Why?

Have you ever caught yourself asking God why something happened or maybe going you know this would have been a lot better.

This past week I found a few prayers that children wrote down as prayers they prayed to God, and they were in this category.

Here were a few of them:

Dear God, Thank you for my baby brother, but what I prayed for was a puppy.

Dear God, I do not think anybody could be a better God. Well I just want you to know, but I am not just saying that because you are God.

Dear God, Maybe Cain and Abel would not kill each other so much if they had their own rooms,It works with my brother

Dear God, Did you mean for giraffes to look lik that or was it an accident?

And there was another one that I found multiple places which was: Why did you make misquotes?

I wonder that too.

But you know kids are not the only ones that ask God questions,

I mean I think every person hear probably has tons of questions that we would love to ask God.

And if I had to guess probably one of the biggest questions we face is the question: why do bad things happen?

If God is good why their sickness?

Why is my marriage struggling?

Why is do terrible things happen?

Why am I wrestleing with anxiety or depression?

Why is their death

Because this does not seem like something God will allow to happen.

And so today what we are going to be doing we will be looking at a story found in John 9:1-44 and this passage begins to give us an answer to this question.

And so we will just be starting in the first 3 verses and look what it says:

John 9:1–3 NIV

1 As 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 him.

So just to give some context Jesus just walked out of the temple and outside the temple was a place where begers would often sit because they realized that the Jewish people would be more likely to help them then others.

And so Jesus exits and as he walking he runs into this blind man, who most likely was someone asking for money.

And we do not know a ton about this blind man other then he was blind from birth.

And this does not go with everything else we are talking about but

Here is this blind man (who was considered low in society) (labeled unimportant by this culture)

And Jesus comes to him.

You might feel unimportant, or unloved, but Jesus will not look the other way, but he comes.

And let me get back because Jesus’s disciples ask Him a question and they say Jesus who sinned this man or his parents,

Because back in this time they had beliefs that probably a lot of people today had that were simaler to karma,

You do good things and God will make everything go great in life,

But if something bad happens in your life, well you probably did something bad

And this is really bad theology, because bad things happen everyone, and sometimes its our fault, but sometimes your car breaks down, because your car breaks down.

And really its because we live in a fallen world.

We talked about this a few weeks ago,

The way God created the world in Genesis, was beautiful.

There was no sickness, death, gossip , but everything was how God created it

But as sin entered the world, things changed quickly, because all of the sudden things were turned upside down.

And because of sin in the world things quickly became broken.

And to often we go why would God do this and we forget that God is not the one that causes the brokeness and heartache in our world, but He is moving in the middle of it.

Did you catch Jesus’s answer to the disciples in verse 3?

Because they disciples are speculating but then Jesus says it is so the work of God can be displayed in Him.

God is not sitting on the sidelines going wow thats rough, but He is working even in the middle of lifes situations that flip our world upside down.

Its kind of like this anyone ever hear of magnatiles?

Liam and Finn love these things.

And Liam gets really into it, and Finn really likes knocking down all that Liam builds.

And Liam gets really angry, and if I do not step Liam will either resort to violance, stop playing, and he will just be bitter at the world.

But what I am trying to teach Liam is year this is sad, I don’t want to take away that it stinks you just watched this thing destroyed, but the beautiful thing about Magnatiles is that you can put them back together and make something new.

And in our life so often its easy to sit in our brokenness, but when we sit in our brokenness it becomes easy to miss how God is moving in the middle of the brokenness that we face.

I never want to take away how broken a part of our life can be, but I want to make sure that we understand that even in the brokenness God is moving.

Lets jump down to verse 6 and 7 because it says this:

John 9:6–7 (NIV)

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.

So Jesus does something a little odd.

He spits in the dirt, makes mud and then rubs it on the mans eyes.

Does anyone else read that and go what in the world was that Jesus?!

Why was that nescasssary?!

I mean I am not a germophope, but that definitly crosses a line.

So you guys want to know why Jesus does this?

We don’t know…

There are some guesses that maybe Jesus is trying to rebel against the pharasees because its the sabbath or that he is doing other things, but ultimatly no one knows why Jesus decides to put his spit mud in this guys eyes.

But I think this gives us a really important point.

We do not always understand how God is moving in the middle of the situation, but we know He is moving.

because we cannot see everything.

I mean have you ever put directions in your phone and you go I know thats wrong, I am going my own way.

And then you get to a piece of contruction and all the sudden you go wow thats why it was that way!

What looks like God spitting in your eye so often has a bigger purpose.

And what I love about this is its a process, because Jesus then told him to go wash in a pool.

And this man could have went “you just spit in the dirt, made mud and rubbed it on my eyes!”

I am not doing anything you tell me.

But instead he does something different, because he actually goes to the pool and he came home being able to see.

He kept saying yes to God whether he understood it or not.

There is another pastor I am a friend with and He has an issue where he suffers from Chrionic migraines and he has a servere migraine at least 22 days out of a month.

And He actually works through it, and He often will say I do not understand why this happens other then the fact that I have no choice but to trust God and realize in my weakness, He is strong.

And lets get back into the story, because the blind mans healed, and its a maricle (in fact this would have completely changed His life), because not only can he see but he can begin to work (because that was not an option in this culture)

And what ends up happening is people have started to notice this man who used to sit outside the temple blind is now walking around.

And some people are going “no he just looks like him”

And others are saying “no thats him!”

And eventually the religous leaders are interested and they actuaally go to the parents and go was your son actually born blind?

Was he just faking the past 38 years or was this real?

And they tell them “yeah he was blind” but why don’t you ask him about it?”

Because He could probably tell you.

And look at verses 24-25 because it says this:

John 9:24–25 (NIV)

24 A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. “Give glory to God by telling the truth,” they said. “We know this man is a sinner.”

25 He replied, “Whether he is a sinner or not, I don’t know. One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!”

So they are skeptical of Jesus but this man has probably the most simple testimony in the world.

Read this outloud with me:

… I don’t know. One Thing I do know. I was blind, but now I see”

You know there is something really powerful about this testimony, because its so simple but so powerful.

Because you can debate on beliefs but when you say “I might not know everything, but I can tell you what God has done in my life”

Because this is what I have seen.

And I think this is one of main ways God especially uses the broken pieces in our world to make somethin g beautiful,

Because I can do okay at comforting someone who is going through a tough time,

But it is nothing compared to someone who has went through a situation like that.

I really think this is part of the reason why we are called to gather because God know our stories encourage eachother and push us closr to him.

Your testimonies and life stories are so important, because there is probably someone here going through what you are.

And I just want to point out one last thing because throughout this story if you go back and read the entire thing

one thing you will notice is the Pharisees are always asking how did this happen?

How is this possible?

And I think this is where we get caught up as well.

But I think so often while the how is interesting, the more important part is the “who”

In fact Jesus at the end of this passage mentions that the religous leaders have a bigger problem then physical blindness, because they are spiritually blind.

This morning as we close I think sometimes we get caught up in these questions that I mentioned in the begining.

And they are valid questions, I will never say that what your going through is not valid and terrible, and I wish it was not haappening.

But I think too often we loose focus on who is moving in the middle of it.

And as we close I think to often we feel like God is so disconnected from our pain,

And we forget the He came down, Fully God, Fully man and lived life.

He had hard moments, He experianced disappointment, He knew what pain was, He was rejected by people,

He died on the cross

And this morning maybe there is a pain in your life, maybe its your kids, and maybe the unthinkable has happened, can I just encourage you this morning that God is right there with you and He knows exactly what it is your experiancing.

And so as we close we will be singing this song called “Weep with me”

And I think its a good place for us this morning as we begin finish worshiping this morning, because you might be mourning, but we have a God who is with us and is picking up this mess (use magna tiles) where we may only see brokeness and is working it for good.

And you will notice that we will also be closing by recieving communion and its a little different this week. Its at your table instead of up front.