An Informed Faith

This sermon was written and preached by the Rev. Elizabeth Raine at the Tuggeranong Uniting Church on Sunday 19 March (the Fourth Sunday in Lent).

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The story in John this week reminded me of the play, The One Day of the Year. I don’t know if you know it, but it is about different perceptions of Anzac Day. For Hughie Cook, the son, Anzac Day appeared to be just an excuse for “one long grog-up”. For his father Alf, an ex-servicemen, it was a day to be with your mates. For Wacka, his mate, it was a day when we as a nation reflected on those who had paid with the sacrifice of their lives.

At one point during a heated debate between father and son, Alf points out that Wacka was there at Gallipoli and knew what Anzac was all about. Hughie puts the counter argument that soldiers who took part in the campaign at Gallipoli couldn’t know the full story of the disaster that was Anzac Cove because they only saw part of the whole picture, the part they were involved in. He sees himself as having a full overview, having studied history.

But Hughie’s view that Anzac Day was just “one long grog-up” is also flawed, as this is the only part of the picture Hughie can currently see. He doesn’t see the mateship, or the skill and resourcefulness, or the sense of pride that Alf and Wacka see in the ex-servicemen who ‘hung in there’ on Anzac Cove. And Hughie fails to recognise that the freedom that gives him the right to speak his opinion was a freedom in part won by soldiers like his father, fighting in the jungles of Asia.

These different viewpoints in the play all contributed to the whole picture of what Anzac day is, but none of the parts on their own are the full story. The story today of the healing of the blind man is very similar in its construction.

How often do we fail to grasp the whole picture? Let us do a simple exercise. Look around you. What do you see? Now, look around again, more carefully. What do you now see that you didn’t notice the first time? If I asked to describe the church, the answer would vary depending on whether you were looking at the front or the back, or even relying on your memory. The whole picture can be hard to take in.

We view the world through the lens of our own experience and perceptions. Like Alf and Hughie in the play, we concentrate on some things and take them in, but filter out others that we deem as unimportant or that perhaps we don’t understand or don’t like. We regularly interpret the information we receive, and we each choose different ways to respond to it. The writer Anais Nin was right when she said, “We do not see things as they are. We see things as we are.” In effect, often we see only what we choose to see.

We see this happening in the gospel story. As the disciples walk down a village street with Jesus, they saw what they had been taught to see – a man who was being punished by God. They knew something of his story. He had always been blind. Which raised a tough question for them. Did the birth defect mean that he had somehow sinned in the womb, or was he the victim of his parents’ transgression? For the disciples, this was simply an interesting theological question to raise with their teacher, Jesus, but for the man concerned it was a painful reality that he lived every day, and that, it seems, had left him destitute.

We know that his parents were still alive because later in the story they get called in by the religious authorities to testify at the investigation into his healing. But, probably out of fear, they refuse to be drawn in, and simply point out their son is now a grown adult and can answer for himself.

Their presence at this point in the story raises some questions though. If they were alive, and close enough to be called in for questioning, why was this man a beggar? why was he left pleading for the pity of strangers in order to survive? why was he not cared for by his parents?

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How then did this man see himself? After a life of being outcast, perhaps from his parents, from his neighbours, from the Temple, how could he have felt anything but shame and despair? how could he possibly even think that he might see something different in himself from what everyone else saw? how could he not accept the wisdom of the crowds and judge himself accordingly?

And he remains this way until someone came along who could see the whole situation, and see it differently. Jesus did not accept the dominant paradigm of his times, that illness and disability was a punishment from God. Perhaps for the first time, the blind man felt the gaze of someone who did not pity him or wonder what sin he had committed. For the first time the blind man knew what it was to be valued, to be accepted and to be made whole.

And then, as if this wasn’t enough, he discovered what it was like to really see, to accept light into his eyes and have it transformed into colours and textures, depth and movement. But if he thought this healing would make everything right he was mistaken. He may have had his eyes opened, but there were other, more powerful people who were not interested in having theirs opened. They were convinced that they knew how the world worked, and they weren’t about to change their perceptions.

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It can’t have been easy for the Pharisees in this story, for Jesus had a tendency to complicate things. When religious custom dictates that blindness is God’s judgement for sin, it’s easy to know what to do and what to think. But, when blind people get miraculously healed in God’s name, it all gets messy. If sin didn’t cause the problem, then where did it come from? And what about all those other beggars? Would they now be expected to be treated as equals? And if a healing really had happened, then they had another problem. None of them had done it, Jesus had done it. For them, it was best not to see the whole picture and just stick with what they knew.

What to do? The Pharisees try and extract a confession from the blind man. Perhaps he wasn’t really blind – it had been a lifelong hoax and the community had fallen for it. Or maybe he’d found a body-double who was now pretending to be healed to get him a few minutes of fame. Then they resorted to questioning his parents. Again, the result was unsatisfactory.

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Finally, there was no other option but to throw him out of the synagogue. Though the blind man could see, the Pharisees refused to see. The religious leaders had decided that Jesus was a fraud, so that’s all they could see. They decided the blind man was a sinner, so that’s all they could see. And they had decided that God could no more use Jesus to heal than that God would heal a person God had afflicted with blindness in the first place. Because that’s what they believed, that’s what they saw.

Perception is everything. It’s not just what we see or don’t see, but how we interpret what we see that determines our actions, our responses and our beliefs. We can look at the poor and see unfortunate victims of circumstance, or lazy people who refuse to work, or dignified human beings making the most of a tough situation. We can look at climate science and see a natural cycle which has just happened to hit us now, or human actions putting our planet under pressure.

Ultimately, how we determine what we see and what it means must flow from Jesus’ example. How did Jesus address poverty? How did Jesus view the natural world, power, violence, sickness, and human dignity? If we are to follow Jesus into a world of justice, we will have to wrestle with these questions and not see them as outside of the realm of faith. And once we have seen the problems, we also have the task of helping others – our leaders, our neighbours, our children – to see as well.

In our daily lives we all make choices (consciously or subconsciously) about what we will see and what we won’t. It’s tempting to choose not to see the suffering and injustice in our world – to switch off the news, and to ignore reports of grief, warand trauma. It’s tempting to avoid seeing certain people and to allow them to just blend in with the landscape, removing their need and struggle from our vision.

It’s tempting to avoid seeing God’s truth and grace in those with whom we disagree, and whom we would rather see as “all bad”. It’s tempting to avoid seeing the brokenness in those we support and with whom we agree and to see them as “all good”. It’s tempting to avoid seeing the resources, the opportunities and the capacity we have for making a difference, and to believe we can do nothing.

But, if we have really seen Jesus, and if we have truly seen God’s reign proclaimed and manifest in him, then we have to confront how we see things, and allow God’s grace and mercy, God’s truth and justice to change our seeing and shed light on our world, our relationships and our neighbourhoods.

And, once again, our seeing must be informed by God’s different perspective where the greatest are the least, and where everyone – even a young shepherd boy, or a carpenter from the countryside – can make significant differences in the world.

The lectionary offers us stories, during Lent, of encounters that Jesus had with a range of people. We have already heard of his conversation with a Pharisee in Jerusalem and a woman beside a well in Samaria. This week, he is in Jerusalem, where one of the people he encounters is a man who was born blind (John 9:1–41).

Of course, each of these scenes is a narrative which has been shaped and formed by the author, more in the nature of a developed literary creation than a verbatim account of an historical event. It may be that each extended scene is based on a report of an encounter that took place decades before the Gospel was written, but most certainly it has been elaborated and developed over a period of time, worked into a narrative that catches attention, invites reflection, and has a life all of its own.

“John” wrote his Gospel some 50 to 80 years after the lifetime of Jesus. The account of each of these conversations—at night with Nicodemus, at noon with the woman, in Jerusalem with the authorities, and then the encounter in Bethany and the council meeting in Jerusalem—are thus far removed from each of these events. (And how could we possibly claim to know verbatim what was said in a Sanhedrin meeting in the early 30s CE? — especially since the High Priest articulates a central tenet of later Christian doctrine! ).

But removing certainty with regard to the historical accuracy of the encounter does not in any way impair the power of the story to connect with us as we read and hear it, many centuries later, in a very different context—we still have stories from the 1st century, valued and passed on and collected in scripture, that speak to our own journeys of faith development in the 21st century.

The scene—or rather, the series of scenes—that we are offers this coming Sunday occur within a context that has set up antagonism and tension in the relationship that Jesus has with the authorities in Jerusalem. In John’s narrative, he has set things off in an interesting way: violence in the courtyard of the Temple (2:13–22) is his first action in the capital city.

Then follows the secret meeting with Nicodemus, “a leader of the Jews” in which Jesus appears to accuse Nicodemus and his ilk of misunderstanding what Jesus teaches about “heavenly things” (3:11–12), and the public noontime meeting with a Samaritan woman by the well, in which he contests the northern penchant for worship “on this mountain” (4:19–24).

However, the antagonism in these encounters pales into insignificance when compared with what follows. After he has healed an official’s son in Galilee (4:46–54) and a man challenged by his poor mobility (5:2–9), Jesus enters into debate with “the Judeans”—most likely the scribal and priestly authorities in Jerusalem—which has already stirred them up, as “they were seeking all the more to kill him” (5:18).

For my views on why references to “the Jews” in this Gospel should be translated as “the Judean authorities”, see

Then a long session of exposition with his disciples by the lake in Galilee (6:22–71) sees not only Judeans stirred by his words (6:52), but his own disciples resistant (6:60) and some, indeed, leaving his company of followers (6:66). We don’t hear much, usually, about Jesus’ failures!!

After a debate about whether Jesus and his followers should go south to Jerusalem (7:1–9), Jesus went, “not publicly but as it were in secret” (7:10), engaging in yet more discussion with “the Judeans” (7:15–62), in the course of which, the accusation is shouted by the crowd, “you have a demon!” (7:20). That languages comes back in the subsequent scene, an extended section in which Jesus remains in Jerusalem (8:12–10:21).

The claim that Jesus makes, “I am the light of the world” (8:12), introduces a section where accusation and counter-accusation intensify. “You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father’s desires”, Jesus declares, continuing with the accusation that “he was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him” (8:44). In response, “the Judeans” ask, “are we not right in saying that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?” (8:48), and then “they picked up stones to throw at him” (8:59). Jesus escapes by leaving the temple.

This polemic continues in chapter 10, when many of “the Judeans” were saying, “He has a demon and is out of his mind. Why listen to him?” (10:20), whilst others were saying, “These are not the words of one who has a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?” (10:21). The long scene ends with the narrator reporting, “they tried to arrest him again, but he escaped from their hands” (10:39).

The antagonism will continue, nevertheless, for after Jesus has moved to Bethany, encountered a grieving family, and raised Lazarus back to life (11:1–44), the Jewish authorities decide to make their move. Worried that, “if we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation” (11:48), Caiaphas leads with these prophetic words: “it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed” (11:50). And so, “from that day on they planned to put him to death” (11:53).

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The extended narrative revolving around the man born blind, whom Jesus heals, and the associated controversy, is thus set at the heart of this extended sequence of conflict scenes. It is different, in character, from the earlier scenes of encounter, where the focus is on Jesus and the person with whom he is talking—Nicodemus, and the Samaritan woman in particular. This particular scene of encounter has quite a cast of characters—Jesus, his disciples, the blind man, his parents, the Pharisees, and a crowd of people in Jerusalem.

In fact, this encounter leads to a sequence that feels more like a dramatic portrayal of a court scenario, than a religious story. There are seven scenes in all. The first scene is narrated in the opening verses (9:1–7), telling of Jesus healing the man. The question from the disciples (9:2) allows Jesus to give an explanation about the purpose of “his work” (9:3–5) which culminates in a reprise of his earlier claim, “I am the light of the world” (9:5; see 8:12, as well as the initial reference at 1:5).

Jesus heals the man by forming mud with his own saliva (9:6)—something jarring to modern sensibilities, but a common practice amongst ancient miracle-workers and healers. For my reflections on the distinctive way that Jesus heals this blind man, see

The second scene involves the neighbours of the healed man debating with him about what has happened (9:8–12); “how were your eyes opened?”, they ask him (9:10), incredulous at the change that has taken place. This scene is something of “set-up”, to lead into the third scene, in which the complexities of the situation begin to be unravelled.

The third scene sees the healed man brought before the Pharisees (9:13–17); what ensues feels like it is setting up to be a cross-examination, since the healing took place on a sabbath (9:14) and thus the event comes under Torah prescriptions (cf. Mark 2:23–28; 3:1–6; Luke 13:10–17; 14:1–6; and John 7:19–24). In fact, the Pharisees accuse Jesus, “this man is not from God, for he does not observe the sabbath” (9:16), while the healed man, pressed hard, declares, “he is a prophet” (9:17).

A prophet: is the same affirmation made by the Samaritan woman (4:19), a crowd in Galilee after a miracle (6:14), and a crowd in Jerusalem (7:40)—and, by implication, perhaps some in the Sanhedrin, led by Nicodemus, say that also (7:52)?

Does the author want his hearers and readers to understand each of these affirmations in terms of the central one: “this is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world” (6:14), presumably along the lines of the earlier statement of Moses, “the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own people; you shall heed such a prophet … I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their own people; I will put my words in the mouth of the prophet, who shall speak to them everything that I command” (Deut 18:15, 18). Certainly, this is the text on the basis of which Samaritans were anticipating the return of Moses as their Taheb, their Restorer.

We resume the extended narrative of John 9 with the fourth scene, involving the parents of the man, whom the Pharisees summonses and proceed to question (9:18–23). They ask, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?” (9:19). The key element in this scene is the narrative comment—reflecting the experience of the followers of Jesus many decades after the setting of this scene, in Jerusalem in the early 30s—that “the [Judean authorities] had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue” (9:22).

John’s Gospel indicates, three times, that followers of Jesus were expelled from the synagogue (9:22; 12:42; 16:1–2). That’s quite a schism! This indicates that the negative portrayals of people from years back may well have as much to do with what has transpired in those intervening years, as with the actual event—probably, I think, much more to do with those intervening years than with the conversations and encounters as reported in the book of signs.

The whole Gospel reflects a situation much developed from the time in which the story is set, when Jesus was a Galilean man preaching and teaching in Israel in the 30s CE. American scholar Raymond Brown developed a complex hypothesis about multiple stages of development of this Gospel, with the figure of the Beloved Disciple providing a focal point of leadership and identity—and perhaps also serving as the earliest source for the distinctive Johannine traditions?

Brown developed this hypothesis as he worked on a marvellous two-volume commentary on John’s Gospel (Anchor Bible, Yale Uni Press, 1966) and then published a clear analysis of this in his book The Community of the Beloved Disciple (Paulist Press, 1978).

Much had transpired in the decades between the time of Jesus and the finalisation of the Gospel—including an intensification of the antagonism between the followers of Jesus and the rabbinic leadership of Judaism. This antagonism is “written back” into the time of the story of Jesus through the verbal polemics that take place in chapters 5–12, between Jesus and the authorities in Jerusalem.

My own teacher, Wayne Meeks (in his classic article, “The Man from Heaven in Johannine Sectarianism”, JBL 91 (1972) 44–72), noted that the claims made about Jesus in the fourth Gospel function as reinforcements of the sectarian identity of the community. As this community had come into existence because of the claims that it had made about Jesus, so the reinforcement of the life of the new community took place, to a large degree, through the strengthening and refining of its initial claim concerning Jesus. The account of the interaction between Jesus, the man born blind, now healed, and the Pharisees and leadership in Jerusalem, reflects elements of that sectarian mindset.

This becomes clear in the fifth scene, in which the Pharisees recall the healed man to question him further (9:24–34). The Pharisees set the key issue: “as for this man, we do not know where he comes from” (9:29). The experience of the healed man, “you do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes”, leads him to testify, “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” (9:30–33). That clear affirmation of faith in Jesus, and recognition of his status, from one “on the inside”, brings the cross-examination to an abrupt close; incredulous, the Pharisees ask, “are you trying to teach us?”, and then drive him out from their gathering (9:34).

The issue at stake is the identity of Jesus and his status as prophet, teacher, “from God”. Of course, hearers and readers of the Gospel have known from the beginning that Jesus, the Word, “was with God, and … was God” (1:1), that this Word “became flesh and lived among us … full of grace and truth” (1:14), and that this Word was “the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known” (1:18). We have been let into the insiders’ world, with access to full knowledge. This is where the healed man is to be found; he recognises Jesus, not only as miracle worker, but as “from God” (9:33).

So the sixth scene (9:35–38) depicts Jesus interacting directly with the healed man once more—the last time he saw him was back in scene one, when he had spat onto the ground to make mud, rubbed it on the man’s eyes, and told him to “wash in the pool of Siloam” (9:6–7). Now, Jesus asks the leading question, “do you believe in the Son of Man?” (9:35), evoking the clear affirmation, “Lord, I believe” (9:38). That is the same affirmation of faith made by Simon Peter (6:69), Martha (11:27), and, by inference, Thomas (20:24–28). The identity of Jesus—Holy One of God, Messiah, Son of Man, Lord and God—is the critical issue which delineates insiders from outsiders.

For my reflections on the significance of this man’s confession of faith in the context of the book of signs as a whole, see

The seventh scene brings Jesus directly into contact with the Pharisees (9:39–41). Compared to the earlier extended debate of 8:31–59 and the less extensive debate which follows at 10:22–39, this is brief, succinct, and focussed on the theological issues of blindness and seeing, and sin. This links back to the opening question of the disciples about blindness and sin (9:2) and the consequent statement of Jesus, “as long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (9:5). This statement, of course, repeats the earlier declaration of Jesus (8:12) which has introduced the whole narrative context in which this encounter sits (8:12–10:21).

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So the whole scene (like the whole Gospel) is about the situation of a group of followers of Jesus towards the end of the first century CE, inheriting the richness of the Jewish faith, convinced that they have found The Teacher of the way that God requires, in Jesus of Nazareth. As a result, they have encountered opposition, argumentation, and expulsion from their familiar faith community, and through this they have engaged in verbal warfare with those who have pushed them out.

Retelling the story of that man in a way that validates their perspective as what God intends and desires, is what has led an unknown member of their community to construct this narrative, in which he reinforces the views that have been developed by the members of his community, even as he hopes that others might “come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing [they] may have life in his name” (20:31).