Learning Points:

Point 1: Love the main focus when dealing with problems

Read John 9:1-12

Back ground information: It was on the Sabbath when Jesus healed the man (John 9:14); this upset the religious leaders.

In the beginning of the story, the disciples pondered about the reason behind the man’s blindness (9:2) What we can see here, is that there is a difference between what Jesus saw and what the disciples and religious leaders saw. Was the man a subject for theological discussion, or should we look at him as a chance to minister God’s love to?

Alex: If we place this principle in today’s context. There was a recent video of Pastor Kong from City harvest church circulating the Internet. It shows many Christians arguing about how Pastor Kong was. That is Theology is off.  Many Christians joined in, either by tearing him down or distancing the rest of the Christian body with City Harvest. I must admit that in my head I was having judgmental thoughts. What really struck me was that  I found an article also circulating the internet defending Pastor Kong. At the end of the article I found out, a Buddhist wrote it.  Christians are tearing a fellow Christian down and a Buddhist is defending. That was really sad. God really spoke to me through that incident.

Question: when we deal with Theological differences or difference in ideals and beliefs. How should we go about doing so?

John 9:3-4 tells us that

1. The reason for illness or pain is not for us to decide (We do not have the authority) ; only God knows.

2. Jesus did not suggest that God had deliberately made the man blind so that Jesus could perform a miracle.

 3. What we should rejoice in is the fact that God’s power is displayed through the healing. Jesus also used different manners of healing the blind (Matthew 9:27-31, Mark 8:22-26) because it isn’t the manner of healing that matters; but rather, therein lies the precious message of the power of the Lord.

The significance of the clay to heal the blind can be found in two ways:

Ask “who”, not “how”

Look at:

 When we see something happening, we tend to wonder how that happened, when we should be looking at who made it happen. This may be because we fail to realize that He is actually omnipotent; all logic is thrown out when it comes to considering what the Lord can do. So, we limit ourselves, when all we really need to know is that He is the Lord, He is omnipotent, He cares for us.

Fear of Man vs Fear of the Lord

John 9: 18-23

Another issue here, is fear of man versus fear of the Lord. When Pharisees began interrogating the parents of the beggar, they told the truth for things that would not implicate their well-being (“He is our son”), but fearfully evaded questioning when it started to get dangerous for them (“He is of age; ask him). Although this was no outright lie, answering the question in the positive or negative has two different outcomes: 1. The Pharisees’ wrath, their earthly condemnation, and God’s pleasure at being glorified through their words, or, 2. God not being glorified through their words.

(John 5:44) What type of glory do we seek?

We also see this in John 7:13 and John 12:42

Are we there only when it is convenient? Which is the decisional factor: Man’s acceptance or God’s pleasure? We cannot serve two masters. “The fear of Man brings a snare” (Proverbs 29:25)

Point 2: Believing as a Result of the Works of the Good Shepherd

John 9:35-41

Jesus identified Himself as the Son of God (John 9:35, 5:25) and the beggar believed and was saved (John 9:38). “My sheep hear my voice” (John 10:27).

Contrast John 9:39 and John 3:16-17. The reason for our Lord’s coming was salvation, but the result of His coming was condemnation of those who would not believe. The Pharisees were blind due to their pride, self-righteousness, tradition and false interpretation of the Word. They chose to be blind to the glory of the Lord : John 9:41à Jesus said, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains”. In contrast, the beggar was physically blind and spiritually blind, yet both his eyes and heart were opened. This was because he listened to the Word, believed, obeyed and experienced the grace of God. The difference is found in John 7:17à If anyone chooses to do God’s will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own.

And all this happens with the work of the Holy Spirit! J

Questions:

1) How was it possible that religiously trained leaders were so blind to who Jesus was?

2) What are our spiritual blind spots? How can you be receptive to Jesus’s illumination in that area?

Done by Gail