this morning we are beginning a three-part series on John chapter 9 and this series in John chapter 9 is all about blindness you see John as the human author of this gospel under the inspiration of the Spirit has shown episodes of intense spiritual blindness in chapter 7 where the Jewish leaders and the opposition wanted to arrest the Lord Jesus and then in chapter 8 it culminates with the same Jewish leaders and citizens wanting to stone the Lord Jesus, only for saying who He is, that He is truly God in the flesh. And so, the subject of blindness has already been looming in the Gospel of John, and I closed last Sunday with those words, that there are none so blind as those who refuse to see. Now in chapter 9, what John is going to do under the inspiration of the Spirit is to do a clinic on blindness. He opens with a case study of a man who is physically blind. He's born blind, but we notice as the passage develops, it turns into an expose of the greater detriment of spiritual blindness. Far greater than physical blindness is spiritual blindness. And so let's find John chapter 9 in our Bibles. Blindness in all of its variations is a serious limitation. And like other physical limitations, blindness can produce compensating strengths in other areas when a person keeps advancing beyond their limits. I'm still learning this, and there's much more that I've yet to learn. As some of you know, and as I was even discussing this morning, seven years ago, I woke up unable to see out of my left eye. It was inexplicable. I didn't know what happened. I thought something was covering my pupil because it felt like there was a translucent film. I could see light, but I couldn't see details through the left eye, and this was very strange. Jennifer had great eyes, and so I asked her to look in my eye, do you see anything covering my pupil? I don't feel anything, but do you see anything that might have rolled over my eye? And so she looked at it, she saw nothing. So we're just mystified why I can't see out of the left eye. You start to think crazy thoughts when your eye goes blind and there's nothing that you can feel. I used to wear contacts and I thought my theory was maybe there's an old contact that had rolled back into my eye and I never got it out. Maybe it had rolled forward. and was just an old contact that's been in my body for years. I know that's a terrible thought, but you think crazy things like that when you're blind. Jen said, nope, there's nothing. There's nothing in your eye, nothing physical. And it's true. The problem was not something covering my eye. It was the eye itself. And after visiting a half a dozen specialists who did MRIs to see if I had a brain tumor, they did a spinal tap to remove the pressure from my spine that might have caused the optic nerve to swell off the charts, as one ophthalmologist said. It was determined that I was 70% blind in my left eye because the optic nerve had partially died in that area. We don't know why. We still don't know the cause. It may have been a string of days when I had a high fever, a month before I lost the vision, but only the Lord knows. And right now I can only see light out of my left eye. No clear vision for details and therefore driving is difficult when it's dark. Now having talked to people with total blindness, I know that I am very blessed to have any vision at all. Very blessed to have any sight. But there are also theological insights that you learn when this happens to you that you would not have necessarily learned without it. And one of the theological insights I've learned is that even a little bit of a known hindrance, like partial blindness, can still be used for God's glory. Very much so, so long as three conditions are met. First, we must ascribe the entire providence to God's good and perfect will for us. Second, we must have a perspective that looks beyond the initial loss to see the greater gain in it. And third, we must keep advancing forward. We must do whatever the next thing is that we are supposed to do. Now because of my own personal experience with a loss of physical vision in one eye, John 9 has deeper meaning for me now than if I had tried to preach this before 2014. I would not have had the depth of insight that I have now standing here. And maybe years later, I'll have even more insight. But right now, I've learned a lot just from that little bit of experiencing partial blindness. John 9 is all about a man who was born blind, totally blind, congenitally blind. And as we learned from Jesus, he was born this way for a good and perfect reason. In the first 12 verses, The focus is on the man's blindness and its purpose for God's glory. So that's why this message is about blindness and glory. So let's consider this opening section together. John 9, reading verses 1 through 12. And now in honor of God and His word, if you're physically able to do so, please stand with me for the reading of these verses. As Jesus passed by, he saw a man blind from birth, and his disciples asked him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered, It was not that this man sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me, while it is day. Night is coming, when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.' Having said these things, he spit on the ground, and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man's eyes with the mud, and said to him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, which means scent. So he went and washed, and came back seeing. The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying, Is this not the man who used to sit and beg? Some said, It is he. Others said, No, but he is like him. He kept saying, I am the man. So they said to him, then how were your eyes opened? He answered, 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 received my sight. They said to him, where is he? He said, I don't know. Please pray with me. Father, thank you for revealing what true blindness is. so that we might understand real vision through faith. Enable us to see that our sin is not the only explanation for why certain trials and afflictions come inexplicably into our lives. but that you may be glorified through our responses and through the final outcomes which are still future. Empower us to do the real works that we were each created and called to do while it's still day, before the night comes when no one can work. Jesus is the one true light of the world. May we bear His glorious light through the gospel as His gathered witnesses here on earth. And we ask all of these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Please be seated. Verse 12 closes this opening narrative with a mystery. It's an unresolved mystery that ends like a cliffhanger. Now that's where we're going to land this morning, but I'm previewing that it's going to close with the mystery of verse 12. It hangs in the air until we get down to verse 35, where it is there resolved. But it's the mystery of location. The man who's been healed knows that it was Jesus who healed him. He knows a little bit about the facts of what took place. He made mud. He used saliva. He sent me to this place called Siloam to wash, and I came back seeing. So he knows something about the what, and he knows the who. But the question here is where? That's the unanswered question initially. He doesn't know where Jesus is from, and he does not presently know where Jesus has gone. And so we finally learn where Jesus is when we get into the third part of John 9 and there is that great reunion in verse 35 and it culminates in the man's regeneration. Now, John 9, as a whole, records what is called the sixth sign miracle of Jesus. John has these signs, the seven great signs. This is the sixth sign miracle of Jesus, and John uses the whole chapter. What we know is chapter 9. There were no chapters or verses when he wrote it, but we know it is chapter 9 in John's gospel. And we learn in verse 14 that this all took place on another Sabbath. So it is Saturday. Register that it's Saturday in your mind. And this is not a leisurely Saturday in Israel for Jesus. In fact, He's doing a lot of things on this Saturday. Jesus was always using the Sabbath to heal and to display God's restoring work. And these healings on the Sabbath always infuriated the Pharisees. It made them irate. It so irritated the Pharisees and the other religious leaders in Israel. Why were they irritated? Well, it's because they thought Jesus was violating a Sabbath precept in the law of Moses. Now I ask you, did Jesus ever violate any of God's precepts? Well, you know the answer is no. Of course he didn't. So why are these Jewish leaders upset? Well, they felt that the Sabbath was being violated because they had been conditioned by their traditions of men, man-made traditions, all of these things that they had added. They're man-made rules. Jesus never violated God's law regarding this or any other precept. It was only a violation of their man-made rules and traditions about the Sabbath. So that's exactly what Jesus is doing. He's knocking down these little man-made idols left and right. He's pushing their buttons about their false use of the Sabbath and how they're really missing the point of why God gave them the Sabbath. I said this is a busy Saturday. Well, listen to what I mean. Chronologically, the events recorded here in John chapter 9 take place after Jesus has already healed a woman on the same Sabbath. I believe it's the same time as Luke 13, which records that Jesus healed a woman who had been bound by Satan, we are told, with a spirit of infirmity for 18 years. And he already rebuked them for not having compassion on a woman who had been healed after 18 years of bondage. And then not long after Jesus heals this blind man, he then will weep over the city of Jerusalem. That's also recorded in Luke 13. After that, He's not finished. He then heals another man on the Sabbath of something that is called Dropsy. And that's recorded in Luke 14. Dropsy is a condition where fluid is retained in the tissues of the body, much like lymphedema. And it's associated with kidney or liver conditions, including cancer. That's called Dropsy. So Jesus heals the man instantly. He can do that. Now, Jesus can heal in any way. He doesn't even have to be present. He can heal from another city by word. He doesn't have to be present. He doesn't have to touch. He can mediate the healing just by willing it to happen. This is His power. This is His prerogative to do such healings. He can heal anytime He wants to, in any way He wants to. And so we have one Sabbath healing after another recorded in this phase of our Lord's earthly ministry. Now the first five verses of John 9 introduce what I'm calling the human predicament. The human predicament. The basic problem introduced here is one of congenital blindness, meaning blindness from birth. The passage begins, as Jesus passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, Rabbi, who sent this man or his parents that he was born blind? Now let's pause just long enough to analyze their question. Let's consider their question about the source of this blindness. Notice it's an either or question. We will learn later it's a false dichotomy. It's a selection between A or B. Which one is it, Lord? A or B. So often we think in this way. A or B. Is it this or that? We don't have any clue what the other options are. Now, in their Jewish theology, they had reduced the options down to two. And it seemed like a very legitimate thing to do. Now, let's look at what they were getting right. Notice where they're coming from. They rightly understood that all people are born in trespasses and sins from the moment of conception. They got that exactly right. So their premise is correct. But it doesn't explain why this man is blind. Because those same factors apply to all of us. Why aren't we all born blind? Why aren't we all born deformed and crippled and maimed in different ways if sin is the factor? So that doesn't explain why this man is born blind even though it's a true factor. There is sin in all of us. We are born in trespasses and sins. Now, I want to also point out something else that's good about their question. They're not coming in as total ignoramuses with this. In fact, it sounds like they've been researching a little bit and they've heard things about the medical causes of blindness, at least as it existed in their day. their question shows an awareness of current medical insight and science that may have had a bearing on this situation at hand. Now one of the reasons they asked if the man's parents might have sinned so as to cause his blindness is because in that day, and even now in less developed nations like in many parts of Africa, Most of the blindness in newborn infants is caused by sexually transmitted diseases like gonorrhea, syphilis, things of this nature. And in such cases, it is often sexual sin that sets off a chain of other consequences, one of which is congenital blindness in some of the babies. And so this is just one small piece of our larger human predicament as a fallen race and a fallen place. They knew that. And so the disciples are not saying something that is totally ignorant. There is some knowledge behind their question, but the problem is they just limited what the possibilities are. And that's so often a human thing to do. And so the disciples, using the medical information they knew about congenital blindness, that frames this question that they think is astute for the master who knows all things. That's why they asked, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he's born blind? From their perspective, that is a totally reasonable question, but we know it's a false dichotomy. Now the answer is hidden option C. There's another option. Look at verse three. Jesus answered, it was not that this man sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. What a beautifully unexpected answer for these men who were thinking only on the horizontal plane. The works of God always display the glory of God. The works of God always display the glory of God. Now this answer from Jesus opens up a vast theological category for all kinds of events that defy human reasoning. The answer to the disciples' question is not a who question for the assignment of blame, it's a why question, and it's for the glory of God. In this way, It's like so many of our own why questions. I've asked many of them myself and I will likely ask many more before I'm in heaven. Why, why, why? No finite obstacle can ultimately eclipse God's glory, not blindness and not even death itself. C.S. Lewis put it in this way. A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word darkness on the walls of his cell." God often chooses to be glorified through difficult and inscrutable circumstances that we cannot explain. He does that. That is his prerogative. Many things take place simply, I say simply, for the glory of God. That's a massive concept, but sometimes that is the simple reason. It is for the glory of God as other people hear about it or in what takes place that impacts other people's lives for God's glory as a result of whatever that event is. You know, whenever a brother or a sister in the church goes through a trial or some great difficulty, does it not call out the better desires of our biblically informed consciences? Yeah. It calls out a higher level of seeing a need and meeting it. A higher level of involvement when you see someone who is really struggling in the ditch of life. And our brokenness because of sin is a major part of our human predicament. But another element is the limitation of time. It's not just our sin problem, but there is also a limitation of time problem. You know there are some things that have to be done in a certain window of time or it becomes obsolete. There are just certain things in life that have to be done in a time window period, otherwise you're going to lose the opportunity and the moment is forever gone. Now we know that from life's experiences, but Jesus teaches that right here in these verses. Jesus continues in verses 4 and 5 with this unusual word choice. It is strange word choice, but we're going to analyze it. Jesus says, beginning in verse four, we must work the works of him who sent me while it is day. Night is coming when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. Now there's a lot in these two verses. The first thing to notice is the first person plural at the beginning of verse four. We must work. We. So what is Jesus doing here? He's including the disciples. He's including the apostles in the work that must be done in this window of opportunity. It is not Jesus working all by himself. It is work given to him by the Father for them to do. We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day. Night is coming when no one can work. Now what is Jesus talking about in verse four? What is this night? Well, he's talking about the season of earthly ministry opportunity in his ministry. The time between when he said it and the cross. Because what happens at the cross? Well, that's going to be a time of spiritual night. That is going to be the darkest night, spiritually speaking, when the events surrounding His betrayal, His arrest, the trials, and the crucifixion are going to shut off all ministry. You know, there is no ministry done in that period of night. After the healing of Malchus, the servant of the high priest, when his ear is chopped off in that blundering attempt at assassination by Peter, Jesus heals the ear. After that, there's no healing done. No more healings recorded. It is night. Nobody is evangelizing. Nobody is saying, have you heard the gospel of Jesus? Nobody is talking about that. It's shut down. Their mouths are frozen shut. So there is no ministry, there's no preaching being done during those dark, dark hours. This is night. No earthly, no human ministry could be done during those dark hours. Everything is shut down for the crucifixion in terms of ministry. And then verse five, Jesus follows it by saying, as long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. Now Jesus has always been the light of the world. He made this declaration in the previous chapter in John 8, verse 12. He would also continue to be the light of the world even after he went back into heaven. But Jesus also told his disciples much earlier in his ministry. In fact, it's at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, recorded in Matthew 5, 14. He said, you are the light of the world. Speaking to them, speaking to us. You are the light of the world, meaning you who follow Jesus bear witness to Christ while you and we are in the world. So Jesus came as the true spiritual light to a world that is utterly shut out in darkness. This is our human predicament. But Jesus also came to bring light and sight to blind eyes in a physical sense as well. Now the physical illustrates the spiritual, not the other way around. We have to have the physical to help us to understand the much greater, much more important spiritual realm. And this is what is happening in this passage. So now that we've considered the human predicament, let us next consider the Savior's provision. We have our Lord's response in verses six and seven. It says, having said these things, he, Jesus, spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man's eyes with the mud and said to him, go, wash in the pool of Siloam, which means sent. So he went and washed and came back seeing. Now the Lord does something that is counterintuitive here. Instead of speaking to restore the man's sight, which he absolutely could have done, he didn't have to be present, as I said earlier. He could have been in another city and healed the man verbally. He could have just thought it. He could have willed it to happen. Or another option is he could have taken his clean hands, his pure undefiled hands that have power and healing in them, and he could have placed them over the man's eyes and no mud would have had to be involved. He could have done that. And if there was a physical touch that he wanted to use to mediate it, that would have done it. But he neither spoke nor did he use clean hands. He chose the means that we have recorded here. He spits with saliva, his sinless saliva, into the dirt and he makes mud with his saliva. Now, what is Jesus doing? I believe what he's doing is he is recapitulating the work of creation for this man's eyes. He's showing a little thumbnail of what happened when he created everything. In the beginning, it was from the dirt of the ground that God originally formed the first man. And from the first man, the first woman. And in this recapitulation, God the Son, through whom all things are created, He creates new eyes for a man who has never seen anything in his entire life. And it's all for this moment. However long the man has been blind, however old he is, he has never seen a thing until this moment is coming right now. Now, in our way of thinking, again, this sounds very strange, to make a blind person see by rubbing mud in their eyes. You see, to us, that sounds like the opposite would happen. It would make somebody who can see not be able to see if you rub mud in their eyes. Why can't you see? I got mud in my eyes. I can't see anything. Well, that's normally the way we would think about it. That's why I said it's counterintuitive. The Lord rubs mud into the man's eyes and then he tells him to go wash in the pool of Siloam. The man still can't see. He's still blind with Jesus having touched him. There's mud on his eyes. His eyes are closed maybe because of the mud. So he's still blind at that moment with mud covering his eyes. And I think, although the passage doesn't say this, I think somebody had to lead him. I think he had to be led to the pool of Siloam, and I think that probably happened. He was used to that, and other people had to lead him other places anyway. And he gets to the pool, and he washes in the pool in obedience to Jesus, and he comes back seeing. He can see! He has never seen anything before in his entire life, and now all of the sounds he's heard finally have images. And he's looking at faces and he's seeing the amazement on their faces. He's seeing the twinkling eyes and the smile on faces. And he's looking in the crowd at these excited, astonished onlookers. And he's looking for one face that he didn't see. He doesn't see the man that he would correlate with Jesus, the one who healed him. He doesn't hear that voice right now. Where is he? Nobody looks like they would be the one that healed my eyes, that touched my eyes with mud. And so he's scanning the crowd, I imagine, when he comes back and he's looking for Jesus, but he doesn't see him. He heard the voice of Jesus, and now he can see for the first time. And so the quest for answers begins. From the moment that he is healed, he is now looking for Jesus. Looking for Jesus. That's the only agenda. So from the human predicament to the Savior's provision, we come third to the bystander's perplexity. The bystander's perplexity. This is verses 8 through 12. The general confusion of the townspeople is covered here in verses 8 through 12. And it says in verse 8, the neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying, is this not the man who used to sit and beg? Now, this question in verse 8 illustrates a truth about anyone who comes into contact with Jesus Christ. The truth is this. Even if a person is not spiritually saved, they are nonetheless changed by the encounter. No one meets Jesus unchanged, in other words. Whether they believe or not, they are not unchanged. And the same is true in a different sense about hearing the truth. No one is left unchanged even if they don't accept the truth. Once we hear the truth, we cannot un-hear it. You can't un-ring a bell. Once people are exposed to the reality of who Jesus is, they are changed for better or for worse, forever. Now in this point of the narrative, the man is still lost. He can see, but he's not redeemed yet. That happens later in the passage. But he just met Jesus, and his vision has been created out of nothing, and he wants to find the man who healed him. He has new eyes, he's just begun to see for the first time in his life, and we're going to hear as we get further into the passage that he's articulate. He is a man who knows how to answer. He knows how to think. He knows how to reason. And he makes some great apologetic points to these leaders later on. Now, he's a different man. He is already a changed man in a qualitative sense, even though he's the same man in another sense, right? Because he's the same one. He's the one who used to beg. He's the one who used to be led by other people. But now he is different. His identity is changed. And the change is so radical that the people who knew this man before are now absolutely confused about his identity. Is that him? Who is he? Who is this man? Verse 9 continues. Some said it is he. Others said nobody is like him. He kept saying, I am the man. So they said to him, then how were your eyes opened? He answered, 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 received my sight. They said to him, where is he? He said, I don't know. And so there's mystery here. The confusion of the bystanders is in spite of the clear declaration of the man himself. He's telling them, I am the man, I am the man. And so they ask him the how question, how did this happen? And he explains the physical aspects of the healing, spit, mud, pool, go to wash, come back, sing. And he's already answered the who question, that it's Jesus. It all hinges on Jesus. But since it's a supernatural act of God through Christ, the man doesn't really know how it happened because it's a miracle. You can't explain the site with mud. You can't even explain it with the pool of Salon. Those are incidental to the healing. They're not the reason the man is healed, or we'd be rubbing mud on every blind eye. We'd be telling every blind person, go to Salon with the mud and wash it off and you're healed. Obviously there's more to it. And so they get that. This man only knows the what factor and the all important who factor. Verse 11. 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 received my sight. Now this answers the who question, but it does not address how he can see. He can only explain to them what Jesus did and what he told him to do. Now this opening scene that we've been considering closes in verse 12. They said to him, where is he? He said, I don't know. So there is a mystery that closes this opening section in this narrative. Where is Jesus? Why did he disappear? Why do you think he left the scene so quickly so that the man wouldn't see him immediately when he came back from the pool? Well, there's a mystery here. Now, it's going to be resolved later in the passage, but this mystery hangs in the air at the end of verse 12 in this opening section. Now in the next section we're going to consider the response of unbelief as the Pharisees get involved. The Pharisees interview this man who has now received his sight. And John, the human author, is making a theological point that begins to emerge in the second section. Namely, that spiritual blindness is the greatest eternal problem, not physical. Nothing physical, nothing horizontal, is really our greatest problem. Our greatest problem is always in the vertical realm between us and God. And until that is resolved, it doesn't matter what is resolved physically. And so this is the Pharisee's predicament. It is this spiritual blindness. But until then, let's close in prayer. Father, we do thank you for opening our spiritual eyes through the gift of saving faith, those of us in Christ. For all who have this saving faith, we can now say with this man, these once blind eyes now see. Increase our vision, Lord. Give us hearts on fire to do your will, to meet with you in private prayer, and with eagerness to use our spiritual gifts to edify and serve the people around us, especially in this local church. Make us effective witnesses of Jesus as we go about our daily work. Help us to do it with excellence as unto you. Use us to point others to Christ, and may Jesus be exalted as we go. For we ask all these things in Jesus' name, amen.