Listen to the audio of today’s Reflection:
https://soundcloud.com/hapearce/reflection-for-january-4-2024
John 9:1-12, 35-41
Jesus Heals a Man Born Blind
1As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. 2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in his life.4 As long as it is day, we must do the work of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. 5 While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”
6 After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. 7 “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing.
8 His neighbors and those who had formerly seen him begging asked, “Isn’t this the same man who used to sit and beg?” 9 Some claimed that he was.
Others said, “No, he only looks like him.”
But he himself insisted, “I am the man.”
10 “How then were your eyes opened?” they demanded.
11 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.”
12 “Where is this man?” they asked him.
“I don’t know,” he said.
Spiritual Blindness
35 Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, and when he found him, he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
36 “Who is he, sir?” the man asked. “Tell me so that I may believe in him.”
37 Jesus said, “You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you.”
38 Then the man said, “Lord, I believe,” and he worshiped him.
39 Jesus said, “For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.”
40 Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, “What? Are we blind too?”
41 Jesus said, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.
This passage is actually the beginning and the end of a longer story. In fact, I recommend that you read the whole story in your Bible or online, if time permits. You might remember that the gospel of John has some stories that are much longer that those you find in the other gospels. This particular one seems to me to have some genuinely comical elements in it.
The story begins with Jesus giving sight to a beggar who had been born blind. But when the man goes back to his neighborhood seeing for the first time in his life, his neighbors respond in a way that seems strange and not very neighborly. Instead of being happy for the man’s miraculous healing, the neighbors seem suspicious. And the man seems so different to them that the neighbors debate whether it’s even the same man.
It seems to me that this confusion on their part introduces the central theme of this story – the idea that there are different kinds of blindness. The central character of the story had been born blind, but then gets his sight. His neighbors and the other ‘sighted’ people in the story are then revealed as the ones who can’t really see the truth. A blind man is given sight, but people who think they see clearly are shown to be blind to reality.
In the part of the story that’s left out of the listed reading, the neighbors are so suspicious of the blind man who has been given sight that they drag him off to be interrogated by the religious authorities – the Pharisees. The man no longer fits into the role his neighbors had relegated him to – the role of ‘disabled person.’ That seems to make the man threatening to them. It seems to me that’s often the case when people turn out to have capabilities greater than we thought. We instinctively find it unsettling.
Once he’s been dragged to the Pharisees and forced to tell his story, the religious leaders badger the man for more details of his miraculous healing. Eventually, they even drag his parents in to see if they can shed any more light on the matter. Eventually, when the formerly blind man mocks the Pharisees for their lack of vision, they throw him out into the street.
The listed reading skips to the end, when Jesus comes to the man and identifies himself as the Messiah, then explains the significance of the healing. He says that his presence in the world will give sight to the blind and cause those with sight to lose it. His point, it seems, is that by his teachings, Jesus would allow people living in spiritual darkness to see the truth about what God was (and is) doing in the world. But those who think they have all the answers – those who think they see God’s truth clearly (like the Pharisees) are sometimes revealed as spiritually blind.
It’s an interesting story, and even an entertaining one. But it should probably serve as a warning to people like us not to make the Pharisees’ mistake. Those of us who have been in the church for most of our lives can easily delude ourselves into thinking we’ve got the things of God all figured out. But it’s only by coming back again and again to the teachings of Jesus that we can keep seeing things more and more clearly, and avoid becoming the kind of blind, self-righteous people who were so resentful when they encountered someone who could really see the things Jesus was showing him.
Let’s pray together: Lord, please protect us from thinking we know all we need to know about your work in the world, and from clinging blindly to our self-righteous presumptions. Open our eyes day by day to help us really see what you are trying to show us about serving you and about the life of faith. Amen.
Grace and Peace,
Henry
(The other readings for today are Psalms 149 and 150; Joshua 3:14-4:7; and Ephesians 5:1-20. Our readings come from the NIV Bible, as posted on Biblica.com, the website of the International Bible Society.)
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