Who is Jesus? Chapter 28 - Jesus heals a Blind man on the Sabbath Day

 

Who is Jesus? Chapter 28; Jesus heals a Blind man on the Sabbath Day; from John 9)

Jesus had been teaching at the temple in Jerusalem, and as he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth.  And his disciples asked him, “Master, 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 done in him.”  Having said these things, 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.”  So he went and washed and came back seeing. 

The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying, “Is not this the man who used to sit and beg?”  Some said, “It is he.” Others said, “No, but he looks like him.” But 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 the pool of Siloam and wash.’ So I washed and received my sight.” They said, “Where is he?” He said, “I do not know.”

 The neighbors brought the man who had formerly been blind to the Pharisees.  Now it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes.  So the Pharisees again asked him how he had received his sight. And he said to them, “He put mud on my eyes, and I washed, and now I see.”  Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.” But others said, “How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?” And so they said again to the blind man, “What do you say about him, since he has opened your eyes?” He said, “He is a prophet.”

The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight, until they called the man's parents and asked them, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?”  His parents answered, “We know that this is our son and that he was born blind.  But how he now sees we do not know, neither do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself.”  (His parents said, 'He is old enough, ask him,' because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Jesus to be Christ and the Messiah, he was to be put out of the synagogue.) 

 So for the second time they called the man who had been blind and said to him, “Give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner.”  He answered, “Whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, that once I was blind, now I see.”  They said to him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?”  He answered them, “I have told you already, and you refused to listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?”  And they reviled him, saying, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses.  We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.”  

The man answered, “This is an amazing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes.   We know that if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him.   Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind.  If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.”  They answered him, “You were born in utter sin, and do you assume to teach us?” And they cast him out. (To be thrown out of a synagogue and lose their Jewish privileges, was very humiliating to a Jew.)

 Jesus heard that they had cast him out, He found him he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”  He answered, “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 knelt to worshiped Jesus.  The once blind man acknowledged Jesus as the Messiah and worshiped Him as God. You will notice that Jesus accepted the man's worship and if He were not God, it would have been wrong for him to do so.

Often our eyes are blinded to the truth about Jesus, but when we ask Jesus to remove our blindness, we will recognize that Jesus is Lord. If you have not already done so, now is a good time to tell Jesus you believe and will follow Him all the days of your life.