The Blind, the Deaf, and the Dead
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Luke 9:1-41; 10:1-42; 11:1-12:11
If I am not doing My Father’s works, don’t believe Me. But if I am doing them and you don’t believe Me, believe the works. This way you will know and understand that the Father is in Me and I in the Father.”
Point: Jesus is the same in essence as the Father. Religion does not equal restoration. Only a relationship with Christ equals resurrection! Do I believe in Him?
Hosanna in the Highest! The spotless Lamb is come! Glory to God! Sin is to be forgiven and taken away! The crowd lines the street as the spotless lamb is led through the streets to the ultimate place of sacrifice. Jesus enters Jerusalem at the same time, at the perfect time, as palm branches are waved, cloaks laid before Him, His praises sung, His story shared of the miracles He has performed. It is the Passover Festival. The sins of the nation placed upon the sacrificial lamb. The blood of the lamb sacrificed for the sin of the nation. Atonement…covering…forgiveness…wilderness…redemption and resurrection! It would be a Passover like nonother before it or after it.
Jesus enters Jerusalem having made Himself known by miracles of power in word and deed. Water has been changed into wine, people fed, the blind see, the paralyzed walk, those out of their minds put right, the dead, and nearly dead, have risen, in power and strength. Lazarus the dead, walks beside Jesus, a living testimony of his divinity. People believe, Jesus is the prophet, the Promised One, the Holy One from God, the long awaited Messiah! He will be KIng! He will claim His throne! The Romans will be removed, destroyed, and dejected. Our King has finally come! On a horse....no on donkey, a foal, a beast of burden. An animal of humility, of the poor, of burden…not of war, royalty, or a king. This is the Messiah! Your Messiah…our Messiah.
Jesus Heals the Blind (John 9)
Blindman Theology: God listens to those who worship Him and obey His will. God does not listen to sinners (John 9:31).
Belief and teaching of the Jewish religious leaders
No one who is of God would do work on the Sabbath, after all the Sabbath was established by God.
Their perspective is that man is made for the Sabbath and Jesus says the Sabbath is made for man.
In order for people not to violate the Sabbath, the religious leaders put in place “fence laws” to protect people from violating the Sabbath. Man-made laws to protect man from violating God’s will.
Anyone who does work on the Sabbath is not a person of God, nor is God with them. If they were, they would not violate God’s Sabbath, or man’s rules to protect the Sabbath of God.
So for the second time they called the man who had been blind, and they said to him, “Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner.”
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 person born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.”
If Jesus is a sinner, and we know that God does not listen to sinners, how is it that Jesus could open my eyes, a person born blind from birth, of which we have never heard anybody be healed of such a condition? If this Jesus were not from God, He should not be able to do so. But because He has, Jesus is no sinner, but who He claims to be…One with God, of the same essense, therefore God.
To be born blind, was to be one of sin, it was to have parents who were sinners. It was to have encurred the wrath of God. Judgment already passed, social outcasts, social periah. The religious rulers and teachers would be aware, make you an example, cast their judgments, formulate their theology and teachings of God.
The blind man is well aware of his ranking, his status, his judgment…the stones. His life is lived on begging, humiliation, and handouts. The man does not have to beg for the mercy of Jesus though. Jesus removes the label of unwanted, unloved, sinner and replaces it with a child loved, healed, and a miracle of grace. His life was to serve as a sign of God’s grace, God’s mercy, God’s love, Jesus’ divinity.
“Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” Jesus answered. “This came about so that God’s works might be displayed in him. We must do 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.”
As long as Jesus is in the world, He is the light of the world. His miracles pointed to His person. His recorded miracles point to His person. His Word not points to His person. Do we believe His Word? For night has come, miracles are few and far inbetween. Belief is the requirment…faith.
The blind man’s sight would become the blindness of the religious. Those who thought they knew God, didn’t know God at all. Do we know God? Do we believe the miracles? Do we believe this word of God? The Holy Spirit points to the Word, the Word points to the miracles, the miracles point to Jesus. Are we blind, dead, or dumb?
“This is an amazing thing,” the man told them. “You don’t know where He is from, yet He opened my eyes! We know that God doesn’t listen to sinners, but if anyone is God-fearing and does His will, He listens to him. Throughout history no one has ever heard of someone opening the eyes of a person born blind. If this man were not from God, He wouldn’t be able to do anything.”
If Jesus were not from God the Father, He would not have been able to do anything. Jesus asks a simple question of the man once born blind, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
When Jesus heard that they had thrown the man out, He found him and asked, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
Even though you have been thrown out, restricted, cut off from society, who do you say I Am? Are you willing to confess your belief in Me? “I believe, Lord.”
“I believe, Lord!” he said, and he worshiped Him.
Are we willing to be cut off, cast out, resticted from society because we confess Jesus as Lord and will follow Him? Religion makes no difference unless it is a living relationship with Christ.
Jesus said,
Jesus said, “I came into this world for judgment, in order that those who do not see will see and those who do see will become blind.”
The blind sinner receives the truth and sees; the self-righteous person rejects the truth and becomes even more blind spiritually. Are we blind, dead, or dumb? If we claim to know Christ, but yet do not follow Him, we are blinder than the blind man, and dumber than the religious men.
Jesus Raises the Dead (John 10)
If Jesus was a sinner, therefore not God, nor heard by God, how could He raise the dead?
So they removed the stone. Then Jesus raised His eyes and said, “Father, I thank You that You heard Me. I know that You always hear Me, but because of the crowd standing here I said this, so they may believe You sent Me.”
After He said this, He shouted with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out bound hand and foot with linen strips and with his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Loose him and let him go.”
Jesus affirms that He is no sinner, that He is the same divine of God, because the Father always hears Him. He speaks out loud so that the crowd around Him would believe that God the Father sent Him. Lazarus is raised so that we would believe in the divinity of Christ. Do I believe?
Jesus says to Martha, “Didn’t I tell you if you believed you would see the glory of God?” (John 9:40) Those who believe the words of Jesus will see the glory of God. Do I believe the words of Jesus? We will see Lazarus arise and be unbound. But do we believe, or are we blind, dead, or dumb?
Lazarus is a picture of the lost sinner given life, salvation.
He was dead (11:14) - spiritually dead (Eph 2:1-3; Col 2:13)
And when you were dead in trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive with Him and forgave us all our trespasses.
And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler who exercises authority over the lower heavens, the spirit now working in the disobedient. We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children under wrath as the others were also.
He was decayed (11:39)
He was Raised and Given Life (11:41-44) - because Jesus loved him and because it brought glory to God (John 5:25)
“I assure you: An hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.
He was loosed (11:44) - we are not to be bound by graveclothes of our old life, but should walk in the freedom of new life (Col 3:1-17).
So if you have been raised with the Messiah, seek what is above, where the Messiah is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on what is above, not on what is on the earth.
He witnessed to others (11:45) - Lazarus didn’t hide himself, he showed himself. He witnessed to the person of Christ, by the power of a raised life. Are you witnessing to the person of Christ, by the power of your raised life? Did the people just come to see Jesus on that Palm Sunday, or also the raised person of Lazarus walking with Christ?
Therefore we were buried with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in a new way of life.
He fellowshipped with Christ (12:1-2) - six days before the Passover Lazarus is feasting with Christ as the banquet table. That is the destination of each believer and follower of Christ, to sit at His banqueting table at the end of time (Luke 14:15-24; Eph. 2:5-6).
made us alive with the Messiah even though we were dead in trespasses. You are saved by grace! Together with Christ Jesus He also raised us up and seated us in the heavens,
The fellowship of Christ consists of three practices in a believer’s walk: worship/listening (Mary), work/service (Martha), and walk/testimony (Lazarus). How are we modeling these things in our Christian life?
He was persecuted (12:10-11) - Lazarus was hated by the Jews, and they had plans to kill him, because he convinced other’s of Christ’s diety by simply standing above ground. The Sadducees, who were the chief priests, did not believe in the resurrection, and Lazarus was living proof that they were wrong! “Satan always fights a living miracel that testifies on God’s behalf” -Rev. Warren Wiersbe
If we are not suffering some kind of persecution for being a witness for Christ, are we being a witness for Christ?
Sheep are not Deaf to the Shepherd’s Voice (John 10)
“I did tell you and you don’t believe,” Jesus answered them. “The works that I do in My Father’s name testify about Me. But you don’t believe because you are not My sheep. My sheep hear My voice, I know them, and they follow Me.
The religious, and those who are not of Jesus’ flock, do not hear His voice. They do not respond to His voice. No belief, no response.
In the Middle East, shepherds used sheepfolds to keep their flock safe at night. It was a simple stone wall, maybe ten feet high, and had one enterance, where the shepherd served at the door. The shepherd would lay in the door way and block intruders from coming in, and the sheep from straying out. The gathering of sheep was called the fold.
Thiefs, strangers and animals may try to steal the sheep, but the sheep would not easily follow, especially someone or something they did not recognize. But they learnt their shepherd’s voice, and learnt to respond to the shepherd’s voice.
True sheep of the true shepherd respond to, and follow Jesus. These religious leaders were not the true shepherds. Were they protecting the fold, or were they looking out for themselves? Were they abusing the sheep, or feeding the sheep? When they spoke did the sheep respond to their voice with joy and enthusiasm? Or with dread, fear, and trembling? When danger came, did they protect the flock? Would they give their own lives for theirs? We can see by their actions with the blind man and Lazarus that they were false shepherds.
When Jesus spoke, and did, the sheep were responding and following. Do we know Jesus’ voice, do we know His Word? Satan steals sheep, kills sheep, leads sheep astray by impersonation, modulation, and impression. Why? Because he knows sheep are prone to wander, to wander from the sheepfold. So the true shepherd, is the door to the sheepfold, to protect and guide.
Jesus as the Good Shepherd:
Gives His life on the cross (Ps. 22)
He cares for the sheep (Heb 13:20; Ps 23)
He will come again for His sheep (Ps. 24; 1 Peter 5:4)
Is Jesus our Shepherd? Do we believe that He is the very essense of God the Father? Do we believe His Word that testifies to His work or miracles? It is no longer day, but night. Miracles are not common, but infrequent. To walk with the Great Shepherd, is to walk by faith Jesus, and the writer of Hebrews reminds us (Hebrews 11).
Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen. For our ancestors won God’s approval by it.
Jesus entered Jerusalem on what we know call Palm Sunday, triumphant because He had successfully revealed by His power of word and deed, His divinity. People know followed the True Shepherd. Do we? Will this Passover a celebration of His divinity, love, grace, mercy and sacrifice? Or a following of Satan’s false voice, and man’s empty traditions and stories. Who is the Shepherd of our lives?
If you cannot believe in Jesus, will you look at His works? How is it possible that a liar, a sinner, a man could do the things He did? Will we be blind, deaf, and/ or dead? Or will we come alive in Christ Jesus. This choice is each person’s alone.
Amen