"Blindness" | Rev. Stephanie Boaz | 03.15.26

"Blindness" | Rev. Stephanie Boaz | 03.15.26

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

So this morning we are only halfway through our scripture lesson for today. And the main character of this passage, a man born blind who is healed by Jesus, has already had quite a time in this passage. He was always blind, and now he sees clearly. He is asked over and over to explain to the people of his community and to the Pharisees what has happened to him. He has to explain his identity, and he has to explain why he can see. His name is Jesus. And I think that he is a prophet. The Pharisees want different answers. So they go to the man's parents, who are cautious. They say as little as possible because they do not want to get on the wrong side of those religious leaders. And so we pick up our reading of John chapter 9 with verses 24 through 41. Hear the word of God. So for the second time the Pharisees called the man who had been blind, and they said to him, Give glory to God. We know that this man Jesus is a sinner. He answered, I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see. They said to him, What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes? And he answered them, I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples? Then 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, Here is an astonishing thing. You do not know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. They answered him, You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us? And they drove him out. Jesus heard that they had driven him out, and when he found the man, Jesus said, Do you believe in the Son of Man? He answered, And who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him. Jesus said to him, You have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he. He said, Lord, I believe, and he worshipped him. Jesus said, I came into this world for judgment, so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind. Some of the Pharisees who were with him heard this and said to him, Surely we are not blind, are we? Jesus said to them, If you were blind, you would not have sinned. But now that you say we see, your sin remains. This is a story about blindness. It's also a story of healing. A man who had never seen anything in his entire life had an encounter with Jesus, the light of the world. And suddenly he sees clearly with his eyes. Then, as the text continues, he grows in his ability to see his healer through the eyes of truth. With each question he's asked by the people in his community, Jesus comes more and more into focus for this man. But still, today's text is about blindness, not physical blindness, spiritual blindness. We see in the variety of characters in the story that they were reluctant to open their eyes to what had happened for this man. There had to be some other explanation for what they were seeing in front of them. And maybe we understand this. It's difficult to open our eyes to what doesn't fit inside our self-made parameters of what is possible. What we can accept is true, and even what we're comfortable believing that God can do. Sometimes it means turning a blind eye. Of course, sin also comes up a lot in this story. The disciples bring it up almost immediately, and then the Pharisees talk about sin several times. Finally, Jesus mentions sin in the last verse because he's not willing to let the Pharisees off the hook when they halfway ask if they are stricken by this blindness, which is why blindness is our topic today, not sin. Especially since Jesus tells us early in the passage that sin is not the point. When the disciples saw Jesus turn his attention to the man who was born blind, they wanted to know who sinned, this man or his parents. And Jesus' answer was clear and definitive. Neither of them sinned. Essentially, Jesus goes on to say that it's not about sin. This is about the glory of God. In Eugene Peterson's The Message Translation, Jesus' response sounds a little different. He says to his disciples, You were asking the wrong question. You're looking for someone to blame. There is no such cause and effect here. Look instead for what God can do. And what God did was to take notice of a man who had to stay on the outside edges of the community. And God healed him. Jesus made a little clay, put it on his eyes, and told him to wash. And he did. And then he could see. And this is amazing good news. And you can't really tell that from reading this story or from the reactions of the people in the community. They could not see that this was good news because to them it was confusing, it was unsettling. Turns out people then, like people now, are really more comfortable with placing blame. When hard things happen, it's easier to believe it only happened because somebody made it happen. If we just get rid of that somebody and are careful not to be that somebody, well, things will be better. And cause and effect. Cause an effect is neat and tidy. If you do this, then that will happen. And if you don't do this, then you don't have to worry about that. Neat and tidy. They wanted it to be a law that the people could follow, that people would understand what the consequences would be, because neat and tidy felt like something the people could handle. There is cause and effect. There are laws to follow. Follow all of them and you are good. But this is such a limited view of things, which is how the sinfulness of the man and his parents came into question. And it seemed to go something like this bad things happen as a consequence for sin. You see, if you don't follow the law, your child will be born blind. This was a neat and tidy explanation, with the blame securely placed on well, the parents or the son, but whatever, the point was made. Which would also suggest that as long as you do follow the law, well, then no worries. So all I have to do is follow the law perfectly. But wait, is that even possible? There are so many laws. I mean, what if I miss one or get one wrong? Of course, there are rituals and sacrifices we can make to seek forgiveness, so we're safe, right? I mean, probably, right? And just like that, fear has taken a foothold. It was fear that pushed the man born blind to the edges of the community before he met Jesus. Not his own fear, the community's fear. They could say that his misfortune or hardship was his own fault, but there was just enough uncertainty in their minds that they felt better if they didn't have to look at him, if they didn't have to see him, and if they could walk away easily. The thing about those edges is that if you get to live in the middle, you don't have to spend much time at those edges. In the middle, we can keep on telling ourselves that people get what they deserve, that people need to make better choices for themselves, that people need to buy their own boots and put their own boots on and pull themselves up by their own boot straps. If things are hard for them, well, surely they're to blame. Cause and effect is real. Natural consequences hit hard. And that sounds logical. It even seems like fairly solid parenting until Jesus comes along and talks about our neighbors. He doesn't call us to parent our neighbors, he calls us to love our neighbors, and he shows us how, if we're willing to see. You see, Jesus always looks to those edges, he always finds those who are on the edges, even as he sees all of those who are in the middle. But he truly has a keen eye for those on the edges. And Jesus wants us to follow his gaze. But fear can be blinding. If we choose to see things through cause and effect and then securely place blame, well, we aren't really seeing clearly, are we? And we know it. Because hard things happen, bad things happen, people get hurt, sickness happens, jobs get lost, relationships get broken, and there is not always someone to blame. What's worse? If we try to place blame, we hurt each other more. In the case of the blind man, he found himself pushed to the edges of the community once again, even though he could see, even though in their eyes he should have been considered whole. He was an outsider to begin with because he was blind. And then he was an outsider because he could see more clearly than anybody else. And Jesus, the light of the world, calls us to see what he will show us. He calls us to look with eyes of love. He calls us to believe in the possibilities of what God can do for us and for others, and even through us. We just have to be willing to see. My little brother is asleep, and I can't keep being the adult anymore. Tell me what's happening right now, the woman said. I was sitting between the stove and the sink because that was the only place the trailer didn't feel like it was falling apart under me. My brother Noah was asleep in a laundry basket lined with towels because our old mattress had split open and the spring started biting through. My mom is working nights, I told her. She cleans offices, then drives food until morning. She'll be back around six. We're okay. I just I don't know how to make this better tonight. She didn't rush me, the woman on the phone. What would help the most before sunrise? she asked. I looked at my brother Noah, one sock on, one sock off, curled up so tight he looks smaller than six. A bed, I said. And then I started crying so hard I had to press my fist to my mouth. Just one bed where he won't wake up cold. She asked my name twice, not because she forgot, but because she wanted me to hear it said back. Okay, Ava, she said. Stay on the line with me. Nobody came with sirens. Just a knock that sounded careful, like whoever stood outside knew our door had been slammed too many times by life already. A woman in jeans and a county badge stepped in first. A retired paramedic came behind her carrying two folded blankets and a paper bag that smelled like peanut butter cookies. Then a church volunteer from down the road brought a lamp with a yellow shade. No speeches, no shame. The woman knelt so we were eye level. I'm Denise, she said. Can we help without making a big scene? That was when I knew that she understood everything. She didn't stare at the dishes in the sink. She looked at Noah's red little hands and said, Poor buddy's freezing. The paramedic took off his boots at the door without being asked. He checked the heater, tightened something with a pocket tool, and got it breathing again, like it had just needed somebody patient enough to listen. Denise saw the notebook on the table. You draw, she asked. Sometimes I said. What do you draw? Houses, I told her, the kind with warm windows. I thought she might smile the way grown ups do when they feel sorry for you. She didn't. She nodded like I had told the truth about my little part of this world. That night they left us with blankets, groceries, a small space heater, and a note stuck to the fridge with blue tape. It said you are still a child. You do not have to earn rest. I read it three times before I believed it. When my mother came home at dawn, she smelled like bleach, French fries, and winter air. Her face dropped the second she saw the lamp glowing in the corner. Who was here? she asked. People who didn't make us feel poor, I said. She sat down hard in the kitchen chair and covered her mouth with both hands. I had seen my mother exhausted, angry, numb. I had never seen her looked after. The next evening they came back. Not just Denise, a librarian with a rolling cart, two volunteer firefighters in work shirts, misses Holloway from three trailers down, the one everyone said was nosy, carrying fabric and a sewing tin. A man from the senior center with a truck bed full of furniture somebody's grandson had outgrown. It felt less like charity and more like a barn raising, except instead for just one tired family and a single wide trailer in eastern Tennessee. The firefighters brought bunk bed pieces and built them in Noah's corner. The librarian brought a reading lamp, three dinosaur books, and a free internet hotspot. Because homework shouldn't be dependent on luck, she said. Mrs. Holloway turned old curtains into a divider so Noah could have his own little room. Then she pinned up blue fabric with tiny white stars on it and said, Every boy deserves a sky. My mother kept saying, You don't have to do all this. Denise finally touched her arm and answered gently, I know. We want to. That broke something open in the room. Not bad broken, the kind that lets air in. Noah climbed onto the bottom bunk and laughed so loud I nearly forgot what our trailer had sounded like without the laughter. He bounced once then looked at me like he needed permission to love it. It's yours, I said. You sure? he whispered. Yeah, I said, I'm taking the top. I'm old and dramatic. And that got the first real laugh out of my mother in months. Before they left. The librarian taped my newest drawing to the wall above the table. Not the fridge. She put it on the wall. It was a house with bright yellow windows and four people inside, even though we were only three. And Denise noticed. Who's the fourth? She asked. I looked at that picture for a long second. Maybe that's the person who shows up, I said. She pressed her lips together and nodded like she didn't trust her own voice. That night, I lay on the top bunk and felt the mattress hold me in a way the floor never had. Noah was breathing slow below me. My mother sat on the edge of his bed with her shoes off, looking around like she had walked into somebody else's miracle. At 6 14 the next morning, Denise texted the number she had left with mom, just checking in. Did everybody sleep? And mom sent back one photo. Noah under the star curtain, me on the top bunk, both of us knocked out cold. A minute later the reply came. That's what safety can look like too. I still draw houses with warm windows, but now when I draw them I don't leave the rooms empty anymore. I put people inside, tired people, proud people. People hanging on by a thread, and at least one person at the door with a lamp in their hand. Jesus is the light of the world. And he looks to the edges, seeing all in between. May we at Westminster follow his gaze. Amen.