What it Takes to See Jesus
Tom Shrader examines the healing of the man born blind in John 9, contrasting the physical healing with spiritual blindness. He emphasizes that just as the blind man couldn't see until Jesus opened his eyes, natural man is spiritually blind and cannot understand spiritual things until God opens his heart. The teaching warns against religion without conversion and calls for genuine worship of Christ.
“You're a display case for the work of God. This is not about you. It's not about me. It's about God's work in you.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: John: The Essence of Life (2003)
Recorded: 2003
Duration: 42 min
Themes: blindness, healing, sight, conversion, worship, religion, understanding, faith, new believer, questioning faith, struggling with doubt, religious but unconverted, seeking truth, spiritually confused, church member, young adult
Scripture: John 9:1-41, John 20:30, Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 2:14, Ecclesiastes
Theological Themes: spiritual blindness, regeneration, illumination, divine revelation, natural man, spiritual discernment, genuine conversion, christology
Full Transcript
Today is the fifth session, and we'll take 12 weeks to work our way through the gospel of John. The introduction is similar each week. We could be spending a great deal of time in this. I think I mentioned to you when we did it in church, we spent four and a half years on this gospel, and even then moved pretty quickly. So it is just a tremendous study for us.
Let me give you some chronology that I don't think we mentioned in our introduction. In terms of timing, the gospels are ordered something like this. Mark would have been the first gospel that was written, probably somewhere in the 50s, mid-50s. Luke, we're pretty confident that we can date at 60 A.D. We come back with Matthew and say in the 60s, somewhere in there. So the chronology would go Mark, Luke, Matthew. Then John writes his gospel. This gospel is written toward the end of that century, 85 to 90. We wouldn't get hung up on a specific date, but 85 to 90.
John's Context and Purpose
I'm reminding you that John is clearly at this point at the end of his life. He's been exiled to the island of Patmos. As a matter of fact, fascinating story, they tried to kill him. They tried to boil him in oil, and they failed. I don't understand, you've got to be really bad to fail at that. I've never really read anything about that, and I'm sure that there's some fascinating stuff on it. But every time I say that, it intrigues me to see what would have happened there.
He survives that, he's at Patmos, and he's prolific in his writing. He writes the gospel that bears his name. Then he writes 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, and the book of Revelation. He's very specific in why he's writing. He is writing, he tells us in chapter 20, verse 30, that you might believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and that by believing in Him, you might have eternal life.
He tells us that this is a selective history of the events from the life of Christ. In other words, he says, these things I have selected, these things I have chosen, that you might believe. So that is the thrust of what he is trying to communicate to us. As we look at this in these 12 weeks, part of what we've done is to focus on the miracles. Again, they're hand-selected. If it seems like every week we're pointing toward a time of the gospel presentation, it's because that's what the material really lends itself to. That's what John was trying to do. That would explain why when somebody is new to the Christian faith, somebody will say to them, well, why don't you read the gospel of John? Why don't you start there? Because that's what John has in mind.
The Rising Opposition
We studied chapter 6. We skipped chapter 7 and 8. But we could summarize them if you look at chapter 8, verse 59. Here's the summary: "Therefore they picked up stones to throw at Him, but Jesus hid Himself and went away to the temple." That's what's happened. There is this animosity that's building between the Pharisees and the Jewish leaders and Christ.
Jesus is more and more revealing Himself. He is gaining in popularity. People are beginning to follow Him. If for no other reason than just see what He's going to do next. They're following Him in large numbers. Obviously that's somewhat of a threat to the system that's in place, the religious system. Now, today, we look at John chapter 9, and in doing that, we really come across one of my favorite encounters in all of scripture.
I said this to you, I think a couple of times in the series so far, is that if you want to take liberality with the text, these are great stories to do that. I mean, you can jump off from them and make almost any point you want to make. The challenge, I think, is to stay in the biblical framework that John has laid out. So we're going to do that. By the same token, I am today going to give you a couple of opportunities to let your imagination wander. When we do that, I'll stop and say, hey, I'm sure this is beyond the text, but let's just take a look at it.
The Disciples' Question
Here's the confusion that's taken place as we look at verses 1 and 2. "And now, as Jesus passed by, He saw a man who was blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"
Now, this is a blind beggar, which is synonymous in that day and age. This is a man who's born blind. There would have been no hope for him. He would be an outcast in that society. There's no welfare state. They would have spent no time, energy, effort, resources to try to educate him. He was at the bottom of the food chain. There would have been no hope for self-improvement. He is there. He's begging.
What you see in the question of the disciples is the conventional wisdom or thought process of the day, that we see something that's happened bad. This must be caused by sin. So they ask, and it's a very reasonable question, which one of these people sinned? This guy, as a result of his sin, or as a result of the sin of his mother and his father?
Our Modern Tendency
Let me just stop there for a second. We still, in this day and age, have a tendency to do that. Now, I think we could probably, in the ultimate sense, answer any why question with the answer, Adam sinned. We could do that. Why did the babies die? Well, Adam sinned, ushered that in.
But in our own life, as we start to try to process what we're facing, we'll come into situations with this knowledge. The knowledge is that, as Christians, we have no guarantee that life will be smooth. Don't we all say that? I hear that all the time. Just because I'm a Christian doesn't mean my path is strewn with roses. I hear that all the time. Yet, when things come into our life, one of our first reactions is, what happened? What did I do wrong? Or, better yet, when you hear of someone else who has a problem, your first thought is frequently, what
The Dangerous Trap of Judging by Circumstances
There's a very dangerous trap we can fall into when we see someone experiencing hardship or suffering. We immediately assume they must have done something wrong. There must be sin in their life. This gets us into a very dangerous situation. It's very dangerous to judge your spiritual condition by your circumstances.
God may be blessing you in extraordinary ways, and there may be great times in your life, circumstantially. You may be Bill Gates. I would not necessarily think that necessarily means you are a spiritual giant. On the other side of the coin, you could have very severe problems. That doesn't necessarily mean it's a result of some sin in your life.
Now, frequently, if we make bad decisions, and very often, if we're disobedient, there are consequences to that. We live with those. We understand that. All I'm saying to you is, watch out. God may put you in some very difficult position, and He may do it deliberately.
He may do it so that you can grow spiritually. Why would God allow you to suffer? Why would God allow you to have pain? Why would God allow difficulties? Because in that, you will grow. In that, you will have a tendency to listen to Him.
Jesus Brings Clarification
So there's the confusion that's taking place right here. Here's the second thing, the clarification. Jesus answered. We're in verse 3 here. And Jesus answered and said, "It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents." I'm going to stop right there.
I had a discussion with a guy years ago, and we have this discussion regularly. I had one similar last week, about what's the condition of man. Does man come into the world tabula rasa? That's a Greek term, a blank slate. Does man come in with a propensity toward evil? Is man evil?
And this guy's making the claim that man does not come in as sinner. Not everyone is sinner. And the reason it just caught me totally off guard, because I thought I was in pretty safe ground when I said, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." I thought I was all right with that.
He said, "No, no, no, no." And I said, "Well, where would you get that? Other than just some impression, where would you get that?" And he said, "Well, John chapter 9, verse 3." And I thought to myself, I know chapter 9 really well.
So rather than look like he knew that, I said, "Well, let's just turn there." So I turned there, and it said it was neither that this man sinned nor his parents. He said, "See right there, neither of these people sinned."
Understanding Context in Biblical Interpretation
When you get into biblical interpretation, it is really important to understand context. I can go into the book of Ecclesiastes, and I can pull out for you what Solomon says. Here's what Solomon says. This is a direct quote: "Money is the answer to everything." Now, if I said that to you, you would argue all day long with that. You'd say, "Well, how would you do that?" Well, it's lifted out of Scripture. It's contrary to the rest of Scripture.
What Jesus is doing is answering a specific question. And the question was, "Whose sin caused this problem?" And this is Jesus saying it's not a result of either one of their sins. You see that? I don't even see how that's difficult, but that gives you just a glimpse into what my life is like.
A Display Case for God's Work
"It was neither that this man sinned nor his parents, but it was in order that the works of God might be displayed in him." This man is a display case for the work of God. I love this. I love this phrase.
When I think of a display case, I think of a jewelry case where you create the best possible environment you can to showcase something. In this case, they're trying to lure someone in to buy. A display case. In an absolute real sense. Again, the first time I read that phrase, I loved it.
That's what you and I are. We're a display case for God's work. This is not about you. It's not about me. It's about God's work in you. God's work in me.
We had a church Sunday. We had a little gal named Stephanie Kelly. I shouldn't say little gal. She's 29 now. But when I first met Stephanie and started using Stephanie in different situations, she was 8 years old. And she sits down and plays this piano, and it's absolutely incredible.
I personally love the way she plays. And she had a couple of songs that she played Sunday that she has written. She writes a lot of stuff. And when people would come, she's very uncomfortable. Because I would ask people, "Let's thank Stephanie." She's a very uncomfortable gal. Because the minute you do that, she's going to say, "Praise the Lord for this." And what she's doing, and boy do I understand it, she's trying to deflect anybody who wants to come, because that's what we tend to do. We want to come and fasten on the person and miss the fact that it's a gift.
I'm telling you, when this girl was 2, she started singing and playing the piano. That's a gift. Now certainly she has not done anything to quench that gift, but that's all of God. And that's you. You're a display case for the work of God.
Before Pictures and God's Transformation
Some of you have extraordinary before pictures around your house. When we moved, I found some incredible... I used to wear an afro. And I've got to tell you, it looked pretty good. And from dyeing it and everything, it was orange at this point. And then when I went out at night, I would just pick it. I looked like Sly. And I thought I was pretty cool.
And there's some incredible before pictures around. And everybody locks you into what they see now, and they forget to see you're a display case for the work of God. That's a great picture of what this guy is going to be.
The Light of the World
Jesus continues, He said, "We must work the works of Him who sent Me, as long as it is day. Night is coming when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world."
Let me spend a second on that. Who's the light of the world? Don't answer out loud, because they did yesterday, and they all embarrassed themselves. Don't answer out loud. Who's the light of the world?
Jesus says something very interesting. He says, "While I'm in the world, I'm the light of the world." Now our flinch is to say Jesus is the light of the world, and we'd understand that. But what Jesus really says in the Sermon on the Mount is, "You are the light of the world."
I think that comes right along with the display case. He is the light, if you will, like the sun. He's that direct light, the source of light. You and I are more like—and this is going to sound a little New Age-y here—like a moon, in that we reflect His light in us. We're a display case. God's at work in this world, and He's using you.
That's why your life is so important. That's why the way you live is so important. That's why how you talk, how you conduct business, how you handle your marriage, how you handle your kids, how you treat one another is so important. People are seeing Christ in you.
The Miracle Unfolds
So there's the whole situation, and it just starts to unfold. Jesus clarifies it. Here are the consequences now. There is a miracle that's going to take place.
"And when He had said this, He spat on the ground. He made clay of the spittle and applied the clay to the eyes of the man. And then He said, now go and wash. And He went and washed, and He came back seeing."
Try to put yourself in the blind man's position. He cannot see. He has sat at this spot for years. He hears something. He hears a discussion. Perhaps he's even heard similar discussions before. "Here's this pitiful creature. Whose fault is it? His or his parents?" He responds by hearing Jesus say, "It's neither one. He's going to be a display case for the work of God."
And the next thing he hears is spitting. Now, it doesn't say it here, and I know it's dangerous, but I want you to see this. I'm guessing he's heard that before. I'm guessing there have been conversations where they're walking by and saying, "Who is that? There's a blind man. He's sat there for years." And they would spit on him, literally. This guy is the bottom of the barrel of the society.
He hears that spitting. Like a dog who's been hit, he may flinch. And the next thing he feels is this wet mud on his eyes. And he washes and he can see.
Don't Miss the Humanity
Don't miss this. This is an extraordinary event. Don't miss the humanity of this. Imagine you being sitting there all your life, never seeing. And this event takes place around you and you're the centerpiece of this event. And all you know is you were blind and now you can see. And you heard this discussion that was related to it. It's an extraordinary event.
Again, our tendency is to look at the miracle and forget the sign. The miracle is there as a sign. The miracle points us towards something.
The Problem with Modern Miracle Focus
I know I complain about it a lot, but you cannot turn on Christian television—really, when I say Christian television, I don't even know if it is—TBN. You can't really turn on TBN and not hear all this discussion on miracles and signs and wonders and wealth and health and prosperity. There's very little Bible teaching. And the teaching you get is related to that specific subject.
Miracles essentially are scarce. They come alive in the time of Jesus and then they fade away again. To try to recapture them or say this is going to happen today is nonsensical. It happened in Jesus' time for a specific reason. Why? So they'd know who He was.
And then, even in this context, and this is my point, even in this context in this day and age, we still are hung up on the miracle. We still look at the sign. We still miss the direction. And these guys who are teaching know that. So they create that whole type of environment. And that's what happens.
The Confused Aftermath
Now there's some aftermath. Look at verse 8: "Neighbors therefore, and those who previously saw Him as a beggar, were saying, 'Isn't this not the one who used to sit and beg?' And others were saying, 'No, it isn't He.' And still others were saying, 'No, but He is like Him.'"
Apparently Saddam Hussein didn't invent this idea of a double. Apparently this blind man had a double. "And this isn't the one." There's a lot of confusion here. And they don't seem to get it clear.
So finally they ask Him. "They said, 'How then are your eyes open?' And He said to them, 'The one they call Jesus, He anointed my eyes. He told me to go and wash. I went and washed and I received my sight.' And they said, 'Where is He?' And He said, 'I don't know.'"
The Absence of Joy
All of a sudden there's this response. Isn't it an interesting response? "Is that Him? I'm not really sure. Maybe it's Him. Oh, I think it's a double. I think it's the guy that looks like Him. Is it Him? Were you the guy? Yeah. How did it happen?" He tells them.
What's absent from this and what's striking in this whole account is there's no sense of joy. Even when his parents come in contact with this man who can now see, there's no joy recorded. That's a fascinating aspect of this to me.
Now part of that's the human condition. Paul tells us in Romans 12, "Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep." And he leaves it in that very context and in that order. Why? I think because it is much harder to rejoice with those who rejoice than it is to weep with those who weep.
If you come in today and you say, "Listen, we got a call last night and my daughter's little baby is very, very sick. They don't think it's going to make it. In fact, I'm pretty sure the baby won't even make it through the night." It's not very hard to cry with them, is it? Or to pray with them or to link up with them.
But if that same person comes in and says, "You know what? The strangest thing happened the other day. I got a call from Oklahoma and I have this kid in there, this one guy, kind of a weird guy. We always call him Weird Harold. He was kind of a weird guy. Nobody really hung around him and he kind of lived by himself. Well, what we didn't know, it's the strangest thing..."
What we didn't know is this guy was buying land. He was buying a whole bunch of land. And he bought all this land and in the process of buying all this land, he put together some joint ventures. Well, the old guy died and apparently when I was a kid, I went and visited him and I was the only one he liked and he just left me like six, seven, eight million dollars.
Oh, good for you. I mean, that's how that goes. You see that connection? Rejoice for those who rejoice. Rejoice for those who rejoice. That's a very hard call. And the total absence of joy in this story amazes me.
The Religious Interrogation Begins
Well, now we're going to get the religious guys in here and that will set the whole process straight. Now we start with this whole interrogation process. Verse 13: "So they take this guy to the Pharisees. Now it was the Sabbath on the day when Jesus made clay and opened His eyes. Again, therefore, the Pharisees also were asking Him how He received His sight. And He said to them, 'He applied clay to my eyes and I washed and I could see.'"
"Therefore, some of the Pharisees were saying, 'This man is not from God because He does not keep the Sabbath.' Others were saying, 'How can a man who is a sinner perform signs like this?' And there's division among the Pharisees."
How do the religious people get involved? That would be the normative thing for that day and age. They go to the Pharisees. What's the first question they ask? Who's got a palm pilot? What day did this happen? It was the Sabbath. And all of a sudden, they're looking at this from that religious grid.
God Hates Religion
Now if you're new to us, this statement could surprise you. If you've been around, you could almost say it yourself: God hates religion. By religion, we mean this meaningless ritual that we would go through—something created by man to somehow try to appease or please a holy God and make a person acceptable in God's sight. God hates that.
That's what's happened to these Pharisees. These Pharisees, their religion has gotten in the way of their relationship with God. Along comes this story and all they want to talk about and divide upon is this whole idea of the Sabbath. Some of them say appropriately, "Hey, there must be something to this." Now all of a sudden, there is this process that begins to take place.
"They said therefore to the blind man, 'What do you say about Him since He opened your eyes?' And he said, 'He is a prophet.'" That's his first conclusion. They come to him and they say, "Listen, what do you know?" And he said, "Well, He is a prophet."
Questioning the Parents
"Now the Jews therefore did not believe it of him that he had been blind and received his sight until they called the parents of the one who had received his sight." So now here's what they're saying: "We don't believe it. This is some sort of a bait and switch that's taken place." So they call in the man's parents.
The man's parents, their reaction is interesting to me. If you had a child—many of you in this room are parents—if you had a child that had been blind from birth, and all of a sudden this child, in this case this young man, all of a sudden this man could see, what would be your reaction to that? I would think there would be exhilaration and joy and happiness and tears and thanksgiving.
They call in the parents: "And his parents answered and said, 'We know this is our son and we know he was born blind. But how he sees, we don't know. Or who opened his eyes, we don't know. Ask him. He is of age. He'll speak for himself.' And his parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Jesus to be the Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue. For this reason, the parents said, 'He's of age. Ask him.'"
Interesting response. "He is of age" would indicate in that culture that he is probably somewhere around 30 years of age.
The Escalating Denial
I want you to see the Jews. Here's what they've got now. Now they know this guy's blind. They know who he is. Look at the progression. The first thing they said is, "Well, maybe it wasn't the right guy." Now they're saying, "Maybe he was faking it. Maybe he was faking it for 30 years. Maybe there's a double."
See, everything occurs to them but this one thing: maybe Jesus healed him. Let me tell you something. The hardest group for me to deal with—not those of you that are non-Christians and you're boozers and you're having all sorts of problems. That's easy, because you know that's easy. The hardest group: those of you that are religious but not converted. That's the hardest group. Just like these Pharisees right here.
You're religious. You're not just there on Christmas and Easter. You're there a lot of the time. You're an usher. You're a greeter. Oh, here you go—here's a great place to hide from God: you're in the choir. God's never going to look for you there. You're in the choir. Or maybe you're like the Pharisees. You're in the pulpit. Or you're a teacher.
Spiritual Blindness
See, here's the problem. These guys' religion is in the way from even executing at this point common sense. You've got a guy. Here's the testimony: he was blind, now he can see. And all they want to do is come up with all this religious explanation of what's going on.
Do you see the irony here? Don't miss it. This guy was blind physically. Now he can see. These guys can see physically, but they are spiritually blind. Their eyes are not open. They are not going to get it. By the way, they're a great picture of natural man. That's the way I come into the world: spiritually blind.
Round Two
Well, they go for round two. They're back and they want to talk to the man. So they call him in. Verse 24: "For a second time they called the man who had been blind and they said to him, 'Give glory to God'"—the idea there is tell us the truth here, God's your witness—"'We know that this man is a sinner.'"
We're talking about Jesus. The blind man answered. He said, "Whether He's a sinner or not, I don't know. One thing I know: that whereas I was blind, now I can see." They said therefore to him, "What did He do? How did He open your eyes?"
Look at the progression. Remember what I said? If you're blind from birth, you're done. They're not going to educate you. He's illiterate. He has no education. He has no background. He has no training, nothing. He is now standing toe-to-toe with the religious leaders.
The Blind Man's Growing Confidence
There's a sense of momentum shift here. He's starting to gain some confidence. He started by saying, "Listen, all I know is I was blind, I can see." Then he's saying, "You know, I don't know, His name is called Jesus." Then he says He was a prophet. Now they're asking him, and he says, "Listen, all I know is what I told you. I was blind, I can see."
He said, "How did this happen?" Here's what he says, verse 27: "I already told you. You did not listen. I'm blind, but you're deaf. Why do you want to hear it again?" And then I love the sarcasm: "You do not want to become His disciple too, do you? Are you trying to figure out whether you want to follow Him just like I'm going to?"
You see the man? You see the progression? He was a prophet. Now all of a sudden this guy's saying, "Listen, I'm a disciple of this." And they said, "We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we don't know where He's from."
The Illiterate Man Confounds the Scholars
The illiterate blind guy, who can now see, said to him, "Well, verse 30, well, here's an amazing thing, that you don't know where He's from, and yet He opened my eyes. We know that God does not hear sinners, but if one is God-fearing and does the will of God, God hears him. Since the beginning of time, it has never been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person who's blind. If this man were not from God, He could not do this thing."
They answered him and said, "You were born entirely of sins, and you're teaching us," and they put him out. There's their response. Now they've been confronted. Now they've got the testimony. Now they've got the truth. What do they do? "Get out of here. I never liked you from the beginning. You were a sinful man from the beginning. You've got nothing to do. Who are you to come in here and lecture us?"
Look how hard their heart is. It doesn't stop. It's a true statement. Do you get that? That's the condition of natural man. Closed to spiritual things. Shut off. Never going to hear it.
Jesus Reveals Himself
Now Jesus. Jesus heard, verse 35, that they put him out, and He said, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?" He's basically saying at this point, "Do you believe in Me?" And he answered and said, "And who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?" Jesus said, "Do you believe?" And he said, "Who is it? I don't get it yet." Jesus said, "You have both seen Him, and He is the one who is talking to you." And he said, "Lord, I believe." And he worshiped Him.
Some of the favorite pastimes in the midst of these stories is to try to figure out at what point is conversion. Some of you are very troubled by that. We live in this world that we run in that most people can say, "It was on such and such a day, at such and such a time, that I became a Christian." I can tell you, for me, it was March 6, 1980. I can give you roughly the time of day, about 8, 8:15 in the morning. Some people are troubled by that because they come in and say, "Well, I can't give you a date or a time." My response to that is, "That's okay. The issue is, Are you converted? Do you believe?"
The Process of Coming to Faith
When was this guy converted in this process? I don't know. He starts out by saying, in verse 11, they call Him Jesus. Verse 18, he said He's a prophet. Verse 27, he says he's a disciple. Now he believes. How do we know it's true belief? Do you see it there in verse 37? He worshiped. See, if you really believe God is who He says He is, you're going to worship Him.
I have not watched much television lately for whatever reason, and I'm obviously worse off for it. But the other night, I was going to bed, and I laid down and turned on the television just to doze off, and Madonna was on there with Matt Lauer. I am absolutely sorry that I didn't get... If somebody taped that, or you have a tape of it, I'd love to watch it because I know I can use it.
Madonna, the part that I missed is apparently Madonna was just expressing... She's written a new song. I tried the other night to get some lyrics from it, and I couldn't. I saw it had a parental warning on the tape the other day. She's written a song called "American Life." Basically what she's saying is "I've tried everything, and I'm always empty. I've pursued everything, and there's no fulfillment."
The Emptiness of Worldly Success
How many times do we need to watch this movie? We've heard this over and over again, haven't we? We come back and we hear athletes and we hear movie stars, and we hear singers, and we hear successful business people, and they all say, "I climbed to the top and when I got there, there's an emptiness there. There's a darkness there." Madonna is in some sort of a branch, a subset of Judaism of some type. She has, according to a rabbi, become tolerant of some other things. But still, it's very much about the God that's in her.
So one of the marks of real conversion is I begin to worship Jesus Christ. I begin to understand who He really is in this process.
Spiritual Blindness
We've got about ten minutes. Let me tie it together and apply it because that's the story. It is a magnificent picture. Why did John select this? Because he wants us to believe that Jesus is who He said He was. That's what he said.
I want to hit a couple of points, and one of them I touched on last week, and it was very unfair last week. It is this as well. These blind people, this blind man, and then the blind Pharisees, are beautiful pictures of us spiritually, not physically. You and I are blind. Don't you find yourself reading this story and saying, "What do these Pharisees need to see? What are these Pharisees after?"
I find myself frustrated with these guys. What is it you want? Here's the blind guy. The word's all over. Everybody's heard what's going on. Jesus is healing people. He's walking on water. There's stuff happening everywhere. What do you need to see?
Here's the answer. And it's a great spiritual truth, and you won't like it. They cannot see. They're blind spiritually.
The Spiritual Condition of Natural Man
Do you understand what the Scripture says about natural man? It's that we come into the world blind. Paul uses this. Dead in our sins and trespasses. And the only way that a blind man is going to see is if God opens his eyes.
What needs to happen to people spiritually is what happens to this man physically. This man's never going to see until God opens his eyes. Until God does the work. And we mentioned that to you last week. And I know that for some of you, this is tough stuff.
But the condition of man is that he's dead and lost in his sin and trespasses. And he's never going to get it. No matter what he sees. Listen, if you're a religious person but unconverted, there's never enough evidence. You're always going to want another miracle. You're always going to want another story.
The Problem of Religious Blindness
And there's no objectivity here. Do you see that? These guys have arrived at a conclusion. It may be that they need to protect their own position religiously. But they're denying. You saw it? The guy's faking. The guy's not real. It's not really him. Get out of here! I don't want to hear it!
There's no objectivity here. If you were really looking for the truth and you had somebody standing in front of you, wouldn't you listen? And there's none of that there. So they reject Christ when He comes. And they end up with a man-centered philosophy.
The Father's Work in Drawing People
Let me make this point and then we'll let you go. Man comes into the world dead in his sins and trespasses. Stuck in his sin. Oblivious to the things of God. That's what we looked at last week. No natural man has the ability to come to God unless the Father does something. Unless the Father goes... and it's hard. No one can come unless the Father draws him.
Well, is the Father drawing everybody equally? No! How do we know that? Because Jesus says all that the Father gives us will come to Me. Did everyone come? No! Who comes? Those that the Father is drawing.
Is natural man blind? Well, let's look at 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14. Here's what it says. Natural man cannot understand spiritual things. Let's make sure we understand. By natural man, you know what we mean there? Unconverted. A non-believer. He may be religious. She may be a churchgoer. They may be antagonistic. They're non-believers. They're not Christians in the fundamental, orthodox, evangelical, narrow sense of the word. They're not Christians.
The Impossibility of Natural Understanding
A natural man, an unbeliever, cannot understand a spiritual thing. Is that right? That's what it says. Is the Gospel a spiritual thing? Yes. Can natural man understand the Gospel? There's no way. Because natural man can't understand a spiritual thing.
Something has to happen. And what has to happen? God's got to open his eyes. Open his heart. Now man will believe. Now man will go in a sense here and wash. But all of that is of God. It's all of God.
If you're a Christian, converted, true believer, your salvation is entirely, 100%, totally a work of God. You did nothing. Did you believe? You did believe. But that was an act of God's grace. And a gift to you.
The Pattern of Jesus' Miracles
See, that's the beauty of this story. And we can do what we as humans tend to do. We can get sidetracked in the sign. We can look at the miracle and miss the truth. Jesus does this extraordinary miracle. And then He comes along and He says, Now, let me apply this spiritually.
Have you seen a pattern here? Didn't we see that with the woman at the well? She says, Let me drink this and I'll never thirst again. He says, No, I'm talking about a different water. And the feeding of the 5,000. Let us eat this. Then we'll never be hungry again. He says, No, no. No, this is a picture of something else.
Jesus heals the blind man. It's a picture of something else. It's a picture of man's condition naturally. We're blind and separated from God. And what God does.
A Call for Self-Examination
What is your response to this? If you're a Christian, your response to this should be one of thanksgiving and gratitude and praise and worship. If you're a religious person, I would think this would cause you to examine your heart. Examine your life.
Religion is a deadly thing to Christianity. I'm going to let you apply that to your life. Do you see that truth? Especially those of you that are religious. Will you stop and take an inventory to see if you're really converted?
Do you worship Christ? Do you read His Word? Do you have a desire to be with other Christians? In the midst of hardship and difficulty, is there a joy that's present in your life? Because if not, there's no biblical assurance of your salvation. You see that, don't you? I hope you do.
This is a great study of the Gospel of John. Five of twelve lessons that are done. And we're through for the day.
Father, thank You for this truth, this magnificent truth. God, help us embrace those words that were spoken and written by the Apostle Paul. And whoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. God, we pray that You save us. Save us from the consequences and the ravage of our sin. God, open our eyes, our ears, our heart to the truths You have for us.
Father, we pray even today that those who are in this room who are blind, You would do a mighty work in their life and open their eyes to see this truth. God, we pray that You would free the people who are in bondage to religion. It's ritual. It's meaningless. They can go and come out and say, I don't even have an idea what we just did. I don't know why I do that. I don't get anything out of it.
God, let there be an eye-opening thought to them that this is meaningless and it has no point because it's dead. It doesn't have Christ in it. God, thank You for Jesus, for His life and His death. We pray
Closing Prayer
We thank You, Father, for Your Word and for the truth that You have revealed to us. We pray that You would help us to see clearly, to see You as You truly are, and to walk in the light of Your truth. We ask this in His name. Amen. Have a great week. We'll see you next week.