Devotional - John 9:1-12 - The Man Born Blind

Passage To Study:

John 9:1-12

[1] Now as Jesus passed by, He saw a man who was blind from birth. [2] And His disciples asked Him, saying, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” [3] Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him. [4] “I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work. [5] “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” [6] When He had said these things, He spat on the ground and made clay with the saliva; and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay. [7] And He said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which is translated, Sent). So he went and washed, and came back seeing. [8] Therefore the neighbors and those who previously had seen that he was blind said, “Is not this he who sat and begged?” [9] Some said, “This is he.” Others said, “He is like him.” He said, “I am he.” [10] Therefore they said to him, “How were your eyes opened?” [11] He answered and said, “A Man called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said to me, ‘Go to the pool of Siloam and wash.’ So I went and washed, and I received sight.” [12] Then they said to him, “Where is He?” He said, “I do not know.”

What are the facts of the passage?:

(Verse 1-2) - When passing a man born blind, the disciples ask Jesus whose sin was at fault for the affliction of the man.
(Verse 3) - Jesus tells them that it is not a matter of fault, but rather of God's desire to express His glory.
(Verse 4-5) - He continues that He had to do the works of God while there was still time to do it.
(Verse 6-9) - He then proceeds to heal the man, and the people recognize that the man has been healed. The is some disagreement as to whether it is really him.
(Verse 10-12) - They ask him how he was healed, and after he tells them, he tells them he doesn't know where He is.

What do those facts mean?:

(Verse 3) - Jesus underscores that affliction (at least in this case) is not a matter of retribution or results of sin. Often, there is no real connection between one's experience of sin and the afflictions of life. As men, we tend to want everything to be tidy, and have a reason for being. This is the most frequent question heard in the face of some hardship or tragedy. ''Why is this happening" or ''What is God trying to teach me?" Both of these (and countless other variations of them) center on self and assume that the link we are discussing does indeed exist. It is a part of our nature to think in this vein.

What, then, is the cause? Jesus tells us. There are times (we are not told what proportion of times) when God causes such afflictions for His glory. We need to think about this for a minute.

This tells us something about God's relationship to His creation. Here we see Him plainly as the Sovereign God who can and does use His creation as He sees fit. God desires glory. It is His chief aim in ever creating the world and all that is in it (though it is certainly not His only purpose). He is the Creator of all thing, and has the right to do whatever He desires to do with it. This cuts against our grain, but it is a fact. This is one of the things this passage asserts to us. Sometimes, God is simply doing a thing that will serve His purpose.

We should also note the real human cost of this truth. This Man had been blend from birth. This was no abstract theological concept, but a real life that suffered real misery and real loss. This poor soul went through his entire life, up to this point, as a penniless beggar. He lived on the streets and was, it seems, at least partially estranged from his parents. He had no social standing, and, in fact, would have been seen as a bit of a pariah for precisely the reason we spoke of earlier. Virtually everyone would have understood there to be a tie between his affliction and sin. In short, life would have been a misery for him thus far.

The point here is that God has every right to do such things with that which is His by creative right. We have no position or authority to challenge this authority. Jesus understood this. We reed to underscore that this is not simply arbitrary and capricious. God has a purpose in what He does, in everything he does. This incident is no exception. This man was blind, not because of his sin, or even that of his parents. He was blind because God desired to use that blindness to glorify Himself. Though we are not specifically told, it appears that the way God was glorified in this instance was in the healing of the affliction and the resulting testimony to His goodness and His power.

How do those facts apply to my life?:

The suffering I go through and that I witness others going through is not necessarily the fault of sin.

What should I do in response?:

I need to be sail that I remember this as I think through my own afflictions, and particularly as I give counsel to others.

Day

The Man Born Blind