J. Douglas Dortch, Jr., Ph.D.
First Baptist Church, Tallahassee, FL
“Now Can You See ? ”

From the Lenten Series "A Living Lord "
Scripture: John 9:35-41

February 24 , 2008

An amazing thing happened to me on the way to 50 – I began to see things in a fuzzier and more blurred way.  At one time I could see things miles away, but as the years have crept up, the old retinas have just lost their touch.

My mother warned me this day would come.  “Turn on a light; you’ll hurt your eyes.”  “Eat your carrots; they’re good for your eyes.”  I waved off her warnings as the exaggerations of a doting mother.  “These eyeballs are good for another 100,000 miles,” I thought to myself.  Little did I know that the optical odometer would turn over as quickly as it did.

Evidently, I am not alone.  I read an article recently that explained how 100 million Americans wear eyeglasses and another 70 million wear contact lenses.  That’s out of a population of what?  260 million people?  I’m evidently in good company.  A whole bunch of us struggle to be able to maintain our ability to see, without which our lives would be so much more challenging.

But as I believe Helen Keller once expressed it, “The most pathetic person in the world is the person who has sight but no vision.”  It is the person who has eyes to see but is nonetheless unable to comprehend what is before him.

I think of that saying every time I read this story in John’s gospel of Jesus’ healing of a man who was born blind.  It is a pivotal story in John’s gospel, as it illustrates the confession that Jesus had just made in the previous chapter, when he spoke of himself as “the Light of the World.”  “Whoever follows me,” Jesus said, “will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

Most of us know the story.  Walking along the streets of Jerusalem, Jesus and his disciples encountered a man who had been blind from birth.  His disciples, believing that such calamity had to be the result of somebody’s sin, questioned Jesus as to whether the blame lay with the man himself or his parents.  No doubt their inquiry was personal; knowing themselves to be sinners, they were wondering if by chance the same fate was in their future.

It was a teachable moment, and Jesus took full opportunity to seize the situation for the glory of God.  “This is all about the works of God,” Jesus told his disciples, whereupon he did an amazing thing.  Without the blind man’s permission, Jesus spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and spread it on the blind man’s eyes, sending him to Siloam to wash the mud away.  There’s an important truth in this story that we must not overlook.  While Jesus takes the initiative to do a work of God in our lives, we must show our trust in his capability by doing whatever he gives us to do.  The man went.  The man washed.  The man saw.  And all were amazed…except the religious authorities.  The very people who should have been the most full of praise were the most cynical, because they could not see what should have been evident to everyone.

The most pathetic person in the world is the person who has sight but no vision; the person who has eyes to see but is unable to comprehend the truth that is before him.

Fast forward now to our text for the day.  The religious authorities have thrown the man out of the temple and by providence he meets Jesus who is still wandering the streets of the city.  “Do you believe?” Jesus asks him.  “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”  “Who is he?” the man answers.  “Tell me so that I may believe in him.”

What irony is contained in this story!  For the first time the man born blind actually “sees” Jesus, at least physically speaking.  But it is only when Jesus identifies himself is faith awakened so that the man understands Jesus for who he really is.  Jesus is not just a healer.  Jesus is not just a miracle worker.  Jesus is the Son of Man.  Jesus is the Word that has become flesh.  Jesus is God’s Only Begotten Son who gives life for all who look to him in trust and devotion.

Do you look to Jesus in that way? 

There are so many people in this world who are cursed by their familiarity with their surroundings.  They are blinded by the routine of their everyday lives.  We get life where we want it to be and we don’t anyone to show us otherwise.  We don’t really want our world to be rocked in that way.

You know what I’m talking about.  You travel the same route to school or to work.  You shop in the same places.  You go to the same restaurants.  You hang around the same people.  We are creatures of habit.  And while there’s not anything necessarily wrong about our routines, the “sameness” of our lives can anesthetize us to the miracles that God is about in our midst – a reality that when we become aware of it often causes us great regret.

It’s like the Ray Bradbury novel, where two young boys are walking by a house.  It’s a house they’ve walked by countless times before.  But this time as they pass it one of the boys starts moaning and groaning about how he’s never noticed the colored windowpanes on the house’s little round windows.  When the other one asks what difference does it really make, the first one answers in this way: “If I didn’t see those windows until today, what else have I been missing?”

In this passage of Scripture, the people who can see – the Pharisees – they fail to notice how the presence of God has drawn near in the person of Jesus.  Even when Jesus gives sight to a man who has been blind from birth, they fail to recognize Jesus for who he is, because they don’t want to recognize Jesus for who he is.

Do you?  Do you want to see Jesus for who he is?  “Of course, I do,” you might say.  But do you really want to see Jesus for who he is?  Do you want to run the risk of your recognition of him to change your life so that you value things differently, you approach people differently, you live your life differently? 

In his book, An Anthropologist on Mars, neurologist Oliver Sacks tells the story of a man named Virgil.  When Dr. Sacks first met Virgil, Virgil had been blind from early childhood.

When he was about 50, Virgil underwent surgery and was given the gift of sight.  But as he and Dr. Sacks found out, having the physical capacity for sight is not exactly the same thing as seeing.

Virgil’s first experiences with sight were confusing.  He was able to make out colors and movements, but putting them all together into a picture that was coherent was another matter entirely.  Over time he learned to identify various objects, but his habits and his behaviors – they were still the habits and behaviors of a blind man.

The longer Dr. Sacks studied Virgil’s case the more he began to understand how gaining the ability to see and to understand was something more than just the physical.  It was even more than something emotional; it was something spiritual.  As Dr. Sack’s explained his own understanding, “I learned that one must die as a blind person to be born again as a seeing person.”  In other words, one must let go of all the assumptions and the presuppositions in order to see new truths and make new discoveries.

Now, doesn’t that story parallel this story from the Scripture?  A man who was born blind receives his sight, but doesn’t truly recognize what life is all about until he sees and believes in Jesus.  Meanwhile, those who should have seen Jesus first miss him entirely, because they know that to confess him changes everything they have known to be the truth.  It changes their perception of reality, and they’re not ready to have that happen.

I think it was the famous evangelist of the last century, Billy Sunday, who used to say that the reason sinners can’t find God is the same reason criminals can’t find policemen:  They aren’t looking!

This morning I encourage you to turn your eyes upon Jesus.  Don’t be afraid to see life as he reveals it to be.  Don’t be ashamed that he might show you things that you’ve never noticed before.  Don’t worry about how others might tell you that you are confused or even mistaken.  Jesus really is the Light of the World and those who choose to believe in him are able to see things that other people will never know.

After all, the most pathetic person in the world is that person who has sight but has no vision.  It’s the person who has eyes to see but is unable to recognize the reality of what may be before him.

James L. Kraft is a name you may not know, but I’m sure most of us here this morning are familiar with the corporation he established – Kraft Foods.  James Kraft was a committed Christian.  And as he tells the story, one of the great turning points in his life was the day that a certain kindly eye doctor came into his life.  Kraft was a fourteen years-old at the time, one of a family of eleven children, living on a farm in Canada.  At that time he suffered from nearsightedness, a condition that was so acute and distressing that he assumed everyone on earth suffered continuously from the same furious headaches from which he suffered, and that everyone had the same blurry image of things like a boat seen from under water.  But one summer an eye doctor from the city was vacationing in the area, and young James was taking care of the doctor's horse and buggy.  Noting his extreme nearsightedness, the eye doctor insisted that James go to the city with him to be fitted with a pair of glasses.  James wasn’t sure that the glasses would do any good, but what did he have to lose?  He went with the doctor, received his gift of glasses, and as Kraft gratefully recalls, "That eye doctor gave me the earth and all that was in it, completely in focus and beautiful beyond anything I could have dreamed."

“I am the Light of the Word,” says Jesus.  “Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

What have you got to lose?  Trust Jesus and go where he tells you.  Do as he commands you.  Things will become so much clearer.  And regardless of how young or how old you may be, you will come to see things that you never thought possible.An amazing thing happened to me on the way to 50 – I began to see things in a fuzzier and more blurred way.  At one time I could see things miles away, but as the years have crept up, the old retinas have just lost their touch.

My mother warned me this day would come.  “Turn on a light; you’ll hurt your eyes.”  “Eat your carrots; they’re good for your eyes.”  I waved off her warnings as the exaggerations of a doting mother.  “These eyeballs are good for another 100,000 miles,” I thought to myself.  Little did I know that the optical odometer would turn over as quickly as it did.

Evidently, I am not alone.  I read an article recently that explained how 100 million Americans wear eyeglasses and another 70 million wear contact lenses.  That’s out of a population of what?  260 million people?  I’m evidently in good company.  A whole bunch of us struggle to be able to maintain our ability to see, without which our lives would be so much more challenging.

But as I believe Helen Keller once expressed it, “The most pathetic person in the world is the person who has sight but no vision.”  It is the person who has eyes to see but is nonetheless unable to comprehend what is before him.

I think of that saying every time I read this story in John’s gospel of Jesus’ healing of a man who was born blind.  It is a pivotal story in John’s gospel, as it illustrates the confession that Jesus had just made in the previous chapter, when he spoke of himself as “the Light of the World.”  “Whoever follows me,” Jesus said, “will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

Most of us know the story.  Walking along the streets of Jerusalem, Jesus and his disciples encountered a man who had been blind from birth.  His disciples, believing that such calamity had to be the result of somebody’s sin, questioned Jesus as to whether the blame lay with the man himself or his parents.  No doubt their inquiry was personal; knowing themselves to be sinners, they were wondering if by chance the same fate was in their future.

It was a teachable moment, and Jesus took full opportunity to seize the situation for the glory of God.  “This is all about the works of God,” Jesus told his disciples, whereupon he did an amazing thing.  Without the blind man’s permission, Jesus spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and spread it on the blind man’s eyes, sending him to Siloam to wash the mud away.  There’s an important truth in this story that we must not overlook.  While Jesus takes the initiative to do a work of God in our lives, we must show our trust in his capability by doing whatever he gives us to do.  The man went.  The man washed.  The man saw.  And all were amazed…except the religious authorities.  The very people who should have been the most full of praise were the most cynical, because they could not see what should have been evident to everyone.

The most pathetic person in the world is the person who has sight but no vision; the person who has eyes to see but is unable to comprehend the truth that is before him.

Fast forward now to our text for the day.  The religious authorities have thrown the man out of the temple and by providence he meets Jesus who is still wandering the streets of the city.  “Do you believe?” Jesus asks him.  “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”  “Who is he?” the man answers.  “Tell me so that I may believe in him.”

What irony is contained in this story!  For the first time the man born blind actually “sees” Jesus, at least physically speaking.  But it is only when Jesus identifies himself is faith awakened so that the man understands Jesus for who he really is.  Jesus is not just a healer.  Jesus is not just a miracle worker.  Jesus is the Son of Man.  Jesus is the Word that has become flesh.  Jesus is God’s Only Begotten Son who gives life for all who look to him in trust and devotion.

Do you look to Jesus in that way? 

There are so many people in this world who are cursed by their familiarity with their surroundings.  They are blinded by the routine of their everyday lives.  We get life where we want it to be and we don’t anyone to show us otherwise.  We don’t really want our world to be rocked in that way.

You know what I’m talking about.  You travel the same route to school or to work.  You shop in the same places.  You go to the same restaurants.  You hang around the same people.  We are creatures of habit.  And while there’s not anything necessarily wrong about our routines, the “sameness” of our lives can anesthetize us to the miracles that God is about in our midst – a reality that when we become aware of it often causes us great regret.

It’s like the Ray Bradbury novel, where two young boys are walking by a house.  It’s a house they’ve walked by countless times before.  But this time as they pass it one of the boys starts moaning and groaning about how he’s never noticed the colored windowpanes on the house’s little round windows.  When the other one asks what difference does it really make, the first one answers in this way: “If I didn’t see those windows until today, what else have I been missing?”

In this passage of Scripture, the people who can see – the Pharisees – they fail to notice how the presence of God has drawn near in the person of Jesus.  Even when Jesus gives sight to a man who has been blind from birth, they fail to recognize Jesus for who he is, because they don’t want to recognize Jesus for who he is.

Do you?  Do you want to see Jesus for who he is?  “Of course, I do,” you might say.  But do you really want to see Jesus for who he is?  Do you want to run the risk of your recognition of him to change your life so that you value things differently, you approach people differently, you live your life differently? 

In his book, An Anthropologist on Mars, neurologist Oliver Sacks tells the story of a man named Virgil.  When Dr. Sacks first met Virgil, Virgil had been blind from early childhood.

When he was about 50, Virgil underwent surgery and was given the gift of sight.  But as he and Dr. Sacks found out, having the physical capacity for sight is not exactly the same thing as seeing.

Virgil’s first experiences with sight were confusing.  He was able to make out colors and movements, but putting them all together into a picture that was coherent was another matter entirely.  Over time he learned to identify various objects, but his habits and his behaviors – they were still the habits and behaviors of a blind man.

The longer Dr. Sacks studied Virgil’s case the more he began to understand how gaining the ability to see and to understand was something more than just the physical.  It was even more than something emotional; it was something spiritual.  As Dr. Sack’s explained his own understanding, “I learned that one must die as a blind person to be born again as a seeing person.”  In other words, one must let go of all the assumptions and the presuppositions in order to see new truths and make new discoveries.

Now, doesn’t that story parallel this story from the Scripture?  A man who was born blind receives his sight, but doesn’t truly recognize what life is all about until he sees and believes in Jesus.  Meanwhile, those who should have seen Jesus first miss him entirely, because they know that to confess him changes everything they have known to be the truth.  It changes their perception of reality, and they’re not ready to have that happen.

I think it was the famous evangelist of the last century, Billy Sunday, who used to say that the reason sinners can’t find God is the same reason criminals can’t find policemen:  They aren’t looking!

This morning I encourage you to turn your eyes upon Jesus.  Don’t be afraid to see life as he reveals it to be.  Don’t be ashamed that he might show you things that you’ve never noticed before.  Don’t worry about how others might tell you that you are confused or even mistaken.  Jesus really is the Light of the World and those who choose to believe in him are able to see things that other people will never know.

After all, the most pathetic person in the world is that person who has sight but has no vision.  It’s the person who has eyes to see but is unable to recognize the reality of what may be before him.

James L. Kraft is a name you may not know, but I’m sure most of us here this morning are familiar with the corporation he established – Kraft Foods.  James Kraft was a committed Christian.  And as he tells the story, one of the great turning points in his life was the day that a certain kindly eye doctor came into his life.  Kraft was a fourteen years-old at the time, one of a family of eleven children, living on a farm in Canada.  At that time he suffered from nearsightedness, a condition that was so acute and distressing that he assumed everyone on earth suffered continuously from the same furious headaches from which he suffered, and that everyone had the same blurry image of things like a boat seen from under water.  But one summer an eye doctor from the city was vacationing in the area, and young James was taking care of the doctor's horse and buggy.  Noting his extreme nearsightedness, the eye doctor insisted that James go to the city with him to be fitted with a pair of glasses.  James wasn’t sure that the glasses would do any good, but what did he have to lose?  He went with the doctor, received his gift of glasses, and as Kraft gratefully recalls, "That eye doctor gave me the earth and all that was in it, completely in focus and beautiful beyond anything I could have dreamed."

“I am the Light of the Word,” says Jesus.  “Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

What have you got to lose?  Trust Jesus and go where he tells you.  Do as he commands you.  Things will become so much clearer.  And regardless of how young or how old you may be, you will come to see things that you never thought possible.