat up a little bit.  They call Jesus a sinner, or a bad person, and demand that this guy agree with them.  Then he says, "Whether He is a sinner, I do not know; one thing I know, that though I was blind, now I see."  How can you argue with that?  He's saying "Look guys, you do the math.  Here's how it went down.  First...no sight...then...sight.  Deal with it." They kept after him but he kept coming back to the facts.  I was once blind but now I see.  Then my favorite line in the passage "You do not want to become His disciples too, do you?"


That of course was too much for them.  They cast him out of the trial and...out of the church.  They called him a sinner, something he was already used to, and kicked him out of the club.  This of course was no big loss for him.  He had been out of the club his whole life.  What Jesus offered him was so much more.  He now had physical and spiritual sight.  He now had a relationship with the God of the universe.  His creator.  He lost nothing but gained everything!

How about you?  Do you feel like you are out of the club?  Good, Jesus is right there with you.  He's not a big fan of exclusivity when it comes to religious groups.  He loves all.  The great thing is that once you are his, He will change your life forever.  Once He does, you don't have to have all of the words in place to explain it to people who are asking questions.  All you need to know is that you are His!  All you need to do is point back to the life change that happened once you placed faith in Him.  People might confront you with things they think are inconsistent in the Bible and if you don't have the answer, you can always retreat to "I don't know the answer.  All I know is that God has changed my life." It is really hard to argue with a transformed life.  God will honor that.

Cool Fact
Siloam, the pool Jesus sent this man to wash in, is literally translated to "sent".  Like, Jesus "sent" this guy to wash and once he was healed He "sent" him to tell others.

The Old Testament predicted that the Messiah would give sight to the blind (Isaiah 29:18).