No Fear

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF JOHN

NO FEAR

John 9:18-23

18 The Jews still did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they sent for the man's parents. 19 "Is this your son?" they asked. "Is this the one you say was born blind? How is it that now he can see?" 20 "We know he is our son," the parents answered, "and we know he was born blind. 21 But how he can see now, or who opened his eyes, we don't know. Ask him. He is of age; he will speak for himself." 22 His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews, for already the Jews had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ would be put out of the synagogue. 23 That was why his parents said, "He is of age; ask him."

NIV

Now it is time to learn a lesson from the blind man’s parents. Actually we can learn two lessons from them. The first lesson we can learn, being in somewhat of a human sense, is that although these parents may still have been involved in their son’s life due to his blindness and need of care, they also were not going to be accountable for him, as he was of age. Now it is true their refusal was based on their fear of being excommunicated from the synagogue, it is also true their son was old enough to answer for himself. Some of us believers have different views on our role as parents of adult children. Some believe they still have the rights of parenthood, while others believe their children should live their own lives, speaking for themselves, making their own decisions. Neither may be wrong, but it would appear, scripturally, it is clear; children become accountable to God for their own lives at a certain age. If they are accountable to God for their own lives, then surely they should no longer be accountable to their parents.  Although in that Jewish cultural a boy was a man, accountable to God at the age of twelve and most likely still lived in the household of his father, and thus still had to live under his father’s authority it is different today. Our children, by the law of the land become adults much later in life, but whenever the time comes when they leave our home, either due to marriage, or just forging their own single life, we must surrender authority over them, as they are surely accountable to God for their own lives, and are no longer accountable to us. It is this accountability which renders authority, not authority demanding accountability.  Ultimately, in our society, it should come down to who is paying for their life. If a parent is still paying for the life of a child, then some authority still should still exist, but it the child is independent, paying for their own life, then the parent must surrender all authority over the child to the adult child for its own life. Of course we never stop loving them, praying for them, being concerned for them, but they must forge their own paths, accountable only to God. The second lesson and most likely the most important one is regarding how these parents feared being cast out of the group because of the truth. They would much rather abstain from telling the truth they knew, then to speak the truth and suffer the consequences of being thrown out of the synagogue. Do we fear being a cast out because of telling the truth? Would we rather be a part of a congregation which has some untruths within its way of life, then to speak up and tell the truth, if that means being considered a trouble maker, perhaps even asked to leave? Surely we are not asked to leave, but we are certainly are left out of the inner circle, if we speak up and tell the truth. It is much safer not to make any waves; just to go alone with the flow, keep our mouths shut and refuse to speak about what we know is true. At least they might think us to be wise and spiritual if they never hear us speak anything at all.  This blind man’s parents would rather keep silent about the truth they knew so they could be a part of the group. How sad this is, how sad it is if we are anything like those parents. We need to speak the truth, not fear because of the truth.  No fear! We should be bold and forthright concerning the truth of God. When asked what we know, we should not hold back because of fearing the consequences. The truth is always the truth and we should never fear the truth. No Fear!