Healing a Man Born Blind

[Read John 9:1-41]

What is the largest hindrance to sharing the gospel with people in the community or in your workplace? What’s the main thing that holds you back from doing it? Now, this may not be true for all of you, but for many of the people I talk to about this, two concerns come up by far the most: 1) they’re afraid that some form of conflict will come as a result of attempts to witness, or 2) they feel completely unequipped to share the gospel with people. Our passage this morning, this story about the healing of a man born blind, answers both of those concerns in a powerful way. On the one hand, we’re going to see a man who has been a beggar his whole life—a man who has no education, no power or authority, no status in the community—being a faithful witness to Jesus Christ. On the other hand, we’re going to see the conflict that arises from this faithful witness.

That’s something we need to understand. Conflict is going to happen. When we are faithfully witnessing about Jesus Christ, conflict will come. I think it’s really important for us to get this pounded into our hearts and minds. It’s important because I think many Christians expect they will be able to avoid any conflict when it comes to their Christian faith. To make things worse, many Christians today think that conflict is a sign that they are not being faithful to Jesus Christ—if people get angry at them because of their witness, they think they must have done something wrong. This is why we’re constantly avoiding any forms of conflict and not really sharing our faith.

Yet, Jesus says this in this passage: “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” (John 9:39, ESV). There are those in the world who will eventually see, but there are those in the world who will increasingly become blind. There’s a division here and it’s a division that occurs because of Jesus. We see this continually throughout the gospels. Even in this passage we read: “And there was a division among them.” (John 9:16, ESV). This is why Jesus says elsewhere: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.” (Matthew 10:34–35, ESV). There is division in the world because of Jesus. It’s there and it’s not going to go away.

That means that it is wrong for us to attempt to go through life without any conflict. Actually, it means that it’s unfaithful to attempt to go through life without any conflict. It also means that being afraid of conflict cannot be our excuse for not sharing the gospel. We have to learn how to enter into the conflict and to engage in the conflict and continue to be a bold and faithful witness in the midst of the conflict. And, to be honest, the blind, uneducated beggar in this story gives us a picture of how to do that very thing.

Remember how last week’s passage ended. They picked up stones to stone Jesus because he had just claimed to be God, but he hid himself and went out of the temple. In the flow of the story, it seems like Jesus left the temple with his disciples, and as they were heading out of the temple they saw this man who had been born blind. That makes complete sense because many of the poor, weak, and needy begged outside the temple. When they saw this man, the disciples had a question for Jesus: “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” (John 9:2, ESV). This question flows from an understanding that all illness and sickness is the result of someone’s personal sin—either their’s or the parents. Since this man had been born blind, it seems as though this was the result of the parent’s sin.

However, Jesus responds: “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.” (John 9:3, ESV). This is a powerful statement by Jesus, but it’s often taken too far by some people. I’ve heard many people take this passage and say, “Jesus is teaching that sickness and illness NEVER are the result of someone’s personal sin” and that’s just not true. Actually, Jesus isn’t even addressing the broader question about whether sickness and illness are the result of someone’s sin, he’s specifically answering the question about this man. And for this man, his blindness was not the result of his own sin, nor the sin of his parents. Jesus actually never talks about the cause of the blindness. Jesus talks about the way God will use the blindness. This man’s blindness is going to be used to display the works of God.

I think it’s important for us to understand this clearly because sometimes our own sinfulness causes harm to ourselves and other people. Sometimes that is actually the root issue. However, we know that’s not the only cause of these things. We know that from the book of Job. However, even if we don’t always know the cause of sickness, illness, and trials in our lives, we can know one thing for certain: For those who love God and are called according to his purposes, He will use those sicknesses and illnesses for our good and for his glory. We can know that for certain.

So, Jesus goes on to show the powerful work of God in this man’s life. What’s really powerful about this story is that we never hear the man request anything from Jesus. Jesus just takes the initiative here. We read: “Having said these things, he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man’s eyes with the mud and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). So he went and washed and came back seeing.” (John 9:6–7, ESV).

This is such an interesting reaction from Jesus on so many levels. On the one hand, what’s up with the spitting and the mud? Jesus has healed people before without doing those things. So, why is he doing them here? Also, as we’re going to see later, Jesus could have caused way less problems—avoided a TON of conflict—if he would have just healed the man without making the mud because it was the making of the mud that broke the Pharisees sabbath rules. So, why does Jesus do this?

Two reasons. First, it seems as though Jesus does this to test the man’s faith. In all honesty, it seems like Jesus is making the man’s blindness worse by packing his eyes full of mud. Yet, when he tells the man to go and wash in the pool, the man does it without hesitation. He believed Jesus and obeyed (connecting this to the last two week’s of sermons). Second, I believe Jesus does this to cause some conflict with the Pharisees. He knows they are going to get wound up about making the mud. He could have avoided it by just healing the man, but he doesn’t. He intentionally gets the Pharisees riled to reveal the division that exists—some will see and some will increasingly go blind. As Jesus says at the end of this passage, “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” (John 9:39, ESV).

And what we see flowing from this miracle is a TON of blindness. We see blindness coming from neighbors and friends and we see blindness coming from the Pharisees. This man’s friends and neighbors are all sorts of confused, trying to figure out what actually happened. They are honestly questioning if this is the right guy or not. So, they bring him to the Pharisees, to see if they can figure things out. They question the man about what happened—but really they are not questioning him. They have already made up their minds that a miracle didn’t happen. In reality, they are just interrogating him, hoping that he will contradict himself or say something that will incriminate him. That’s why we read, “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” (John 9:18, ESV). The parents testify that this is their son, that he was born blind, and that he can now see but they don’t say much more than that.

We’re given an explanation for why they are so hesitant to say anything else. We read: “(His parents said these things because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Jesus to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue.)” (John 9:22, ESV). That’s a really big deal. This isn’t just talking about being asked to leave the synagogue for a moment. This is talking about complete excommunication. Anybody who confessed that Jesus was the Christ, anyone who confessed that Jesus was the Messiah, was going to be removed from the community. Talk about conflict and pressure. This is intense stuff. This is the kind of stuff that Christians are dealing with in Muslim countries today. If they confess Jesus as the Messiah, they risk complete ostracization from their family, from their community, and possible death. I think it’s important to realize this because that’s the kind of tension/conflict in this passage between the Jewish leaders and the parents and the man who had been healed. They are risking everything in this moment. Keep that in mind as we go through the rest of this passage because it changes the way you understand the healed man’s responses—it elevates his level of faithful witness in this moment.

I mean, when the Jewish leaders bring him back in, they are coming at him HARD. They say, “Give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner.” (John 9:24, ESV). This is their way of saying, “You better not dishonor God by saying Jesus is the Messiah. You better not say what we think you’re going to say. You better agree with us that he’s a sinner.” Later on they move from accusing Jesus to accusing the healed man: “You were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?” (John 9:34, ESV). They are attacking him and accusing him and threatening him with everything they have. Everything is on the line in this interaction.

And this humble, beggar boldly gives his witness to Jesus Christ. It’s beautiful. I love this line right at the beginning: “Whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.” (John 9:25, ESV). He’s not going to dive into their accusations. He’s not going to play their games. He’s just going to tell them what he knows. He knows what Jesus has done in his life. He knows that Jesus has done a miraculous healing in his life and he isn’t afraid of talking about it.

This is what it means to be a witness, and this is why nobody can actually make the excuse that they are not equipped or qualified to witness with people in the world. Witnessing is as simple as saying, “I’m not sure about all of those things you’ve been talking about, but I know one thing: Jesus has saved me and changed me. I can talk to you about that. I can tell you about what Jesus has done in my life.” That’s witnessing and every Christian can talk about that. You don’t have to be a pastor, you don’t need a college education, or even a middle school education. You just need to talk about what Jesus has done for you. That’s it. Don’t overcomplicate it. Just faithfully and boldly go into the world ready to witness about what Jesus has done in your life.

I also appreciate the next thing this man does in his witness. He calls them out for their hardness of heart and he does it by mocking them—by making fun of them. He says, “I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?” (John 9:27, ESV). That got ‘em wound up. Yet, this shows you this man’s confidence and boldness in the midst of a very tense situation. Remember, everything is on the line here for him. If he doesn’t do what they want him to do, and if he keeps on saying things they don’t want him to say, he’s going to get kicked out of the Jewish community. Yet, he doesn’t enter into that difficulty afraid, or worried, or anxious, but he enters into it with enough confidence and sass that he rebukes the people who are about to throw him out for their hardness of heart—and he rebukes them by mocking them. That’s why we read: “And they cast him out.” (John 9:34, ESV).

Yet, what follows is even more beautiful. We read, “Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and having found him he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”” (John 9:35, ESV). When Jesus heard that they had cast him out, Jesus went and found him. Jesus wanted this man to truly understand the reason for the miracle. Remember, we’ve been saying this throughout this series. The miracles are not the ultimate goal—the miracles themselves are witnesses to who Jesus IS. So, Jesus doesn’t just want this man to physically see. He wants this man to spiritually see the truth as well. So, he seeks him out, reveals himself as the Messiah and we see the man’s response: “He said, “Lord, I believe,” and he worshiped him.” (John 9:38, ESV).

The passage ends where we began, with Jesus saying, “Jesus said, “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” Some of the Pharisees near him heard these things, and said to him, “Are we also blind?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would have no guilt; but now that you say, ‘We see,’ your guilt remains.” (John 9:39–41, ESV).

This is the point of this entire story and it actually helps us understand how this passage connects with our previous passages. Remember what the point has been throughout chapter 8: Who are truly Jesus’ disciples? What does true faith look like? And Jesus has been making the point that some have true faith and that there are others who think they have true faith but don’t. Now, we see that division played out clearly in this story. We see the absolute blindness of the Pharisees, who think they can see and we see a blind man truly seeing. The division between the truly blind and those who can now see is made very clear—and the division brought significant conflict with it.

This passage causes us to ask ourselves a few questions. The first question is: Which one are we? Are we those who think we see, but are continually becoming blind? OR are we those who are blind but continually being healed so that we can see? That’s the division in the world right now and every one of us is one or the other. Ridderbos explains this division well when he says, “If you were lacking only in your ability to see, that would not be a sin and would not stand in the way of your being healed…But in their case things are not that simple. They think: ‘We can see, we need no other light nor anyone to save us from the darkness.’” (Ridderbos, 351). That’s the division. The division is between blind people who admit their blindness and blind people who think they can see. Which one are you? Are you a blind person who is reaching out to Jesus for healing? Or are you someone who thinks they’ve got this under control? That’s the division.

That’s also the point of our witness. Our witness is about helping people see that they are actually blind. They think they can see, but they can’t and if they continue down that road they will increasingly go blind. We need to continually tell people, “I once was blind, but now I see.” We need to continually tell people about the work that Jesus Christ has done in our life and witness to him. And we need to do that with boldness and confidence and do it unashamed.

And you don’t have to be an expert to do that. All you have to say is, “I don’t know about that. I don’t have all of the answers. All I can do is tell you about what Jesus has done in my life. I once was blind, but now I see.” That’s what it means to be a faithful and bold witness in the world.

And, to be honest, that witness will get us into conflict with other people because when we say that, we’re calling them blind—and people don’t like to be called blind. And, to be honest, that witness will get us kicked out of a few places. The world is divided by Jesus Christ. It’s better that we get kicked out of unfaithful places so that we can faithfully be with Jesus. We can have the comfort and confidence that, just like the man in this story, when we get kicked out of unfaithful places, Jesus will seek us out and be with us and give us what we need.