Do we really want to see? Do we really want the eyes of Jesus? Do we really want to see what Jesus sees? Those are the questions that I think today’s story beckons us to ask. So let me ask again:

Do we really want to see?

Blindness was “normal” for the main character in today’s story.

He was born blind. 

He had never known what it was like to live in the seeing world.

But he did know what it was like to live in the blind, visually impaired world. That was his normal. And, apparently, he was ok with that.

He knew how to navigate his way around his home and town.

He knew how to care for himself.

NOTE: The man blind from birth did not ask Jesus for healing, he did not 

ask to be given sight.

There is nothing in the text that even suggests that he wanted to be 

given sight.

What brought about the occasion of his healing was a theological dispute that had risen among the disciples. They were less concerned about the state of his sight, then they were about the state of his soul. More specifically, they wanted to know who was to blame for his being born blind, as being blind in those times was regarded as divine punishment for sin.

The disciples asked a question about whose sins caused him to be blind, 

was it the sins of the man? Hard to believe as he was born blind.

Or was it the sins of the parents now vested on their on son?

and Jesus responded by giving the man sight. 

Jesus responds that neither the man nor his parents sinned.

Rather, he was born blind so that God’s glory and mercy would be

revealed in and through him.

Then Jesus proceeded to give the man sight for the first time in his life.

And as a result of this interaction with Jesus, his life changed.

He went from being an obscure, virtually invisible, part of his community to being thrust into the very center of attention and not in a good way. But I do not think physical sight is the core message of this lesson. Jesus used the physical healing to make a larger and more important point.

At the end of our text, Jesus asks the man: Do you BELIEVE in the Son of Man? And the man replies: And who is he? Tell me, so that I may believe in him. And Jesus responds: You have seen him. And the one speaking to you is he.” Immediately the man professes his belief in Jesus.

While Jesus restored the man’s physical ability to see, I think what Jesus was really focused on was opening the eyes of his heart. That sentiment is echoed by Paul when he writes to the Ephesians: “I pray that the eyes of your heart will have enough light to see what is the hope of God’s call, what is the richness of God’s glorious inheritance among believers,” (1:18)

To his physical eyes, Jesus probably appeared to be just another man. A man with the power to give sight, maybe a highly skilled physician, but a man nonetheless. It was only when the eyes of his heart were opened that the man was able to see Jesus for who he was, to place his belief in him, and to declare him Lord.

The restoration of the man’s physical ability to see dramatically changed the man’s life, but it was even more radically changed when this also entailed the opening of the man’s heart. Now he was placed on a new and different path. With the eyes of his heart opened, he was empowered to see the world around him in a radically different way.

Amazing Grace, which we will sing at the end of this service, is one of the most beloved hymns of all time. It was written by John Newton. Do you know anything about him? He was an Anglican priest. But prior to becoming a priest, Newton owned slaves and more from that be directly benefited from the slave trade, owning and captaining a slave ship. It wasn’t until well into adulthood, during a violent storm on the ship on which he was working, that threatened to destroy both the ship and everyone on it. Newton later would be that was the first time he honestly and fervently prayed to God. He prayed that God would be gracious and save him and the ship. The storm subsided. All survived. And Newton believed that was due to the gracious intervention of God. He would later claim this as his conversion experience which eventually led him to not only leaving the slave trade but also seeing for the first time the evils of the slave trade. He would go on to become one of the great and most outspoken abolitionists of his time. 

It was out of this experience that he wrote the words to Amazing Grace. The eyes of his heart were opened and his life was transformed and he dedicated his life to eradicating the practice of slavery that had resulted in seeing and treating God’s beloved children as property to be used, abused, used up, and then cast out. With the eyes of his heart opened, he knew that he had to do all he could do to eradicate this evil.

Now, I may be wrong, but I don’t think any of us were born physically blind. For some of us as we age our sight has gotten worse and for some it may even have become very limited. We may wish for and even pray for the restoration of our sight. But our physical sight is not the only sight that dims as we grow up and grow older.

As we mature, we are taught to see the world in a certain way. We put on spiritual blinders and only see what we want to see. We train ourselves to see only those things that reinforce our understanding of the world. We become blind to all those parts of our world that contradict that understanding or that we cause us to deeply question our position and stances on key issues impacting our world and hurting any of God’s precious children. John Newton was perfectly content with his life. He did not SEE anything wrong with being a slave owner and prospering in the slave trade. Then God opened the eyes of his heart and he saw how radically wrong and misguided he had been. More than that he now SAW all the harm he had done and the pain he had inflicted on countless men, women, and children. 

WIth the eyes of his heart opened, he repented and sought to repair the damage he had done.With the eyes of his heart open, he could see both the world as it is and the world as he came to see that God wanted it to be.

With the eyes of his heart open, he knew what he had to do.

If today we were to pray that God would open the eyes of our hearts, what would we see? What would that sight compel us to do, individually and collectively, to eradicate the evil we would then see in the world around us? How would our lives be forever changed if God were to open the eyes of our hearts? 

Those are serious questions and ones not to be asked or taken lightly. For if we sincerely and earnestly pray to God to open the eyes of our hearts, and if God responds to that prayer and grants us spiritual sight, like the blind man, like John Newton, everything about our lives will be changed. We will find ourselves rising up and doing things we never thought we could do. We will see with clarity the world as God wants it to be, and we will see with equal clarity what God is calling on us to do to bring that better world to birth.

So let me ask you again: Do you really want to see?