The Man Born Blind - [John 9:1-11]

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This morning, we turn to a familiar passage, John chapter 9, one of my favorite chapters in all of the
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Gospels. This is the account of how Jesus healed a man born blind. There are two remarkable miracles in this chapter, and the first is the healing of a man's physical sight, and the second is the healing of his spiritual sight.
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As you read through the chapter, you see that he was actually brought to faith in two stages, and it was the healing of his spiritual sight, of course, that resulted in his redemption from sin.
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I wish we had time to deal with the whole chapter, but we don't. So I just want to cover the first 11 verses this morning, and we will focus on the first miracle, the miracle of this blind man who received his physical sight.
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And there are some lessons there for us about the Gospel and the power of Christ, and so you'll see this as we go through it.
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Let me set the context for you. This event occurred at one of the most volatile and dangerous moments of Jesus' public ministry.
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In John 8, Jesus had challenged the Pharisees with what became practically the most direct and confrontive language he ever used against them.
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In John 8, 44, he told them, you are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires.
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Bear in mind as you read that, he's speaking to the respected religious leaders of that nation, calling them liars and murderers, which they were.
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They lied about Jesus, claiming in verse 48 that he was a demon -possessed
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Samaritan, and according to John 11, 53, a couple of chapters after this, they were about to undertake a conspiracy to put him to death, which they ultimately did.
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And so when he says in John 8, 44, you are of your father the devil, he was a murderer from the beginning, he is a liar and the father of lies, he is describing the
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Pharisees' real character in literal terms, and of course, that infuriated them.
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That was no more politically correct in Jesus' time than it would be today. But he wasn't even finished.
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He went on to claim absolute equality with God. Look at John 8, 56.
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Jesus says, your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad.
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So the Jews said to him, you're not yet 50 years old, and you've seen Abraham? Jesus said to them, truly, truly,
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I say to you, before Abraham was, I am. He doesn't say before Abraham was,
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I was. He says, I am, and he's using there the covenant name of God and applying it to himself.
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That expression, I am, and especially in a context like this, was a clear assertion of his own deity and his eternal preexistence.
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You read this and it's very clear that he's telling them he existed before he came to earth and he's using the name of God.
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And the verb tenses are significant. Again, he doesn't say before Abraham was, I was, which would be proper grammar if he only wanted to say that he existed before Abraham.
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But an angel could say that. He wasn't claiming to be an incarnate angel.
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He says, before Abraham was, I am. And he deliberately takes for himself the name
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God used in the burning bush when he told Moses his name in Exodus 3, 14.
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I am who I am. That's the name of God. And Jesus was telling the
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Pharisees as God that he is the first and the last and beside him there is no
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God, to borrow language from Isaiah 44, verse 6. He is the Alpha and the
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Omega, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty, Revelation 1, 8.
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And these Pharisees understood his meaning perfectly because John 8, 59 says they picked up stones to throw at him, and they meant to stone him to death because of their own spiritual blindness.
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They believed he was guilty of blasphemy, and that was a capital crime. But in the ensuing confusion,
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Scripture says, Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple. Now understand,
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Jesus' life is in real danger at this point. If he had stayed in the temple court, they surely would have tried to stone him.
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But it says he walked right through the midst of them. Verse 20 tells us why their attempt to stone him was unsuccessful.
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But no one laid hands on him because his hour had not yet come. We spoke of that in the
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Sunday school hour this morning, how frequently Jesus was attacked and threatened, but his hour had not yet come.
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And so the eyes of these Pharisees were blinded by the supernatural and sovereign power of God so that they could not see where Jesus was or who he was, even as he walked right through their midst and passed by.
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And then without breaking the narrative, John writes in verse 1 of chapter 9, as he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth.
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Now the chronology of this is a little bit tricky. There may have been a lapse of some time between these two incidents,
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John 8 and John 9. It's not clear when you harmonize the Gospels whether the events of chapter 9 took place on the same day
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Jesus escaped from those who wanted to stone him. John 10, 22, which is the sort of the end of this long narrative,
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John chapter 10, verse 22, says at that time, the feast of the dedication took place in Jerusalem.
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It was winter. And so in John 10, John tells us the exact date. But if you go back to John 7, 37, the big confrontation
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Jesus had with the Pharisees took place on the last day, the great day of the feast.
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And if you compare verse 2 of chapter 7, it's speaking there about the feast of the tabernacles, feast of tabernacles.
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The feast of tabernacles was a harvest festival that began in the middle of the seventh month.
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The feast of dedication began on the 25th day of the ninth month. And so somehow between John 7 and John 10, eight weeks elapsed.
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And it's not clear in John's narrative where the gaps, the intervals of time were.
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Some commentators actually place an interval of time between the end of chapter 8 and the beginning of chapter 9.
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And it may be, let's admit it, it may be that several weeks or days elapsed there. John isn't so precise.
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But notice that John does tell this story as a series of incidents without telling us where time elapsed between one incident and another.
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He's deliberately tying these events together. And here, even if there was a gap,
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John seems to ignore it deliberately because the events are connected with the final words of chapter 8 and the opening words of chapter 9.
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Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple. As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth.
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And the connection there is even more explicit if you follow the variant reading in the King James and New King James versions.
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They say this, Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.
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Now, as Jesus passed by, he saw a man who was blind from birth. So in those manuscripts, these two incidents are deliberately tied with key words that bind the two events together.
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It ultimately doesn't matter much if there's supposed to be a gap of time between John 8 and John 9.
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John's point is this, Jesus' life was in danger because of the
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Pharisees' hatred of him. And yet, even though they despised him and abused him, he missed no opportunity to do good in their midst.
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And so here, he's in the very heart of his enemy's territory. He is at the very height of danger to him personally.
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And in the midst of all that, he displays a calm and a grace that demonstrate for us his deity, his power, and his absolute sovereignty over all the affairs of men.
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And it also demonstrates for us how moved he is with compassion at the plight of human misery.
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He turns aside with his own life in peril in order to minister to one individual in need.
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And as the narrative unfolds, the sheer glory of Christ is on display here.
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In John 8, he declares his deity. In John 9, he demonstrates it in all its glory.
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And here we see his glory in his inexhaustible patience, in his boundless mercy, in his compassion towards those in need.
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And the point is to take his goodness and set it against the backdrop of his enemy's unmitigated evil.
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His mercy contrasts starkly with their blind hatred of him. And I want to call your attention this morning to three vignettes in these first 11 verses that put the glory of Christ on display.
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Here is Christ in his glory, ministering. First, we see him as the master workman doing the works of God.
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Then we see him as the light of the world, a bright and glorious light in the midst of every kind of human blindness.
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And finally, we see him as the great physician, tenderly healing every infirmity he ever encountered.
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You never see a sick person, or a demon -possessed person, or a person with any sort of disability walk away from Christ without a healing.
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It never happens. In his earthly ministry, he's the great physician, and he demonstrates it again and again and again.
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And this is one of the classic events where he does that. And as we look at these sort of three vignettes, one at a time,
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I want to help you follow my outline. So first, we see Christ as the master workman.
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The master workman. Now, I mentioned some of this in the
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Sunday school hour, that Jesus was intent on doing the will and the works of his father.
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This was work that God had given him to do. He always characterizes his acts that way.
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Now, you might think that the only reason for God to be incarnated in human form and to tabernacle among men would be to be served by them, to be worshiped and waited upon, and to receive the honor that's due him.
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But Matthew 20, verse 28 says, the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.
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He came with work to do, and it was work he did on behalf of others for their sake, not for his own sake.
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Nothing would ever dissuade him from his task, not the threats of his enemies, not the spiritual blindness and ignorance of people, not even the deep philosophical ruminations of his own disciples.
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Listen to the first four verses of the text. As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth, and his disciples asked him,
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Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?
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Jesus answered, it was not that this man sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.
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We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day. Night is coming when no man can work.
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Now, it's hard, isn't it, not to notice the striking difference between the disciples and their master at this point.
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He stands in stark contrast even to his own disciples. Jesus saw this man, this blind man, and instantly looked upon him with compassion and concern.
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The disciples saw the man, and what instantly occurred to them was a philosophical and theological riddle.
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They wanted to know whose fault it was that he suffered blindness from birth.
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Now, let's be honest. That is an interesting and difficult theological question, and it's akin to many similar questions we all ask whenever we seriously and soberly contemplate theology on almost any level.
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This is the classic theological conundrum boiled down to a simple question. Why is there suffering?
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Why do some people seem to suffer more than others? And is there a direct connection between the sins
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I commit and the sufferings I have to endure? Why would God allow anyone to suffer from birth?
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Is there a direct connection between the sins of our parents and the sufferings that fall on us? How come some people have to suffer for other people's sins?
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How is it just and fair for someone to suffer because of something someone else did?
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And those are all interesting and ultimately important theological questions. It's not wrong to ask the questions, but it is wrong to let such questions divert us from the work
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God has given us to do. The disciples' question reflects the common belief of that time that the trials and sufferings we go through are always the direct consequence of some specific personal act of sin.
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And before we condemn them for thinking like that, we need to recognize that there is a basic truth that underlies that kind of thinking.
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Suffering in general is a result of sin. Toil and sweat and sickness and pain and ultimately death, all of these are the results of sin.
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Before Adam fell, none of those things existed. Humanity was placed in a paradise originally where there were no troubles, no afflictions, no distress, not even any sweat or bad weather.
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But since the fall, the world has been filled with anguish, miseries, woes of all kind.
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And that is the fruit of the curse of sin. And all creation has been subjected to that curse.
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And furthermore, there are times when our sufferings are the direct consequences of our own personal acts of sin.
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The person who drives drunk and ends up paralyzed is suffering the consequences of a very specific sin.
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A person who commits a crime and ends up in prison suffers because of his own sin.
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God disciplines believers, his own children who sin, and he often displays his wrath against wicked unbelievers by allowing them to suffer in this life the consequences of sins they commit.
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Galatians 6 verses 7 and 8 says, Do not be deceived, God is not mocked.
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For whatever a person sows, that he will also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption.
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David, you know, in the Old Testament is an example of this. After he sinned with Bathsheba, his life became a long chronicle of grief and affliction, and most of his troubles were direct consequences of his own sin.
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And not only that, there are times when children suffer because of the sins of their parents.
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The awful fruits of divorce in our society are proof of that. And according to Exodus 20 verse 5, there are times when the sins of the fathers are visited on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate
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God. In other words, children who follow in the pattern of their parents' sins, children who imitate their parents' sins and follow that bad example and persist in hating
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God, will reap the consequences of their parents' sins across the generations.
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But many of the rabbis in Jesus' time misunderstood and misapplied those principles.
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True though they are, the rabbis concluded that the only reason for personal suffering was personal sin.
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They understood correctly that there is a necessary connection between suffering and sin, but they tended to make that connection too personal.
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Naturally, they had a hard time seeing the direct connection between personal sin and the suffering of someone with congenital disabilities, you know, people who suffered from birth.
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And so a dispute, a classic theological argument had arisen among the rabbis about this very question.
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Some believed people born with disabilities were suffering because of their parents' sins. Others were convinced that it's possible to sin even in the womb, and so that the blame for every disability fell on the individual himself.
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And when the disciples saw this man born blind, they posed the dilemma to Jesus.
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They asked him the reason for the man's blindness. They obviously, like you and I would have wanted, they wanted to have this debate settled by someone who they knew would know the answer.
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They had enough faith to know that Jesus could give them a definitive answer. He would know for certain why this man suffered from birth.
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There's a great amount of faith reflected in their question. Now, maybe they expected a deep philosophical reply, but Jesus' answer is notable for its brevity.
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It's a succinct answer, almost terse. It almost sounds like a rebuke. He doesn't explain the mystery of pain and suffering.
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He doesn't launch into a long philosophical discourse about the problem of evil.
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He doesn't encourage them to speculate or inquire further into matters such as these.
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He just gives them the simplest possible answer to their question, and then he turns his attention to the work at hand.
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This is a rebuke and a reminder to some of us, isn't it? Deuteronomy 29 .29,
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that famous passage says, the secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and our children forever, that we may do all the works of this law.
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God has given us work to do, and most of what he's revealed clearly to us comes in the form of commands, imperatives, things for us to do.
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And instead of troubling ourselves constantly with questions that we're not given answers to, we need to do what
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God has clearly told us to do. He's given us work to do, and our task is to do it without being diverted by vain speculations into matters we cannot know.
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To quote Spurgeon, it is much better for us to do the work of him who has sent us than to be judging divine providence or judging our fellow men.
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It is ours not to speculate, but to perform acts of mercy and love according to the tenor of the gospel.
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Let us then be less inquisitive and more practical, Spurgeon says. Let's be less in favor of cracking doctrinal nuts and more in favor of bringing forth the bread of life to the starving multitudes.
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But notice also that Jesus' response to the apostles, it's not merely a rebuke, it's filled with encouragement and hope.
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Verse 3, it was not that this man sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.
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I think in the King James Version, it says something like, it says, this man didn't sin or his parents didn't sin.
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It almost leaves the impression that this man or his parents were sinless. Of course, that's not what Jesus is saying.
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He's simply saying that personal acts of sin by this man or his parents were not the cause of his blindness.
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Jesus is saying he was blind by God's design because God planned to manifest his goodness and his power in the man's healing.
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Now, no one would have looked at this man before he was saved and thought that God made him blind as an act of mercy.
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But that's exactly what the truth is. God had done this, made this man blind from birth so that he could glorify himself in the man's healing, and it was an act of goodness and mercy to the man.
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God is going to manifest both his goodness and his power by healing this man. God, who is able to work all things together for good, would make his works manifest in this poor man's extremity.
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Here was an occasion for God to display his power, his goodness, his compassion through the work of his son.
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And that's why Jesus was not looking at the blind man from the same perspective as the disciples, where they saw a philosophical enigma.
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Jesus saw an opportunity to manifest the works of God. The disciples saw the man and wondered how he came to be blind.
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Jesus saw him and set about the task of opening his eyes. The disciples were concerned with philosophical matters.
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Jesus had something more practical in mind. And so the master workman speaks of the urgency and the necessity of the work to be done.
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Verse 4, we must work the works of him who sent me while it is day. The night is coming when no one can work.
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Now notice, he speaks of his work as essential to his task. We must work.
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I must be about my father's business, Luke 2 .49. He had work to do, and from the time he was first conscious of this, he knew the necessity of it.
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I must be about my father's business. And the work he had been given to do was the work of redemption.
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The work in this instance was not merely the healing of this man's blind eyes, but ultimately something much more important, the redemption of this man's soul.
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John 6 .29, this is the work of God, that you believe on him who he has sent.
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And if you read the rest of this chapter, you will see that the greatest blessing Jesus bestowed on this man was the gift of faith, or the opening of his spiritual eyes.
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The physical healing, which is what we're looking at this morning, this is only a symbol of the greater work yet to come.
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But it's a perfect symbol, because Jesus is the only workman in this task.
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He alone is the one who works. In the work of our redemption, he has no human co -workers.
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There is no co -redemptrix. There is no other mediator between God and men but the man
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Christ Jesus. All the work of redemption is his work. That's why, despite what
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Mike said this morning, that's the right answer to the question, what do you bring to your salvation? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
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Christ is the workman here. All the work of redemption is his work.
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We contribute nothing to the process. In fact, scripture says, we who believe are his workmanship,
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Ephesians 2 .10. And all his work on earth, all the work
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Jesus did throughout his life, was directed to this one great goal of redemption.
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John 4 .34, Jesus said, My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.
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And then he went on to say that the fields were white with harvest. And so he's speaking clearly of the work of redemption.
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The Father himself gave this work to Christ to do. We talked about that in the early hour this morning as well.
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In John 5 .36, Jesus said, The works that the Father has given me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing, bear witness about me that the
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Father has sent me. And all of those works had but one design, and one design only,
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Luke 19 .10, the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.
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Don't get the idea that Christ began the work of redemption the day he took up his cross.
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His entire life was directed to the same purpose. And all the works
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Jesus ever did ultimately had a redemptive design. On the final night of his earthly life, hours before he was actually nailed to the cross, he prayed in John 17 .4,
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saying to the Father, I've glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work you gave me to do.
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A lifetime of work was already complete, and all that was left was for him to die.
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And so in his dying words, he said once more, It is finished. And he bowed his head and gave up his spirit,
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John 19 .30. So that the cross was not the full work of redemption by itself.
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It was merely the crowning and culminating task of a lifetime of redemptive work.
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And Jesus frequently expressed the urgent necessity of doing this work. At the very start of his public ministry, he told
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John the Baptist that his baptism was necessary to fulfill all righteousness was the reason he gave.
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And here he speaks of the urgency of the work. We must work while it is day, because the night is coming. He was under obligation.
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He was under divine compulsion. He was on God's timetable. Now is not the time to turn aside and discuss theological and philosophical curiosities.
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We must work the works of him who sent me. There's a glory in his patience and his determination to work the works of God, and I hope you see that glory.
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Jesus is majestic in this scene. Set against the midst of all the opposition against him, he is intent on doing his work.
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And as we're about to see, when he works, the works are the works of God. And so we see the glorious master workman at work.
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That's the first perspective. Now look at Christ from another perspective and see another side of his great glory.
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If you're following my outline and taking notes, this is point two. Here Christ reveals himself as the light of the world.
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The light of the world. Night is coming, Jesus says. He's conscious that his earthly life and ministry are fast progressing towards the cross.
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After that, his work would be finished. Now was the only time he had to work. What does he mean when he says night is coming?
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He explains it himself in verse five. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.
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This was a clear echo of his deity claims from chapter eight.
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Look back at chapter eight, verse 12. He says something very similar. I am the light of the world.
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He who follows me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life. This is the very statement that began the conflict that culminated in their picking up stones to stone him with.
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He was making claims only God can righteously make. And they knew it, but they didn't believe he could possibly be
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God incarnate. But he was, according to John 1 .9. He was that true light which coming into the world enlightens every man.
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But according to John 1 .5, the light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it.
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And John 3 .19, he was a light for the nations to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.
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Jesus had come for this, according to Isaiah 42, verses six and seven, as a light to the nations to open blind eyes.
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He was about to open blind eyes in the most literal sense. John 9, verse two.
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The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in the land of deep darkness, on them has the light shined.
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And Isaiah 60, verses one and two. Arise, shine, for your light has come and the glory of the
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Lord has risen upon you. For behold, darkness shall cover the earth and thick darkness the peoples, but the
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Lord will arise upon you and his glory will be seen upon you. Those were all familiar messianic prophecies.
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And when Jesus said, I am the light of the world, he was announcing himself as the true
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Messiah. And not just Messiah of Israel, but the light of the whole world. There's a magnificent sense of his glory in the very concept of light.
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I love this imagery. Think about what light is. It's bright. It illuminates all it touches.
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It touches everything it sees and yet it's untainted and undefiled by anything it touches.
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You can shine a light on a pile of manure and it doesn't defile the light.
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That's how the glory of Christ is. He is pure light in whom there is no darkness at all.
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In coming into the world, his light dispels darkness. The darkness can't conquer it.
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There's an interesting paradox, though, in the juxtaposition of this statement,
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I am the light of the world, with the fact that Jesus is standing in front of a man born blind.
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Here's a spiritual dilemma. A man born blind has no appreciation whatsoever for light of any kind.
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He can't see light. He can't comprehend it. Just as John said, light comes into the world and the darkness doesn't comprehend it.
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This guy had never seen light. He had no clue what it was or what it would be like. In fact, from the details given to us in the narrative, it seems clear that this blind man was completely unaware of Jesus' presence.
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Verse 1 tells us that as Jesus passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. See, Jesus saw the man.
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The man didn't see Jesus. He had no capacity to see him. He was blind. And blindness is symbolic of the spiritual blindness of every sinner who is without Christ.
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That's what the condition this man was in physically is what every person without Christ is like spiritually.
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Blind. They have no capacity to see Jesus. Darkness cannot comprehend the light.
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The natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him. He is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
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1 Corinthians 2 .14 And that's why, according to John 1 .10, he was in the world and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.
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The blind man probably literally did not even know that Jesus was there. Remember that the disciples were questioning
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Jesus about who was to blame for the man's blindness. Now, these are the disciples, right?
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They're courteous men. You have to assume they were out of earshot even from the blind man, asking questions about whether he'd sinned or not.
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And furthermore, notice, he didn't call out to Jesus like Bartimaeus did in Mark 10.
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He doesn't ask for a miracle. He didn't pray for his sight. Jesus initiated this entire exchange.
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And that, too, is perfectly symbolic of how sinners are saved. You and I are not saved because we sought
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Jesus of our own accord. You understand that, right? According to Romans 3 .11,
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no one understands, no one seeks for God. If you came to him for salvation, it was because you were first sought and drawn by him.
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It feels to us like we're seeking him, but the only reason we ever seek him is because he draws us. In John 6 .44,
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Jesus said, No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. God is the one who initiates our salvation, and Christ is the author and the finisher of our faith.
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Again, he's the only workman in the process of salvation. And Jesus, speaking prophetically through Isaiah, in Isaiah 65 verse 1,
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Jesus says, I was found by those who did not seek me. His free grace is given to us before we have any desire for it.
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We can't take credit as if we sought him and found him before he drew us. He is always the one who initiates.
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One of my favorite hymns, it's a Presbyterian hymn, says this,
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I sought the Lord, and afterward I knew he moved my soul to seek him, seeking me.
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It was not I that found, O Savior true, no, I was found of thee. Jesus loved this blind man with an eternal love before the man even understood who
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Jesus was. That's how it is with all of us who are redeemed. We love him because he first loved us.
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1 John 4, 19. We can't take any credit for coming to Jesus. We get no credit for it.
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We deserve no credit for it. Let me quote Spurgeon again. He said, Do you dislike this?
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Do you want a share of the spoils, a fragment of the glory? Go your way and be blind, for your condition can never be altered while you refuse to honor the
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Savior. This blind man was about to get his first glimpse of natural light, and after that Jesus would open his spiritual eyes to see the true light of the world.
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Here is why this man was born blind in the first place, so that Jesus could reveal his glory as the light of the world by opening this man's eyes to the light in such a way that no one, not even
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Jesus' bitterest enemies, could possibly question the reality of this miracle or deny the authority of the one who performed the miracle the true light of the world.
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Now we see Christ's glory revealed from a third perspective. If you're taking notes, we see Christ first in his role as the master workman, second, in his majesty as the light of the world, and now third, we see his glorious skill as the great physician.
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The great physician. And this is a very down -to -earth aspect of Christ's glory.
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You'll see that as we go through it. But I love this part of the story. Here is this blind man, and it's hard not to like him.
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He's obviously an intelligent, keen -thinking man, and you'll be able to tell that as you read through the chapter from his interaction with the
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Pharisees. They begin to interrogate him after this healing, and it turns out he's got a lively wit and a great sense of humor.
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He is shrewd. He is bitingly sarcastic. I love that. He's bold.
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He is a blind man who's been a beggar all his life, and yet he is not the least bit intimidated by the badgering of these
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Pharisees. He probably had sat in that same place every day, and he would have been well -known to the people who came and went to the temple.
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Nobody could deny this miracle. It's one of the best attested of all the miracles of Jesus.
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In fact, the man's parents were summoned by the Pharisees, and they were utterly dumbfounded to see that their son, blind from birth, and they affirmed this.
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Here he was, seeing. He had received his sight. Even the Pharisees, who were so desperate to discredit
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Jesus, could not deny that this was a wonder indeed. But what
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I like best about this whole account is the means by which Jesus healed this guy.
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Verse 6. Having said these things, he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva.
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Then he anointed the man's eyes with the mud and said to him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, which means scent.
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So he went and washed and came back seeing. Here's a curious means of healing.
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He spits on the ground, and I'm assuming he spit several times because if you have ever tried to make clay with your own spit, and I have, it takes a lot of spit to make even a little ball of clay.
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And then he takes this mud made from spit and he rubs it into the eyes of the blind man.
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It's remarkable that the guy submitted to this remedy. You know, if my optometrist tried to treat my nearsightedness with his own spit,
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I'd be finding a new doctor. This is not the only time Jesus healed blindness with his own spittle.
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On another occasion, he spit directly into the blind person's eyes. Mark 8 .23.
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In the town of Bethsaida, he took a blind man by the hand and led him out of the village and spit on his eyes and laid his hand on him, and the man received his sight.
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In Mark 7 .33, going through about verse 35 there, he takes a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment, and here's what
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Mark says, Mark 7 .33, and taking him aside from the crowd privately, he put his fingers into his ears and after spitting, touched his tongue, and looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him,
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Ephatha, which is be opened, and his ears were opened and his tongue was released and he spoke plainly.
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Now, Jesus could heal with or without means. He could have simply spoken the word and given this man sight.
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Some of you delicate moms and proper old ladies are sitting there wishing that's what he'd done.
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I mean, let's be honest. Something in all of us wants to recoil in disgust from this methodology.
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It strikes us as uncouth and anything but glorious. You look at this and say, how has that put the glory of Christ on display?
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But that's what I want to show you, that even in the mundane way Jesus healed this guy, his glory is revealed.
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Why did Jesus use this method? Have you ever thought that through? Well, for one thing, this is a really good picture of the gospel.
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It's offensive. It goes against propriety and common sense. It offends our sense of good taste.
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It's the last method you would expect God to choose. In the judgment of our worldly wisdom, it seems foolish.
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It's a stumbling block and an offense to our sense of decorum and refinement. It's crude.
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And yet it was perfectly suitable to Christ's purpose. Underneath the crass and uncouth outward appearance of this act, there is a tremendous amount of divine wisdom.
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Suppose Jesus had used a more refined means of healing a man. Suppose he had reached into his bag and taken out an alabaster vial of glycerin or oil and delicately put drops in the man's eyes and the man received his sight from that.
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Imagine that. What would have been the result? Everybody would have said, what a wonderful medicine.
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What is that stuff? Where can I get some? And the focus would have been on the elixir. The cure would have been ascribed to the eye drops rather than to the power of God.
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But the way Jesus healed this man, no one would ever say the mud did it.
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It was the spit. Instead, the glory goes to Christ where it rightfully belongs.
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He deliberately chose means that were commonplace and menial. Instead of an elaborate ceremony or a cultured and polished ritual, he chose means that people might think unsanitary, messy, perhaps even indecent.
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But again, this parallels how God works through the gospel. God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.
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God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing the things that are so that no human being might boast in the presence of God, 1
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Corinthians 1, 27 -29. See, the atonement itself is regarded by many in this world as an ugly, appalling, embarrassing thing.
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A blood sacrifice involving the death of God's own Son on a cross of shame to pay the price of sin in such a public and inglorious way.
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But the wisdom of God is foolishness to this world. The word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing.
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But to us who are being saved, it's the power of God, 1 Corinthians 1, 18. And what's more, if you think about the means by which
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Jesus healed this guy, it seems almost counterproductive. Who would ever think that putting mud in a man's eyes would help him see?
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The clay is an impediment to the light. It's an irritant to the eye. This is no way to heal blindness.
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And besides, clay is basically inert. It has no healing power or efficacy.
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And you know what? That's right. That's the exact point. The healing power was not in the dirt.
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It wasn't even in the spittle. The efficacy came from the power of Christ.
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Why did He do it this way? There may be a couple of reasons. Remember, this miracle comes in a context where Jesus is proclaiming
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His deity. What better proof of His deity than a miracle that shows
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His creative power? And that's what this miracle does. Remember how God made Adam in the first place? Genesis 2, verse 7,
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The Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living creature.
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Here it was as if Christ took that same dust of the ground and fashioned new eyes for this man.
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It was a creative miracle, regenerating those eyes that had never, ever before been able to see.
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What better proof of Jesus' deity? Maybe another reason
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Jesus chose this means was to demonstrate that He was Lord even of the
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Sabbath. According to verse 14, this miracle occurred on the Sabbath. Like so many of the healing miracles of Jesus, and in this case,
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He actually stoops down and makes clay, and that was a deliberate breach of the pharisaical system.
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It was tantamount to making bricks on the Sabbath. They saw it as work, and it was.
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Remember, Jesus Himself said so in verse 4. But it was not the kind of work that was forbidden on the
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Sabbath. Matthew 12, verse 12, Jesus had reminded them, It is lawful to do good on the
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Sabbath. But that infuriated these legalistic Pharisees. He was flouting their system, directly disobeying what they knew, what they had said was right to do and wrong to do on the
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Sabbath. It's as if He does this in their faces. And even when they knew the miracle itself could not be gainsaid, there was no way they could suggest that this was a fraud, or Jesus had somehow faked the miracle.
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They couldn't do that. Nevertheless, they turned their hostility against Christ into an accusation of blasphemy, as if the miracle itself were not proof of His deity.
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In verse 16, some of the Pharisees say, This man is not from God, for He does not keep the
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Sabbath. And there you see the hard -heartedness of unbelief.
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These men hated the master workman because his works violated their man -made
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Sabbath restrictions. They rejected the light of the world because they loved darkness rather than light.
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They spurned the great physician because they didn't like his diagnosis of their spiritual infirmities.
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And so they shut themselves off from His power and His light and His spiritual healing.
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On the other hand, here you also see the blessedness of simple faith.
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Verse 7, After Jesus anointed this man's eyes with clay, Jesus said to him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, which means sin.
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So he went and washed and came back seeing. The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying,
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Is not this the man who used to sit and beg? Some said, It is he. Others said, No, but he is like him.
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He kept saying, I am the man. And so they said to him, Then how were your eyes opened? He answered,
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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 I received my sight.
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All this man did was obey the Lord's simple instructions. He didn't protest about the mud in his eyes.
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He didn't complain that the prescribed cure was irrational. He didn't object like Naaman did in 2
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Kings 5 that the prescription was too humiliating or that the cure wasn't glorious enough.
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He didn't have to pray about it. He didn't have to wait until he felt the Spirit move him. He just went and washed.
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He obeyed the simple command. And he was blessed for that first little glimmer of faith.
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He could see at once. This man who had never known what light and colors were before this day suddenly returned with his vision perfect and entire.
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His act of obedience. I don't think it signifies saving faith at this point because he didn't even know who
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Jesus was. But the miracle was symbolic of something even greater yet to come. And just as his physical eyes had been opened, he was about to have the veil removed from his spiritual eyes.
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And that's what the second half of this chapter is all about. And I wish we had time to go through it.
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We don't. And I need to wrap up. But I don't want to send you away this morning without underscoring the gospel truth that comes through so clearly in this passage.
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Just as Jesus alone can heal blind eyes, it is Jesus alone who can save sinners from their sin.
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The work of salvation is all his. And it's a work that he has finished completely.
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There's nothing for us to add except, as Pastor Mike said, our sin, which merits nothing for us.
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That's what we need redemption from. And Christ alone has paid the price of atonement in full.
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He alone can remove the spiritual blindness that keeps us in our sin.
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We simply trust him. And the heart that truly trusts him is the heart that knows its own spiritual poverty and blindness, the heart that is weary of the darkness and longing for the light.
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And if that describes you, he may already be drawing you to himself. You can't remove the darkness from your own life, but he can and he will.
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And Romans 10 .13 says, Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
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What a glorious Savior we have to call upon. He's the master workman.
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He's the light of the world. He's the great physician. And I'll close with the words of Jesus from John 12 .35
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and 36. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you.
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The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he's going. While you have the light, believe in the light that you may become sons of light.
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Let's pray. Lord, we're so grateful for the gospel.
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The good news of how Christ atones for sin and redeems sinners.
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And Lord, I pray that you would increase our faith. And may not one person go from here this morning without full assurance of Christ as Savior.