Sunday reflection – 4th Sunday of Lent, March 15th, 2026′, Lectionary readings: I Samuel 16:1-13, Psalm 23, ephesians 5:8-14, John 9:1-41

‘Seeing Clearly’

Have you ever found yourself looking at something, and thinking you weren’t seeing it clearly.  As when you look through a camera and what you see is out of focus, it might be just the way you are looking of course, but more likely there is some adjustment that is needed to bring things into focus.  In the gospel reading for today, there are a whole lot of people not seeing clearly, and needing to make adjustments.

Jesus was walking with his disciples, when he saw a man who was blind from birth. The disciples ask him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” (John 9: 2) They only see the man from the perspective of the question they have on their minds, he is more or less, a problem for them to solve. While it was the prevailing attitude at the time, that a person’s condition, or the trouble in their life, was the product of sin. It was punishment as such, for the wrong that was done.  Jesus however doesn’t see it that way, and very quickly dispels that thinking, saying, “Neither this man or his Parents sinned,” but rather that  ‘‘ he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” (9:3) Unlike the disciples, Jesus saw the man for who he was, he saw his need and what he might do to help him. 

“As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world,” (9: 5), he says, and he “spat on the ground and made mud, put it on the man’s eyes, and tells him to, “Go wash in the pool of Siloam”.  (6) Life can sometimes be very messy we know that, just like the mud Jesus placed on the man’s eyes, we can stay in our messes however, or we can do as the man did and follow the one who is true light for the world.  He went and washed and came back able to see. 

It was a wonderful Miracle of God’s grace at work in the man’s life.  But no one however seems able to see it clearly.  The Man’s neighbours and those in the community,  who have known him likely all their lives, seeing him begging on the street every day, even perhaps giving him a handout along the way; but now having his sight, when they see him they can’t even agree if it is him or not.   Even when the man, says himself, “I am the man.” They still doubt, plying him with more questions.   Even taking him to the authorities to see what they would say about it.  

And we know how that turned out, so rigid in their thinking when it came to the laws of the Sabbath, when it was said that Jesus had put mud on the man’s eyes, and told him to wash and then he could see. It being on the Sabbath, and as they considered healing to be work, they say Jesus is a sinner for breaking the law of the Sabbath.

Seeing clearly, is not just about the way one might see with their physical sight, but about acknowledging the many blindspots in our lives, the  insecurities we have, the judgements we make, the assumptions we make, or the prejudice that keep us from seeing clearly. Like looking through the viewfinder of a camera and seeing everything out of focus, without making the adjustments that is needed, we cannot get a clear picture. And the Pharisees because of the blindspots they had about Jesus, regardless of what he had done, could see nothing good in any of it. Unable to see clearly, they do not believe the man had been blind.  

Even to call the parents of the man to question them about it;  and because of the fear, that should they say they believed it was Jesus, knowing the Pharisees would likely throw them out of the synagogue, they say only that, “they know it is their son, and that he had been born blind, but as for how it is that he could see, or who opened his eyes they did not know.  And so as not to be involved they say, “ask him, he is of age, he can speak for himself.” (9:20,21)

And while they said that as we know out of fear.  The synagogue being the focus of the whole community, Meant not only that they would not have a place of worship, but also they feared for their livelihoods and perhaps even their lives.  While that may be understandable, it doesn’t however say much about love.  And as it says elsewhere in the scriptures, “perfect Love cast out fear.” (1 John 4:18)

We find it difficult to accept that they would just leave their son to stand alone to face his interrogators.  They do however to protect themselves.  Not the way most parents would likely react but unless we are there and know what they experienced we can’t rightly condemn them. 

No this gospel goes nothing like what we would expect, there is no joy to be found in it, no celebration, no acceptance, love or support, only dispute, confusion, arguing, and rejection.

Not seeing clearly doesn’t mean we don’t have what is needed to make the adjustment that would bring the image in to clear focus, but maybe because we would rather tell the story our way, we leave it as it is.  And for the Pharisees that meant telling it so that Jesus would not look the Hero of the story in any way, but the sinner they wanted him to be. “Give Glory to God, they say, we know that this man (Jesus) is a sinner” (9:24).

The Man in sticking to his story as it was, gave glory to God, however as it did not suit them in the way it was told, they keep on questioning him more.   

The man however stayed firm on what he knows Jesus had done for him, and answers them,  “I do not know whether he is a sinner, but the one thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see?” (9:25)

It is said that the greatest Authority there is, is the testimony one gives to one’s own experience.  And while the man couldn’t explain what Jesus had done for him, only to describe it, he knew however the difference it had made to him.  Someone who was blind, and now can see, what other conclusion should there be.  Only to know the powerful presence of God at work in his life. 

You would have thought that Man’s testimony would have been enough for them to believe him, being as they were the experts on God’s law, and interpreting his way in the world. It wasn’t however and instead they press the man even further, to tell his story over again. 

“I have told you he says, but you do not listen. Why do you want to hear it again?”  (9:27).

And isn’t that the truth, though!… how often is it that not being able to see clearly, is more about the way one listens or do not listen to the stories we are told, not wanting to see what it might reveal to us, rather then being open to what it has to say.  And the Pharises did not want to hear what the man’s story said about Jesus, for to do so, they knew they too would have to change the way they wanted the story to go, and that felt too threatening for them, and the authority and power they wanted to hold on to. And so they refused to believe. 

The man however holds to what he knows to be true, and when the Pharisees say “we know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he is from.” (9:29)
The man its seems unable to hold back any longer makes it perfectly clear, “Here is an astonishing thing!…he says, …You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes…..Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person blind.  If this man were not from God, he could do nothing” (9:30-33).

And of course they couldn’t dispute what he had said, but rather than accept the miracle for what it was, God’s divine grace, made present in the works of Jesus.  They instead throw the man out of the synagogue.  I suppose, perhaps they thought in doing so it might silence the man.  But as we know God cannot be silenced in that way. 

The man is left sitting all alone, perhaps now more alone than he had ever been, even when he had no sight, not having his community behind him, his parents to stand with him, and no place for him in the synagogue. The man was as one isolated and all alone.

Jesus however knows they threw him out and comes to him, and we know too that as Jesus knew and came to the man in his need, so too he sees and comes to us; no matter how alone, rejected, isolated, one might be, no matter what our struggles are, or the trouble we may have, we however are not alone, our God is always with us, and it is looking to him, trusting him in our need, that we too find our way again. 

Jesus asks the Man, “Do you believe in the Son of man”   and he answered, “who is he sir, tell me that I may believe in him?  And Jesus says to him, “you have seen him, and the one speaking to you is he.”  the man answers “Lord, I believe, and worshipped him.” (9:35-38)

And we know it is here that he comes to faith in Jesus, as one coming out of the darkness of having no sight, to living in the light.  Not that he didn’t already show faith in Jesus along the way, standing firm as he did on what he Knew Jesus to have done for him, even though he didn’t yet really know him. Still he believed.  

And we know too it is in the stories of our own faith, the testimony of knowing Jesus in our lives, how we find him there, where it is we have found him present to us, in our need, in our worship, in our prayer, in our daily lives, in all the ways we find him there, that we come to a greater understanding of our God and walk more faithfully with him. 

So while this story is about the man receiving his sight, and coming to a full light of faith in Jesus, we know however not all there did, and though we might fault them for it, we know however the struggle is real, it is difficult to keep the faith in a world with so many going the opposite way, it is down right hard when the challenge of seeing God’s presence in our world is so shrouded by the darkness of our own day.    

It is however in walking in faithfulness to him, holding onto his truths, mindful of the blindspots we might have in our own lives, that we too stand firm in our faith, and come to see him clearly as light for the world and the one true light for our lives. 

“For once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light, for the fruit of the light is found in all that is right and true.” (eph 5:8,9).

May we always seek to know our God more clearly, trusting always in him.  

Amen, God Bless. 

Hannah+