Keeping Our Sight

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF JOHN

KEEPING OUR SIGHT

John 9:35-41

35 Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, and when he found him, he said, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?"  36 "Who is he, sir?" the man asked. "Tell me so that I may believe in him." 37 Jesus said, "You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you."  38 Then the man said, "Lord, I believe," and he worshiped him. 39 Jesus said, "For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind." 40 Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, "What? Are we blind too?" 41 Jesus said, "If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.

NIV

The conclusion of the narrative is here and what a conclusion it is.  We can see the blind man does in fact believe and understand that Jesus is the Son of God, although he calls himself the Son of Man. But the astonishing conclusion is with what the Lord says to the Pharisees that heard him tell this man who he was. Jesus is certainly talking about spiritual sight as opposed to spiritual blindness although he healed the man of physical blindness. All of us were once spiritually blind, born blind, unable to see the truth of God. It was not a good way to live, perhaps some of us received our sight earlier in our lives, while others of us spend many years being blind, stumbling around in our own darkness. We may have thought we were having fun in those blind years, but in actually we were simply dead men walking. Although Jesus uses the words, “For Judgment I have come”, he does not judge, but judgment is the result of his words. Those of us who were blind can now see and it appears some that thought they could see will be blind. This statement most likely is directed right at the Pharisees, even all of Israel. They once saw God, but now they have become blind and all we Gentiles were once blind, but now Jesus is giving sight to us. But this is truth for each individual as well. Just as Jesus was telling those Pharisees who suppose they see, who were proud, self-confident, but actually despised the truth. Those kinds of people were actually exasperated by the teachings of Jesus. Their pride and opposition to him would confirm them more and more in their erroneous views. This is always the effect of truth. Where it does not soften, it hardens the heart: where it does not convert, it sinks into deeper blindness and condemnation. This is the lesson we must make sure sinks deep within our spirits. We cannot allow ourselves to think more highly of ourselves then we should. We cannot allow denominationalism to overshadow the truth of God, the teachings of Jesus. Once we received our sight, once we became born again, we need continue to focus our sight on the truth of God. The Pharisees once had the truth but became blinded by their own brand of truth. We must never allow this to happen to us. If we begin to think we live a holy and righteous life based on our religious activities, our good deeds, our sin free condition, we have become blind. The Word of God declares we are all sinners and that we are saved by grace, and not by works least any of us boast. How we could possible believe for one minute, that when we get to heaven we will all stand around telling each other stories of what we did to get there, one trying to outdo the others good deeds, or how many of the laws, rules we followed correctly, which won us the prize of eternal life. Let us not lose our sight of Jesus by staring at some brand of Christianity. Let us keep our eyes on Jesus, and the things of this world will grow strangely dim, in the light of his glory and grace.