“A Child Born Blind” John 9:1-20 10-14-07
We are all blind to some things. I believe we are blind to what we do not care about. I hear people tell me often when I talk about Lake Murray Presbyterian Church- “where is that?” If I say, “It’s the church next to the PDQ” they say, “Ohhhh, that church! I’ve been by that church a hundred times, but I’ve never been in that church before.” It is ironic that we have to be identified with a gas station that no longer sells gas. They are blind to our location because it didn’t concern them.
We are often blind to another’s point of view. We live in a highly charged society. We are deeply polarized. It showed in the lat two presidential elections, and it shows in the fever of debate these days. People do not see each others point of view and cannot hear each other’s arguments partly because we care about different things. . Republicans cannot hear the Democratic point of view, and the Democrats cannot hear the Republican point of view. Often the non-religious cannot understand the religious and the religious cannot understand the secular. It has been described that they are in “two different worlds.” John Calvin fine tuned the Biblical doctrine of predestination around this blindness that some appear to have. People are not really in two different worlds, but they are blind to each other’s view points in the same world. It is almost like the parent who is angry at the teenager and cannot listen to their excuse, and the teenager who wants to do what he wants to do so much that he cannot hear the parent’s point of view. I hear teachers and coaches who complain about parents who think their child is right no matter what kind of trouble they get into- they are blind to their faults.
IN some ways we choose to be blind about certain things. After all, we cannot know all things. My brother is an engineer, and although I went to college, he speaks a different language. I hope we will challenge our blindness to God. I hope we will care enough about God to open our eyes to Him. You are here today at least in part, because you want your eyes more open to God.
I think the Lord who opened the blind man’s eyes, is able to open our eyes to what is important, if we let Him do it.
Some are blind to The power of God. Some simply cannot believe that anything unusual happens in life. I hear some say, “Everything is a miracle.” I have said that myself. But there is a sense in which when everything is a miracle nothing is a miracle. We should be able to distinguish between someone who can hit a high A note and someone who can only hit eight notes on the scale. There are exceptions. While it is true that everything is beautiful in its own way, If everything is beautiful in the same way, we have lost our sense and appreciation of beauty.
The Pharisees didn’t want to believe in Jesus, so they didn’t want to believe in this miracle, though there were witnesses, including the man himself that everyone knew. There are many people in the church who want life to be a certain mundane way. Maybe God didn’t answer their prayers the way they wanted them to be answered, so now they don’t believe in answered prayers. They are blind. But maybe, with faith, their eyes can be opened.
The captain of the Titanic refused to believe the ship was in trouble until the water was ankle deep in the mail room. Only then was it apparent that the multi-layered hull had been pierced and the unsinkable ship was sinking. He was blind. There are people who don’t want others to have miracles because they didn’t. Because Jesus didn’t heal every blind man everywhere at once, and especially because maybe their son or daughter was still blind, therefore it couldn’t happen. Or maybe they thought Jesus a sinner because he didn’t meet their expectations. God meets his own expectations. Do not limit God. Do not put God in a box about what he should or shouldn’t do or what prayers He should answer. This is a great problem in our society. We believe we know better to judge God because He didn’t meet us the way we thought He should.
Some are blind to God because of Peer Pressure. You have seen what I have seen. Great, strong Christian young people go off to school and do not get involved with any Christian group on campus, and the pressure of drinking and immorality, or even just sleeping in leads them astray. In our passage, an amazing thing happens. The parents of this blind man were brought before the group of Pharisees. These were the people who really knew what was going on. They knew their son was born blind. They knew that he could now see. They knew that Jesus did it, too. But they weren’t about to get in trouble. You might think that the parents at least would side with the one who had healed their son. But they could not. Why couldn’t they believe in Jesus who healed their son? Why couldn’t they at least stand up for their son who was being persecuted for saying Jesus was born blind? The Pharisees were the ones who were saying things like the parents sinned and that’s why their son was born blind. Jesus was the one who said, “neither this man nor his parents sinned” (9:3). Why couldn’t they grasp the release from guilt, sin, and blindness Jesus was offering? I believe it was the pressure of conformity. Being like everyone else for fear of being ridiculed. They were holding onto those who were condemning them because of peer pressure. If all of your friends are fun, but they are leaving Jesus behind- who is influencing whom? George had been on heroin for five years. He lost his family, he lost about four jobs, he lost his house to his drug use. He went into rehab. He confessed his problem to Jesus, and in a miraculous way, he got straight. He knew it was a miracle. He was free. He went through a half-way house fine. His wife accepted him back. He got a good job. People were giving him a second chance. But then an old friend came by just to say “Hello.” It wasn’t long before he was back with his so-called friends, and was using again. He lost all he had gained. So many drug addicts get clean, but fall back because they go back to their old friends who still are users. It takes a tremendous amount of grace, strength, and courage to recognize that friends who drag you down are not your best friends.
Some are blinded by their pride. Niebuhr said that pride was the ultimate sin. I think in our day it ranks up there and is intertwined with human selfishness/greed. Pride blinds us, because we don’t want to be wrong. If you are a person who argues well, then you must particularly be aware of pride. Because you are probably good at justifying your position! The Pharisees and the people of Athens (who called Paul a babbler) were people who had a hard time believing even the Apostle Paul. Even when the arguments were clear, and the man had clearly been healed by Jesus, the Pharisees performed the last resort of all arguments (in their pride): first they called him names (you were steeped in sin from birth- how dare you speak to us), and then they forcefully kicked him out (9:34). If you can’t reason, call names and use force to prove you are right. Pride makes us think if we put them down where they ought to be, then we will be proved right. Pride allows us to think if I have might I am right.
I have known Christians- even devout and zealous Christians- who have been blinded by a limited idea of God’s power, by peer pressure and by pride. These are things of which we must be aware. What makes this blind man someone to be emulated is that he believes in the power of God denying his own pride, and the pressure put on him to deny Jesus.
Scientists say that it is common to have a cornea transplant, but someone born blind at birth rarely succeeds at seeing. This makes Jesus’ miracle that much more great. Arthur Zojanc is a professor who has written a book about this phenomenon called, “Catching the Light.” He said the light gets to the brain, but the mind does not respond because it is not used to responding. God can do a hundred miracles in your life. God can answer dozens of prayers. But if your heart and mind are not open to seeing God at work- if you do not want to see Him- then you will not. How sad it would have been for the blind man to not want or acknowledge the help of Jesus.
Thomas Huxley was a famous agnostic, before they became so common today. A Christian once stressed to Huxley, very humbly that he disagreed with Huxley, though he thought Huxley was very sincere. He asked Huxley would it be possible that he were mentally color blind to God? That is, some people cannot see traces of green where other people cannot help but see it. Could it be that this was Huxley’s problem—that he was simply blind to truth that was quite evident to millions of others? Huxley, being a man of integrity, admitted that this was possible, and added that if it were, he himself, of course, could not know or recognize it. [Interpreter’s Bible Vol. 8, p. 708]. We can be blind to each others’ point of view and that is sad. But it is sadder still to be blind to the One who made you and offers His help to you in life. We are all blind to the things that we do not care about. I invite you to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength and allow Him to open your eyes.