Verse 47 leaped off the page at me as I scrolled down through the ESV of John 8 one more time: "Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God." So true! Those whose hearts are not inclined to God - who don't share His life within them, are spiritually blinded and cannot 'hear' Him. It takes the power of the Holy Spirit to draw people to Jesus, and we invite His intervention power through intercessory prayer!
Chapter 9 opens with Jesus walking with His disciples in Jerusalem. As they passed a blind beggar, Jesus' disciples asked Him, "Who sinned, this man of his parents that he was born blind?"
What a question! It implies that a disability is a punishment for sin. And - - asking if the baby sinned before he was even born? Preposterous! Their question bared a view that was common in their culture, which extended far more expansively than just to disabilities. They believed that suffering of any sort could be traced to sin. In one sense they are right. It can be traced to original sin! But, to bring it down to the personal level - and even infer it might have been the baby! Preposterous!
Jesus' response shows that this man - even though he had to suffer - had a purpose, and that the purpose of his being blind was so the works of God could be displayed in him. With that, Jesus mixed His spit with dirt and applied the mud He had made to the man's eyes. Then He told him to go wash in the Pool of Siloam.
Spit, dirt, mud....on his eyes? Really? The creator who had formed man out of the dust of the earth at creation used his medium of mud-art in this healing! The blind man didn't question Jesus' method. He went and did as told. He had to be very near the pool, for he went, and washed, and came back seeing. I love His obedience. I love the visual of going from eyes that are totally blinded and encrusted with the things of this world (literal mud) to sighted eyes that see Jesus for the first time!
The practice of the day was to bring those who had disabilities to the gates of the city where passers-by would see them, take pity on them - or at least assuage their consciences, and throw a few coins into their waiting cups.
On this particular Sabbath, Jesus very intentionally chose this specific man and healed him. The neighbors of the man - and those who had walked past him time after time weren't sure he was the same man....
The formerly blind man's first witness was to say to them, "I am the man."
Then they asked how he had received his sight, and he told them the story, just as it had happened. "The man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me, 'Go to Siloam and wash.' So I went and washed and received my sight."
So these good rule followers brought the now sighted man to the Pharisees so they could interrogate him in front of the authorities, and they did! He gave them the Cliff notes' version that time, "He put mud on my eyes, and I washed, and I see."
And, some of the Pharisees, who obviously cared far more about their rules than the man whose amazing transformation was apparent, said, "This man is not from God, for He does not keep the Sabbath." But others said, "How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?" So they were divided, and deferred to the man who had been healed for his opinion. His response was, "He is a prophet."
They didn't believe he really was the man who had been blind, so they called his parents and asked them, "Is this your son who you say was born blind?" His parents affirmed that he was indeed their son, and that he had been born blind - but they deferred to their son to give his own answers because they were afraid to lose their status. The Pharisees had already made it known that if anyone confessed Jesus to be the Messiah he was to be forbidden access to the synagogue.
So, after talking to the man's parents, the Pharisees called the man before them a second time. They instruct him, "Give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner."
He answered, "Whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, is that though I was blind, now I see."
They persist in their questioning, and they get a fiery response. This man's healing encompassed more than his eyes! He was blind from birth - a nothing in society - led daily to the gates to beg - as familiar to those who passed him by as the stones and olive trees they regularly passed. But, wow, does he get his voice fast....
"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?"
Their put-down in response was, "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."
I'm pretty certain there was a little edge in the man's voice in his resulting response to the Pharisees: "Why this is an amazing 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 if anyone is a worshipper of God and does his will, God listens to him. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing." (I wonder how many times he had been told that as the reason he was blind...that God does not listen to sinners....*)
And for his invective, they cast him out of the synagogue, which was the thing his parents most wanted to avoid for themselves....
The man went from being a second class, very judged citizen for his blindness - to being cast out of the synagogue for witnessing to his healing. What a day! But it wasn't over. Jesus heard about the man being cast out and found him. "Do you believe in the Son of Man," Jesus asked him.
"Who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?"
Jesus said to him, "You have seen him and it is he who is speaking to you."
The man responded, "Lord, I believe," and he worshiped Him. That would have been the proper response for the Pharisees, and for the man's parents. It wasn't. But it was for the man!
What Jesus said next is a riddle for those who do not see: "For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind." And his response to the listening Pharisees question, "Are we also blind?" continues the riddle: "If you were blind, you would have no guilt; but now that you say, 'We see' your guilt remains."
The words from Chapter 8 that I quoted at the beginning of today's entry resonate clearly in the Pharisees' refusal to receive Jesus.
Words from any old song wend through my mind...
Once I was blind, but now I can see
The light of the world is Jesus!
One wee postscript: I'm grateful God listens to sinners! He hears their plea for His mercy and their heartfelt prayer asking for forgiveness and to live a new life in Christ! I know because He heard me!
I also wonder about this man. How many times he had prayed for a miracle.... If he had heard the stories about Jesus' healing others.... I guess I'll have to ask him when we meet in heaven....
And one final note: The Pool of Siloam was just unearthed in 2005. Israel is one huge excavation site, and the more they unearth, the more clarity we have to specific locations mentioned in the Bible. You can check it out online....
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