Transcription
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake.
Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil, for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows. Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord my whole life long. And then our New Testament scripture comes from the Gospel of John, John chapter nine.
Hear the word of the Lord. As he was walking 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? Jesus answered, neither this man nor his parents sinned.
He was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day. Night is coming when no one can work.
As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. When he had said this, he spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and spread the mud on the man’s eyes, saying to him, go wash in the pool of Siloam. When he went and washed and came back able to see, the neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar began to ask, is this not the man who used to sit and beg? Some were saying, it is he.
Others were saying, no, but is someone like him? He kept saying, I am the man. But he kept saying, I am the man. But they kept asking him, then how were your eyes opened? He answered, the man called Jesus, made mud, spread it on my eyes, and said to me, go walk, go to Siloam, and wash.
Then I went and washed and received my sight. They said to him, where is he? He said, I do not know. They brought him to the Pharisees, the man who had been formerly been blind.
Now, it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. When the Pharisees also began to ask him how he had received his sight, he said to them, he put mud on my eyes, then I washed, and now I see. Some of the Pharisees said, this man is not from God, for he does not observe the Sabbath.
But others said, how can a man who is a sinner perform such signs? And they were divided. So they said again to the blind man, what do you say about him? It was your eyes he opened. He said, he is a prophet.
The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight and asked them, is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see? His parents answered, we know that this is our son and that he was born blind, but we do not know how it is that now he sees, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him, he is of age. He will speak for himself.
His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. Therefore, his parents said, he is of age, ask him. So for the second time, they called the man who had been born blind and they said to him, give glory to God.
We know that this man is a sinner. He answered, I do not know whether he is a sinner. I know one thing, that though I was blind, now I see.
They said to him, what did he do to you? How did he open your eyes? He answered them, I have told you already and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples? Then they reviled him saying, you are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.
The man answered, here is an astonishing thing. You do not know where he comes from and yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will.
Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a blind person who was born that way. If this man were not from God, he could not do anything. They answered him, you were born entirely in sins and are you trying to teach us? And they drove him out.
Jesus heard that they had driven him out and when he found him, he said, do you believe in the son of man? He answered, and who is he, sir? Tell me so that I may believe in him. Jesus said to him, you have seen him and the one speaking with you is he. He said, Lord, I believe and he worshiped him.
Jesus said, I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see and those who do see may become blind. Some of the Pharisees near him heard this and said to him, surely we are not blind, are we? Jesus said to them, if you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say we see, your sin remains.
This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray. Gracious God, we thank you for your word that lights our path and guides our hearts and leads us to be your servants.
Give us eyes to see and ears to hear your word as it moves through our world and into our lives. Lead us and guide us through it. In your name we pray.
That was quite a long verse, wasn’t it? Oh. Now last week, we not only had a very long passage, but we also had one with societal undercurrents of Samaritans and Jews and the arguments and the infightings that happened there. And here we’ve got some of the same baggage.
Not the exact same baggage, but baggage of cultural, societal buildings that have been built up in the lives of God’s people. Things that God didn’t necessarily command, but people had created. Now, think about the way in which there’s this undercurrent throughout this of nobody wants to give a clear answer.
Nobody gives the Pharisees a really clear, definitive answer. There’s this sidestepping, this dipping, this dodging around that happens with a man who was born blind and his parents. And we see that directly stated when the parents say, he is our son, yes, he was born blind.
We don’t know what happened, just talk to him. They’re doing their best to not answer the question. And John tells us why this is, about the banning from the synagogue, being cast out, being ostracized and separated.
Now, this is not the same as being told, you cannot come to worship in church until you repent. Something weird like that. No, this is, you are cast out of the community of believers.
Out of your worshiping, your living community. This is being sent away. The nearest I can assess this is if you were in an Amish community and were cast out and ostracized.
Or one of the more insular communities because for the most part, we don’t do this because of how harmful it is. Think about it. You are cast out because you declared that Jesus was the Messiah.
You can’t talk to mom and dad because they’re not a part of the community you’re a part of anymore. You can’t talk to your siblings, your friends, other parts of your family. You are on the outs because you declared that Jesus was the Messiah.
That’s at stake here. And so in the small run, this story speaks to our brothers and sisters in that early community who were cast out, who did know that their community had shunned them because they declared Jesus as Lord. Now, it’s hard to see how this plays out for us but it’s one of those pieces where we see the weaponization of faith, the weaponization of belief.
The Pharisees wield that like a sword. You can’t declare that Jesus is Lord or we will cut you off from everyone. Faith is not a weapon.
And that I think speaks to the tragedy in this but there’s another tragedy in this because the opening question, hey Jesus, who’s the sinner? Who’s to blame for this tragedy in this man’s life that he is blind? And that’s a common thing we all do. We like nice, tidy answers. We like what is the reason for this? We want to know why this happened.
And nobody likes the answer that it is just part of the world and life. It’s part of sin existing in our world that things happen like this. But we still ask questions like why do bad things happen to good people? Why do things happen? We want tidy answers.
We want clear, concise answers. We want to know who is to blame when something like this happens because we need something to blame. We can’t look at a tragedy and say that stinks and leave it there.
We can’t say that. But that’s the truth. We want clear-cut heroes, clear-cut villains.
We want bad guys. We want the good guy to win in the Western. We don’t want the guy who’s ambiguous being the one who rides off into the sunset.
And yet here we’re presented with a moment that has so much pulling at it. We have the fear of announcing who Jesus is because of the societal pressures. We have a good deed that is actually getting punished.
And we also have bad theology that blames a person for a tragedy. And before we dismiss the reality of this blame game, this happens even now when tragedies happen. When Sarah and I lost our son, Luca, we had to go into pastoral care mode as we’re dealing with that because our congregation had people asking, well, how could this happen? How could this happen? We love you.
You are such great people. And yet this happened in your wives. When bad things happen, guess what? They happen.
God is present in those moments. God is in those moments. And God is in this moment with this man
And what always has flabbergasted me is the work on Sunday aspect of this. Have you paid attention to that? What is it that Jesus gets into trouble with? He broke the Sabbath. He hawked a loogie on the ground, mixed it up and put it on the guy’s eyes.
If you think that’s work, I got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. The fact of the matter is they’re looking for a reason to be mad at Jesus. They are looking for any reason to go at Jesus.
He literally, and makes a little mud and puts it on the guy’s eyes. That’s not work. That’s compassion, kind of gross compassion, but it’s compassion.
And that’s what Jesus does. He isn’t worried about who’s to blame because he knows that sin is the blame. Sin is why this happens.
This is why brokenness exists across the board. And yet there’s something else that happens here. If you pay attention to this miracle, Jesus is really a minor player.
Yes, he heals the man. Yes, he gives him his sight. And I’m sure the man who is blind would say Jesus is beyond all the main player in this story.
But the main player is actually the transformation that happens for this man. And not just the transformation of him receiving his sight. Look at the man he starts out as.
He’s a beggar. Cast out by his community, sitting outside asking for assistance for alms. And then Jesus does that thing he does, making a little mud, putting it over his eyes, and telling him to go and follow.
Follow, listen to what I tell you. Faith plays a role there. And he goes and does that.
And then he’s confronted by his neighbors and the Pharisees. Were you really blind or were you making it up all these years? Well, what happened? How did you suddenly end up this way? And what happens? Well, I don’t know. He’s a prophet.
He did this and that’s it. But then they bring him back after mom and dad refuse to answer who Jesus is or who did this. And what happens with the man? All of a sudden, if you could see him grow, he has gotten taller.
Because all of a sudden, his answer is not, oh, he’s only a prophet. He’s like, I know who this guy is. You know who this guy is and you won’t say it.
But I’ll say it. He suddenly has grown in stature. He’s grown in faith.
He knows who Jesus is. And when he meets Jesus along the way, he follows him. That’s the challenge here is what happens to this man.
The growth that he shows in just a few pages. The way his faith just blossoms is absolutely beautiful. Is it beautiful that he receives his sight? Yeah.
But look at what happens and how his arc happens. He goes from outside the community, people taking pity on him, throwing him a little bit of money as they go past, looking down on him. And then he is able to see, able to live his life as he can, as he should.
And then when he’s confronted, he meekly starts out saying, well, I think he’s a prophet. But by the end, what is he doing? He’s standing up to those Pharisees. He’s leading with his chin.
He’s taking them to task and saying, I know who Jesus is. The challenge for us is a few fold. When we are challenged to admit and say who Jesus is, do we? Do we announce to our broken world that Jesus is Lord? Think about those few words and how absolutely life-changing they are.
Jesus is Lord. When someone dies and death takes a hand, we announce as his church that Jesus is Lord, not death, that Jesus is Lord, over death. When there is tragedy in our world, what do we announce? Here’s where I’m encouraging you to say it with me.
What do we announce when tragedy happens? Jesus is Lord. When good happens, what do we announce as his church? Jesus is Lord. That simple phrase, that simple statement, it’s so easy to say, and it is truly in our hearts to believe.
No matter what happens in our world, no matter how bad our world is, that one phrase, Jesus is Lord, rings out above all the darkness in it. When we look and we see tragedy in our world, when we see a school shooting, when we see planes raining bombs on children, when we see unknowing tragedy, when families have to bury children, when families have to bury brothers and sisters, we can still say, Jesus is Lord. And because of that, that is the end of everything, because no matter what happens, he is still Lord.
And he is above all else. And he is the one who gives sight to the blind, love to the unlovable, and he is our Lord. Brothers and sisters, no matter what happens, may we always be able to say that phrase, those three words, those three earth-shattering and changing words, that Jesus is.
May we live that out and remember it at all times. And now let us respond to him through our gifts.