Enlighten Me

Intro

Recap of Chapter 8:

Woman caught in adultery

“I AM the Light”

“Unless you believe that I AM you will die in your sins”

“You do the works of your father the devil … you do the lusts of your father“

“Because I speak the truth, you cannot hear me”

“You have a demon and are Samaritan!”

“Before Abraham was, I AM”

Now, we come to Chapter 9, and we are introduced to a man born blind as well as some of the preconceived notions of the day regarding disability.

There is one thing for us to keep in mind as we keep about this study: Watch how John points back to that “prologue” as he unfolds for us Who Jesus is!

John 9:1–12 LSB

1 As He passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. 2 And His disciples asked Him, saying, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?” 3 Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this was so that the works of God might be manifested in him. 4 “We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can work. 5 “While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” 6 When He had said this, He spat on the ground, made clay of the saliva, and rubbed the clay on his eyes, 7 and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which is translated, Sent). So he went away and washed, and came back seeing. 8 Therefore the neighbors, and those who previously saw him as a beggar, were saying, “Is not this the one who used to sit and beg?” 9 Others were saying, “This is he,” still others were saying, “No, but he is like him.” He kept saying, “I am the one.” 10 So they were saying to him, “How then were your eyes opened?” 11 He answered, “The man who is called Jesus made clay, and rubbed my eyes, and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash’; so when I went away and washed, I received sight.” 12 And they said to him, “Where is He?” He said, “I do not know.”

Who Sinned?

As they walked past a blind man, they asked a very peculiar question… What was it? Why do you think they asked it?

They believed that those who were born with disability were under some form of curse by God

Jesus tells them that no one had sinned to cause the blindness — for what reason does Jesus give that he was born that way?

The glory of God!

How does that make you feel, that God would create this affliction unto His glory?

Have you any natural born afflictions you wish you didn’t have?

The thing is: there is no objective goodness or badness in our natural afflictions. God is the author of life and the body and the brain! And He can make it and use it however He desires! For this blind man, he had been born and placed just in the right time and place for God to be glorified in Christ the Lord — and he serves and an object lesson of sorts. First, hear what John Chrysostom says:

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers 1.14: Saint Chrysostom: Homilies on the Gospel of St. John and Epistle to the Hebrews Homily LVI

“What,” saith some one, “did he suffer wrong for the glory of God?” What wrong, tell me? For what if God had never willed to produce him at all? But I assert that he even received benefit from his blindness: since he recovered the sight of the eyes within. What were the Jews profited by their eyes? They incurred the heavier punishment, being blinded even while they saw. And what injury had this man by his blindness? For by means of it he recovered sight. As then the evils of the present life are not evils, so neither are the good things good; sin alone is an evil, but blindness is not an evil.

Jesus, Creator and Restorer

There are two things that resound to me about what Jesus is doing here — and we will see even more next week about these.

Who created you?

Jesus! “Nothing that has been created was created apart from Him”

The man before Jesus was not born blind apart from His knowing about it! That being said, the very creator eye-sight was standing there before the blind man, and He showed compassion and mercy to Him by granting him that vision. Notice, He uses dirt!

But, was it only for physical vision that this man’s eyes were restored?

Jesus, the Enlightener

John 1:9–10 LSB

9 There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens everyone. 10 He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.

John 1:3–5 LSB

3 All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. 5 And the Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it.

In John 1, Jesus is shown all the way back there to be the great Light of the Word!

What does light do?

Gives the ability to see!

Do you remember the philosophical implications of John’s words here?

Jesus provides men with true enlightenment, as v. 9 says. Not just the vision of our physical eyes, but the ability to perceive truth and reality concerning the things of God and spirituality. Darkness is metaphorically used for the condition of those walking in sin — John says in his first epistle that the one who hates his brother walks in darkness and does not know where he is going. In Christ Jesus, we have received the true Light that we do know the way in which we should go, and it leads to God!

This blind man before Him was not just used to provide yet another miracle, but what did Jesus say as He made clay?

“I am the Light of the world” — the same which He said in the previous chapter in the closing moments of the Feast of Tabernacles among the Menorah.

He is the way unto God, His is the way in which we must walk, He is the true One in which we find real life and enlightenment.

What other kinds of things have men sought to find enlightenment in?

Anything else is, at best, to see through a blurry lens. Only Christ, the Incarnate God among us Who loved us and gave Himself for us, is the place wherein we will ever find true enlightenment and sight to see reality!

But, truth looks like fools to those content with lies! This is why the world hates us. They cannot see — yet we can live in such a way as to show the Light to them!

Conclusion

From these first 12 verses in chapter 9 I want us to come away knowing in our hearts that whatever you feel is “wrong” with you is something which God can use unto His glory! It is not an evil, but a tool to be used that the truth of our Lord can be seen and known!

The world will see the light of Christ in His Church if only we know in our hearts and trust Him that He is the Light! Are we living our lives believing that He is truth, and pursuing Him? Are we living each breath love Him and love like Him?

Even with our flaws, when we live unto His glory with them — or if we are healed of them! — we can show that in Him is life itself, and that life is the Light of men, that He is one Who shows us and opens our eyes to the greatest truths and reality