SPECIAL DAYS: Fourth Sunday of Lent
March 14, 1999 - LESSON: John 9:39, NRSV
SERMON TITLE: Conquering Blindness
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INTRODUCTION:
John 9 -
1 As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth.
2 His disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"
3 Jesus answered, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him.
4 We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; 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 this, he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva and spread the mud on the man's eyes,
7 saying to him, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam" (which means Sent). Then he went and washed and came back able to see.
8 The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar began to ask, "Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?"
9 Some were saying, "It is he."
Others were saying, "No, but it is someone like him."
He kept saying, "I am the man."
10 But they kept asking him, "Then how were your eyes opened?"
11 He answered, "The man called Jesus made mud, spread it on my eyes, and said to me, 'Go to Siloam and wash.'
Then I went and washed and received my sight."
12 They said to him, "Where is he?"
He said, "I do not know."
13 They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind.
14 Now it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes.
15 Then the Pharisees also began to ask him how he had received his sight.
He said to them, "He put mud on my eyes. Then I washed, and now I see."
16 Some of the Pharisees said, "This man is not from God, for he does not observe the Sabbath."
But others said, "How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?"
And they were divided.
17 So they said again to the blind man, "What do you say about him? It was your eyes he opened."
He said, "He is a prophet."
18 The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight
19 They asked them, "Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?"
20 His parents answered, "We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; 21 but we do not know how it is that now he sees, nor do we know who opened his eyes.
Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself."
22 His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue.
23 Therefore his parents said, "He is of age; ask him."
24 So for the second time they called the man who had been blind, and they said to him, "Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner."
25 He answered, "I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see."
26 They said to him, "What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?"
27 He answered them, "I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?"
28 Then they reviled him, saying, "You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses.
29 We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from."
30 The man answered, "Here is an astonishing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes.
31 We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will.
32 Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind.
33 If this man were not from God, he could do nothing."
34 They answered him, "You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?"
And they drove him out.
35 Jesus heard that they had driven him out, and when he found him, he said, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?"
36 He answered, "And who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him."
37 Jesus said to him, "You have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he."
38 He said, "Lord, I believe." And he worshiped him.
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I acquired this story from the Rev. Dale Cockrum, (1)
Two blind men who had been healed by Jesus, who happened to meet one day, and they were so excited to meet someone else who had been healed.
They talked about the wonder of sight, the color of flowers, the beauty of butterflies, the glory of sunrises, the faces of children and grandchildren.
They talked about the wonder of having seen the face of Jesus.
They were laughing and having a great time together, when one of them said, "And do you remember how Jesus spit on the ground and took that mud, and put it on your eye?"
The other fellow looked kind of stunned, and answered, "Why no, he simply said, 'Receive your sight,' and I could see."
The first fellow said, "Wait a minute - now just wait a minute here. You mean he didn't use any mud?"
"No."
"Well, did he at least have you wash in the pool of Siloam?"
"No - of course not - who ever heard of anything so ridiculous as mud in your eye?!"
"Well," said the first man, "if he didn't put mud in your eyes and have you wash in the pool of Siloam, you are still blind! Blind - do your hear me? Because that's the way Jesus healed me; that's the way he does it!"
Then the second man began to get angry. He shouted, "Mud, mud, mud! Who ever heard of using mud?! That's the dumbest thing I have ever heard! You still have mud in your eyes. You're the one who's still blind!"
They got into a big argument - their relationship was destroyed, and right then and there, they formed the first two denominations: the Mudites and the Antimudites!
Since then, of course, the church has been fighting and splitting over issues not a whole lot more significant than that!
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She called Dr. Laura Schlesinger with a most serious question.
She didn't know what to do.
She is attending a Muslim school.
Her mother is Lutheran
Her Father is Catholic.
Her mother took her to church and when it came time for communion, the girl declined the invitation.
She didn't believe that she should.
She was confused.
She asked Dr. Laura what religion she should choose.
Dr. Laura discovered that her parents after being married couldn't agree on a common faith, either Catholic or Lutheran.
They didn't talk about it at all.
Now, mom wants her daughter to make a decision as to what religion she will be, and what church she will attend.
Dr. Laura told the girl that she was not in a position to make a decision.
After the girl hung up she said, this is the problem that parents create for their children when they cannot agree on a spiritual home.
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"'I'm an Episcopalian, and I think of myself as a non-practicing Jew," says Katherine Powell Cohen, a 36-year-old English teacher in San Francisco.
"'I'm a Mennonite hyphen Unitarian Universalist,' says Ralph Imhoff, 57, a retired educator from Chandler, AR.
"'I call myself a Christian Buddhist, but sort of tongue-in-cheek,' says Maitreya Badami, 30, who works in Contra Costa, CA, public defender's office.
"Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, a prominent Jewish scholar, is also a Sufi shiek.
James Ishmael Ford, a Unitarian minister in Arizona is a Zen sensei, or master.
Jesus said to Nicodemus, (John 3:10 NRSV) Jesus answered him, "Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?
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Jesus said to the woman at the well in Samaria, (John 4:21-22 NRSV) Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. [22] You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.
39 Jesus said, "I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind."
40 Some of the Pharisees near him heard this and said to him, "Surely we are not blind, are we?"
41 Jesus said to them, "If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, 'We see,' your sin remains.
In Reynolds Price's story, "The Foreseeable Future," (2) a man named Whit Wade returns from World War II severely wounded.
A spiritual healer named Juanita asks him, "Did your brain get damaged, or any of your backbone?"
Whit said, "Not actual physical damage. What hurts is my soul."
"That WILL give you fits. Are you saved?" she asked.
He said, "Pretty surely. I'd rather drink lye than talk about it, but I accepted Christ when I was 13."
"And you know he loves you?"
Whit said, "I do" - his eyes were still shut.
And he braced for an oncoming missionary spiel.
If it came, he would thank her and fight his way out through whatever trouble [Juanita's] dogs threw at him.
But Juanita kept up a long, breathing silence.
Then, with a first little yip in her voice, as if she might have waked herself up, she said, "Whitley Wade, you are now alive. Any day you'll realize that you have been healed."
CONCLUSION:
1. Rev. Dale Cockrum, "Why Denominations?" First United Methodist Church home page, Olympia, Wash., September 20, 1996.
2. Reynolds Price, The Foreseeable Future (New York: Atheneum, 1991), 84.
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