Lessons from the Man Born Blind
But he himself insisted, “I am the man.” (John 9:9 revised)
Short Bunny Track:
I read the Bible. Contrary to what some may think because of my apparently hedonistic views on some things, I do in fact have a Bible. Three, actually. One of which is in my handbag at all times. When I am waiting for an appointment, I read the Bible. When I get to church early, I read the Bible. When I wake up in the morning before the kids, I read the Bible. I usually have a schedule of reading it from start to finish at least once a year, re-reading Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon and Revelations several times more because I just really like them. (Psychoanalyze at will.) Lately, though, I’ve found myself mired in the New Testament.
I tell you all of that totally unnecessary information to explain why, when my son woke up at 4:30 this morning and I couldn’t go back to sleep, I ended up reading the books of John and Acts. Have you ever had the experience of reading something so familiar, and at the same time it seeming like wholly new text? This is a rare occurrence for me, but this morning that was the case. Perhaps it was my sleep addled mind further addled by an onion bagel and Pepsi, perhaps it was the sound of the birds and train at five AM, perhaps it was the way the light looks in early morning when there’s bound to be a storm before noon. Whatever it was, I was feeling unusually contemplative.
My mind got stuck on the man born blind. I’ve read that passage many times, too many times to count. My brother preached from it once many years back. I could remember his haughty and over-acted tone as he read the words, “he himself insisted, ‘I AM THE MAN.‘” I could remember the laughter of the congregation. But something in me this time said, “that’s not funny.”
Let me re-tell you the story this morning. (John 9 for those curious.)
Just coming off of an argument with the Pharisees in which Jesus said that the Father would be glorified through Jesus, Jesus and the disciples encounter a man born blind. His disciples, ever curious, ask why the man was born blind. See, the Jews believed that earthly misfortune, such as illness, was brought on by sin. So they were curious- if a man was born blind, whose sin was that meant to punish? Sins the man would commit, or sins his parents had?
Jesus, ever cryptic, responded that it was to show God’s glory. So Jesus put mud on the mans eyes and told him to wash himself. The man went and washed himself, and found that he could see. Some might say that it was in that moment that God’s glory was seen. But wait, there’s more! When the man came back to town I’d wager that he carried himself differently. That he was different. So when the people saw him they questioned- is this the man born blind? And the man insisted that he was. So the Pharisees got involved. The Pharisees were sure that it must be the Devil’s work, as Jesus offered healing on the sabbath (something they had decided was sinful) and the man went and bathed publicly on the sabbath (something against the rabbinical laws of the time). Of course this causes a great deal of confusion. The man born blind insists that it was through God that he was healed.
So the Pharisees say “you were mired in sin from birth!” and kick him out of the temple.
I suppose that was something that poor man heard a lot. I’m sure he was constantly reminded that he was living out the punishment for sins past and present. I’m sure that it would have been impossible for him to better his station in life, as he couldn’t work and other people wouldn’t want to bring an “unclean” man into their homes. After his parents had died I’m sure that he lived a destitute life, saved only by the fact that the Jewish people were ordered to care for the poor.
“Mired in sin from birth.”
And what did Jesus do? He did much more than heal a man’s sight. He gave him a second chance, a new life, freedom from the curses that were constantly spoke over him. He washed that man of the taint of sin and perception. He raised him above the standard to which he had always been held. Jesus radically changed the way that people had to look at that man and his life. No longer was he under the curse of sin and death and the judgment of the law- here he was, a freed man. A seeing man. And proudly would he proclaim that he himself was that man! All of the shame he had carried, gone in an instant, washed away with the mud that covered his face. What a beautiful picture to hold in one’s mind, that mud dripping away, the man looking up. Realizing.
But that moment was not the full extent of God’s glory. God’s glory was in the townspeople and the Pharisees, gumming away at the problem, wondering. If the judgment was gone, what did it mean? Had the proper sacrifices been made? Had reparations been meted out? Had the sacrifice been accepted and blessed?
Jesus had asked not for sacrifice, but for obedience.
Can’t you just see the glory? Feel it tingle down to your fingertips? Taste it on the tip of your tongues? There are moments where I think, “why was I saved? What good am I?”
I tell myself, “you are mired in sin.”
But hear for a moment the pride in that man’s voice as he said, “I AM THE MAN!” We are saved! God is glorified through Jesus.
It’s almost too much to hold in one’s mind.
The Long Road to Damascus
(link to scripture references: Acts 9, Acts 22, the Gospel of John)
I’ve seen comments around WordPress that talk about the fact that the New Testament shows many ways of winning people to Christ. Sometimes Jesus showed compassion before calling people to repentance, this mode of thought states, and other times he threw them down off their horses.
It’s an interesting way of seeing things, to say the least. I myself have always stated that Jesus showed compassion equally, with the exception of the Priests and Pharisees. Jesus showed no tolerance for hypocrisy, and God never seemed to like hypocrites or the “lukewarm” very much. For all of those who struggled, on the other hand, there never seemed to be a lack of compassion.
Throughout the Gospels one sees Jesus showing such an amazing amount of compassion. His first miracle was one which may otherwise seem odd. When he changed the water into wine (John 2) he did so not to encourage drunkeness, but to save the host and hostess a great deal of embarrassment. To have insufficient refreshments for your guests was, in that time, something very shameful. He showed compassion to the woman at the Well by speaking to her, and by not judging her for her sins. For a jewish man in those times to be alone with a woman who was not his wife was questionable- a Samaritan woman moreso, a Samaritan who took many lovers and lived with a man to whom she was not wed- that was unconscionable! Simply speaking with her was an act of grace. Choosing her to be the one to redeem her people- that was God, plain and simple.
The next miracle? The man by the Pool of Bethesba. Jesus showed him compassion by healing him, since he had no family to aid him in his time of need. This is an odd one, because Jesus actually commands him to do what the Pharisees termed as sin, by picking up his mat and walking. Had the man refused and chosen legalism, he would have lost God. Yet- Jesus also commands him to stop sinning. That man must have had to have spent a great deal meditating on what seemed like Jesus’ mixed messages.
And another- feeding the five thousand. What else could you call that but compassion for the many who were hungry for the word and also had growling stomachs?
The woman caught in adultery- what could be more compassionate than sparing a woman who would have otherwise died? Again, we see love and grace before we see a command.
With the Man born Blind we see that Jesus, like with the man at Bethesda, requires obedience before healing. Jesus puts mud on the man’s eyes and tells him to go wash, after which he is healed. But in that request for obedience we still see compassion. Later in that passage, when Jesus is confronted by the Pharisees, he says, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.” This is tremendous compassion for the man born blind, who was kicked out of the temple because he had been “steeped in sin from birth.”
Next we find the story of Lazarus. What could show Jesus’ love more than the fact that he cried for the anguish of his friends, that he reassured them, that he did not respond to their doubts with anger, that he raised their brother and friend from the dead?
Then in a short while, we come to the ride back to Jerusalem. We see Jesus riding a donkey through the gate that the Romans would ride their war horses through, both symbolic of Jesus’ servanthood and simplicity, and also a harsh call to attention for the zealots who would have expected Jesus’ “kinghood” to be a literal one. (Not to mention that it must have felt to the Romans as if they were being openly mocked.) Then Jesus washes his disciples feet, again making himself a servant, again showing compassion. He feeds his friends.
And then he dies.
But his work here is not done. He returns to the disciples and again teaches them on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24). And finally, after all this time, we find ourselves on the road to Damascus with Paul, who was then Saul. And who was Saul? Saul was a Roman Jew who gladly imprisoned Christians, who witnessed their stonings, and was on the road to Damascus with arrest warrants in hands in order to drag back more Christians to their death. Saul was no mere sinner- Saul was the enemy of Christians and thus in some ways the enemy of Christ.
On the Road to Damascus he witnessed a bright light and heard Jesus asking him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” Saul was struck blind. In Damascus Christ appeared to another man, Ananais, and told Ananais that Paul was Christ’s chosen to preach to the Gentiles. Who better to minister to the Gentiles than someone with a reputation for killing Jews, right? (Am I being sarcastic or not… you decide!) Ananais healed Saul, and Saul then became the Christian known as Paul.
Here is my question to all of you: Does this story sound like Jesus coming and throwing someone off their high horse? Does it sound like permission for condemnation? Or does even this story reek of God’s compassion, grace, and love for even the most lost? God took an enemy of the faith and made him one of the Way’s most infamous Apostles. Only God could do such a thing. That God must do such a thing by making the man blind and weak and dependent on the graciousness of one of the men he had come to Damascus to arrest has a sort of poetic or prophetic sweetness to it- but it doesn’t seem like God made Paul weak in order to torment him- he did so in order to bless him.
And only God himself has such power.
So to go back to my original point- with what should we win people over? Do we knock them off their horses? No, we show them compassion. Leave the fancy stuff to God.
Comment with Care
The internet is a tricky place. It’s a little like a masquerade, with everyone picking avatars that rarely show their face, the real person hidden in a veil of carefully constructed identity. The internet being such, it’s easy to forget that there’s a real person on the other side of the ethernet cable. Because there’s rarely proximity or touch involved, it’s easy to think of people one meets online as not real people, not containing real emotion or full identity. It’s easy to think of every aspect of their online identity as being concocted. It’s easy to disregard truth in favor of perception.
It’s easy to be cruel.
In my days on the internet I’ve been a part of a lot of different online communities. In my early days it was fan sites for favorite bands. Every once in a while we’d all be told that we had no taste in music or that certain members of bands were not who we thought they were. There’d be outright lies, misleading half-truths, odd motivations. As time passed on I joined a few online RPGs, groups in which concocting identities was the norm. And as such there were a few practical jokes played with multiple personas, some of which went miserably awry. Even further on there were a few support groups for people dealing with depression. Let me just say that if you have blade to wrist and someone says “depression is a choice”, it doesn’t help things. Despite the fact that it’s easy to lash out at an idea, one must always remember that whatever one is lashing out with involves people as well. Real people with real feelings that can be really hurt.
Mothers forums in which mothers who don’t breastfeed are eviscerated. Or mothers who choose to go back to work are mocked. Or mothers who don’t choose to go back to work are accused of taking advantage of their spouses. Or single mothers are told they are “better off” without having to deal with a spouse. All of these things that just make it harder on us all. Make it harder for everyone on every side of the issue. Because we don’t need to be divided, we need to be united. Instead of focusing on our differences we should focus on those things which all of us share.
I do not, as a rule, moderate comments on this blog. I realize that ninety percent of the things I talk about are issues that divide people, and I respect the fact that not everyone who reads my posts will agree with me. Some people will think I am absolutely and in all ways wrong, and they are entitled to that opinion and entitled to voice it. Occassionally I do delete a comment. If someone, for example, refers to a person who is gay as one who (and I quote) “embraces the vile vomit of sodomy”, I will delete that comment. It serves no purpose other than to be inflamatory. Someone can believe that gay sex is against God’s plan without using words such as “vile” and “vomit”.
Just remember, commenters, that there are real people on the other side of this issue. The gays are real people, with emotions, and needs, and desires, and even spirituality. Just as those who believe homosexuality is a sin are also people, people who are trying to adhere to that which they believe is holy. That is why I allow comments from all sides- because ninety nine percent of the time I think everyone truly is trying to do what they think is right or necessary.
Just please, please, comment with care. Be respectful. Don’t attack. Wear gloves, if necessary. Remember that for better or worse God put us all on this planet together and he called us all to each other. We NEED each other.
Practice compassion. Live with grace.
And for the love of God, comment with care.
June 20, 2008. Tags: blog, blogging, commenting, trolls. Christianity, Relationships, life. 13 comments.