John 9

There are quite a number of serious showdowns in the Gospels, and today's chapter is one of them.  Jesus is very definitely on a collision course with the religious leaders, curiously especially the Pharisees (we have previously discussed how this was largely due to the fact that, given that their theology was so similar to Christ's own, they should have been the first to recognise him; instead they're looking for a way to kill him!).

Yet strange that the battlefield should be one of the many beggars sitting by the road.

We know little about him; only that he was sitting by the road, and that what was presumably his usual spot was reasonably close to the Pool of Siloam, a fairly well-known landmark (which has been rediscovered over the last century or so).  That's really about it.

Jesus' actions seem a little odd here.  I actually came across something of an explanation for this when preparing for a sermon on another incident (perhaps the same one) in another gospel.  Why does he make mud with his saliva?

The short answer is that there was a belief present at the time that the saliva from a firstborn son had healing properties.  By doing this, Jesus is giving a subtle but clear message to people on hand that He was who He was.

Anyway, predictably, the blind man is healed when he washes the mud off his eyes.  And people who knew him are obviously surprised!

But not as surprised as the Pharisees were, perhaps.  And once again, they have an opportunity to trap Jesus, because this healing was done on the Sabbath!

Think about that and let it sink in.  A man is healed from blindness[1] - that's being unable to see! - and all the Pharisees can think of is their opportunity to trap a political nuisance.

I look at this and scream "NO!"  How can they be so, well, blind?

The awkward thing is that we do this trick all the time.  God can and does work in people of all kinds (and here's a shock for us Christians - He can work through others if He is so inclined too!).  And yet when we see it, it's all too easy for us to ignore the work of God and focus on the weaknesses of others.  This is especially visible in the debates between conservative and charismatic evangelicals - we can often lose focus on what is really important and use perceived problems with our opponents as a way of discrediting them!  And we run the risk of ignoring God's work, which we really should be more aware of.  When we see God work through someone else, even if they don't have a similar theological stance to ourselves, we should be glorifying Him!

The [former!] blind man is not theologically educated.  But he knows one thing - he was blind, but now he's not.  So for him, it's all very simple - he follows the person who was able to do something only God could do.

His simple (and logical!) faith infuriates the Pharisees, who are looking for something more complex.  They throw him out of the Synagogue.  Not that this worries the man, who returns to Jesus and pledges to follow Him[2].

This is frightening to me, because I can see myself being a Pharisee.  What should I do?  Well, it is fairly straightforward; if I see God's work in someone, even if I don't think they've got their theology squared away fully, I need to recognise God for whom He is, and glorify Him!

Note that this doesn't mean we should ignore theological issues.  Obviously these are important to discuss. But we need to be careful to not let these debates blind us to the work of God, who - let's face it - is bigger than ANY difference we have with another believer.

[1] Even today, this is an amazing miracle - a person who was born blind would have to regrow nerves from their eyes to their brain, and since nerves grow at about the speed of hair growth, we can see that even if it were possible to do this trick it would be months before the patient would be able to see!  Not so here.  The man is healed instantly.

[2] It is possible that this man was well known to Christians at the tme of the writing, hence the amount of time spent on him.  We'll never truly know this.

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