Blind man sat by the road...

This week at Crossings we read the story of the man born blind. Talk about the blues!

This guy is a blind beggar, minding his own business when the disciples decide to turn him into a morality question -- is the blindness his fault or because of his parent's sins.

Jesus spits on the ground and puts mud on his eyes and tells him to wash... people talking about you, putting spit on your face. Kind of a bad day. But this guy seems to be used to the blues. He just goes and washes.

MIRACLE! upon washing the guy can see!

This sets everyone off. Is it really the blind guy? can he really see. Everyone starts whispering. It turns into a big ordeal and people start questioning the guy over and over. Were you really blind? How can you see now?

The man tells his story but no one listens. They are all getting puffed up about Jesus spitting and how improper that is and how he isn't supposed to work on a holy day ("making mud" counts as work).

They keep asking the guy to say that what Jesus did was wrong but the guy can't do that. His life was changed by Jesus. So what they do? They kicked him out the the church.

Dude, talk about the blues. Going from one kind of outcast to another.
but yet, the guy doesn't seem to have the blues. Jesus touched him. Jesus changed him. He has joy that most don't understand.

and the blind shall see...

This week at biblestudy, we discussed John Chapter 9. Jesus heals the blind man. In sum, Jesus's disciples see a blind man and ask Jesus if he is blind because of sin. Jesus says no, spits on the ground and rubs mud in the guy's eyes and tells him to wash in the pool. The man goes, washes and is healed.

People are amazed and they take him to the pharisee's who question him about who healed him. It just so happened to be the Sabbath, a time when Jews weren't supposed to work. So the leaders got in a fight about whether the healing was from God or not. They ask the blind man what he thinks. The blind man says that he thinks it must be from God. They kick him out of the synagog.

Later Jesus finds the man and the man believes in him. Then Jesus says "I came into the world to bring everything into the clear light of day, making all the distinctions clear, so that those who have never seen will see, and those who have made a great pretense of seeing will be exposed as blind."

People were so worked up about how well they thought they understood God that they couldn't see God's work among them. The lesson struck me that when we think we know who God is and how God works we become blind to what God is doing because we stop looking for him. Jesus made things simple - miracles done out of compassion were a sign of God's work on earth - simple people could see this. But people who had a preconcieved notion of who Jesus was supposed to be missed it completely. What preconcieved ideas do we have about God? can we see God at work now?