Grace,
mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ. Amen.
A man, blind from birth, sitting at
the side of the road, spending his life in utter suffering. This is the first century, there was no
safety net, the government didn’t provide him with a place to live and money to
buy food. He was completely dependent on
the kindness of others, by that I mean he was a beggar. If people didn’t throw a few alms his way, he
didn’t eat. And upon seeing this man
(and as is so often the case) the disciples are quick to speak but slow to
understand. They ask Jesus what they
think is an obvious question, “Rabbi,
who sinned, this man or his parents that he was born blind?”
In other words, “Jesus, things aren’t
right with this guy, he’s suffered much in his life, so, who sinned so greatly
as to kindle God’s wrath, this man or his parents?”
Well let’s get to the root of the
question. The real question here is
this, “How are we to know that we’ve gained the favor of God.” It’s obvious to the disciples that if things
are going well in your life, God’s pleased with you. But, if you’ve been struck with tragedy, with
illness, like this man in our text, God must be angry with you.
Children, today, are born with maladies
and handicaps of all sorts. We all know
someone whose child was born with autism, down syndrome, physically impaired in
some way. And so, if we’re to view God
the same way the disciples do, we may ask the same question, “Who sinned, the children
or their parents?” Has God shown His
displeasure on these children that they have to go through life with their
handicaps? Does God show His displeasure
with you when you’re lying in the hospital bed?
Does God show His displeasure with you when your knee, hip, shoulder, or
ankle gives out? Did you commit some
horrible sin that God’s now angry with you?
You may not have been born blind or
born with some physical handicap, but we all face physical ailments, injuries,
and infirmities of all sorts. Many would
look at you, who are going through the challenges of life, dealing with the results
of a fallen world; they would look at your pain and suffering and use that as
the measure of God’s disposition toward you, a gauge on just how bad a sinner
you are. These are the people who would
say with the disciples, “Oh boy, somebody really blew it this time! What great and terrible iniquity did you do
to offend God that He would smite you like this!?”
The truth is, God views our suffering
much differently than we do, and especially the way the world does. Are those who lost their lives in the
mudslide in Washington state worse sinners than anyone else? Was God showing His displeasure toward those
who were on the Malaysian Airlines flight who many presume dead a sign God’s
displeasure toward them? No. It’s a sign of that we live in a fallen
world. Children are born blind, children
are born with down syndrome, children are born with heart conditions. It’s not a sign that the child or their
parents committed come horrible sin. But
as we live in a fallen world and see these things that go on, sicknesses,
diseases, tsunamis and earthquakes, they’re signs that calls us to repentance. Because of our sin, we deserve death too. Not, that we have to search our past and
attempt to interpret what particular sin we’ve committed, but because we’re a fallen
people, who, without Christ are spiritually blind and helpless, who live in a
fallen world full of sin; we do have need to repent.
But God views all of this
differently. When the disciples pose the
question to Jesus, He says, “It was not
that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be
displayed in him.” Wow! This guy was born blind so that Christ could
display the power of God! Jesus doesn’t
view this man’s blindness as something that’s even “bad.” And what are those works? Well, look what Jesus did. “Having
said these things, He spat 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.” Nobody’s ever seen anything like it before. Yet, Christ, the Light of the world, still
isn’t done with Him. What good is it to
see if you don’t have faith? So Jesus
addresses that too.
“…having
found him [Jesus] said to him, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” He answered, “And who is he, sir, that I may
believe in him?” Jesus said to him, “you
have seen Him, and it is He who is speaking to you.” He said, “Lord, I believe,” and he worshiped
Him.”
There it is; the works of God on
full display. This is how God uses
suffering. Even through this man, who
spent decades stumbling through the world blind as a bat, Christ drives him to
faith. Christ doesn’t only heal
partially, He heals the whole person - body and soul. Jesus not only gave this guy physical sight,
but the eyes of faith.
This is how God uses our
suffering. Even through these physical
impairments that we endure, God can and does make good come out of them, though
the good may never be apparent to us.
They drive us back to Christ and His cross. This is how we see Christ through suffering. As we heard a couple of weeks ago in our
epistle reading, Paul writes in Romans 5, “Not
only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces
endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and
hope does not put us to shame…” And
that sure and certain hope we have is Christ.
That’s how we know God loves us, not by the circumstances in our life,
but because He gave us His Son. God’s
loves comes from outside of us and our lives and is shown and given to us in
Christ.
For we have a Lord who know what
it’s like to suffer. He knows what it’s like
to feel the pains of life, to have no place to rest His head. We don’t gauge God’s love by the
circumstances of life, but rather, through the cross. The work of God is on display in its fullness
for you in His Son, who suffered and died.
Who suffered and died so that your eyes, too, would be open to recognize
Christ for who He is, the Savior who takes away your sins. Who suffered and died by way of a cross so
that we can bear our crosses with patients, knowing that the pains and trials
of this life are temporary but life with Christ is forever. Who suffered and died so that you would have
that place in heaven where all tears are wiped from your eyes.
This promise is given to you in
baptism. Jesus didn’t spit on the ground
and spread mud on you like make-up, rather, He poured on you water that was
combined with His Word. Water that bathes
you in the blood of Christ. So that now
these promises are yours. Promises that
are sure and certain because God’s Word is sure and certain. He didn’t smear mud on your eyes, but He
places His body in your mouth and pours His blood down your throat.
So now, through Christ, our eyes
have been open to see Him as our Savior.
We can now face the pains of life with the comfort that Christ has
already walked down that road for you.
Pains, sicknesses, life-long handicaps, natural disasters will come, but
through Christ, we have comfort.
So if you ever wonder if God loves you, don’t look
inside of yourself or to the things going “wrong” in your life. Look to the cross for that’s how you know God
loves you – He gave His Son for you.
God’s love comes from outside of you, flowing from the cross, where He
has won for you salvation and eternal life.
This life is fallen, but the life to come is nothing but bliss as we
spend an eternity with our Jesus. Amen.
The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,
keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus unto life everlasting. Amen.
