He Makes the Blind to See from Jesus as Seen by John

"As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”  Jesus makes this statement at the beginning of Chapter 9 of the Gospel of John before performing the miracle of healing. He is really making an announcement which is a repeat in the Gospel, "I am the light of the world." He brings light into the darkness of blindness but also brings the light of truth into the spirits of those who are blind to the truth of God. In the passage quoted below, we just have the first part of the story -- the healing.

As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

   “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”

 After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing.

 His neighbors and those who had formerly seen him begging asked, “Isn’t this the same man who used to sit and beg?” Some claimed that he was.

   Others said, “No, he only looks like him.”

   But he himself insisted, “I am the man.”

 “How then were your eyes opened?” they asked.

 He replied, “The man they call Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes. He told me to go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed, and then I could see.”

 “Where is this man?” they asked him.

   “I don’t know,” he said.

The story starts simply enough; Jesus ans his disciples are walking along and they saw a blind man begging (the only occupation open to blind men in those days) and the disciples asked a question: "Who sinned, the parents or the man?" In that culture, sickness was often seen as punishment from God -- particularly deformities such as blindness from birth. But is that so? Jesus said that this wasn't the case here. In fact there are very few examples in the scriptures where God punished people through sickness -- particularly children.

Of course sin does cause sickness, but usually through natural consequences not through punishment. Those of us who over eat and don't exercise may develop heart trouble. The person who abuses alcohol may develop cirrhosis of the liver. The smoker may develop lung cancer etc. The problem is that many people, even Christians often feel abandoned by God if they become sick; God must be displeased with them -- this might as well be punishment.

Jesus said that in this instance that the sickness was an opportunity to see the working of God; his glory might be seen. And of course we see that as Jesus proceeds to heal the man. While sickness is never pleasant, nor is it normally the will of God for us, we live in a world where people do get sick and people are born blind. But many times as we live through the sickness the glory of God is seen in the way that we are transformed through the suffering. There are a lot of books devoted to a theology of suffering which I am not trying to summarize. Even though I don't like suffering, God has made me a better person when I have gone through tough times; and sickness. But the main thrust of this posting is that we don't need to see sickness as some kind of punishment from God; he is not mad at us!

Can you imagine in this day and age someone saying that they want to heal you. Then they bend down, spit in the dirt and make a paste to put in your eyes. They say nothing else except go down to the pool and wash the dirt out of your eyes. Would you do it? The man did and he was healed. The people who knew this man couldn't believe it. They thought maybe his twin brother just appeared. But he affirmed that he was the guy. He told them what Jesus did. They asked where Jesus was and he said that he didn't know. That's all  there is to the story -- of course we will see later in the chapter that the local establishment makes more of the story. But this is an anti-climactic end.

Well, what does this story say to us? First, sickness is not a punishment from God. Second, the healing performed by Jesus is not a formula for healing blindness. God performs supernatural healings, but he also works through doctors, medicines and surgery. Thirdly he works through sickness itself. This brings me to my fathers day tribute.

My dad and I were alienated for 10 years; I didn't speak to him (or even know where he was) from the age of 20 to 30 (my ages). My dad had been a very heavy smoker most of his adult life, so it was not too surprising that it was not too long after we reconciled that he developed lung cancer. I was pleased when we finally got together that he had also reconciled with God; he was a believer. I last saw my dad in early 1973. He looked like a refugee from a concentration camp; this heavy weight boxer and football player was just skin and bones. He was also bed-ridden. I gave him a set of tapes that were made from the songs in our church songbook -- lousy recordings; he wore out two sets of the tapes worshipping God from his bed. He died in April of 1973 and this is how my aunt explained it to me. "He was laying there asleep and all of a sudden he sat up and opened his eyes. He wasn't looking at me; he was looking in the distance, and he said, 'It's all right Lord, I'm coming.' He closed his eyes, lay down and died." I was proud of my dad in his death. I missed him and I am very sorry that we didn't have more time together before he left. But sickness killed him -- but he died a righteous man -- full of the Spirit. His lung cancer was a natural consequence of dissipation, but it was not punishment. God had not abandoned him.