Healing the Man Born Blind

John 9:1-23

9/7/2025 

It is hard to imagine not being able to see. 

A week ago, Nancy and I and three of our daughters were in the Grand Tetons hiking in the mountains. 

The views were amazing… valleys, lakes, waterfalls, God’s amazing creation. 

Early in the week we hiked amid clouds, at one point able to look down over the clouds. 

To not be able to see all that would be incredibly difficult. To see nothing would be horrible. 

Yesterday, I blindfolded myself just to try to imagine what it would be like. 

In my weakness, I could only take it for an hour. Blindness is crippling. 

Only Jesus can open blind eyes. 

Throughout His gospel, John has been telling us of the events and teaching of Jesus, the Son of God. 

In chapter 1 we learned that Jesus is God Himself who has come into this world to save us. 

He came as a human, in our human history, speaking human languages, so that we could understand Him. 

He shows us that He is God in the flesh by doing miracles and teaching truth with authority. 

He identified Himself as God by claiming an intimate relationship with the Father. 

He has identified Himself as God by claiming to be the source of life everlasting. Only God can be that. 

He identified Himself as God in saying things like “I Am the Bread of Life.” (6:35) 

And people are believing in Him. 

The Samaritan woman Jesus met at the well believed as did many Samaritans. 

There is the nobleman whose son Jesus healed from afar. 

There is the man, lame for 38 years, at the pool of Bethesda that Jesus healed. But that might be all so far. 

This gets to another of the themes that we have become accustomed to in the Gospel of John. 

To have true life with God now and forever, you must trust Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God the Father. 

If you do not, you will suffer God’s judgment forever in hell because you are a sinner, rejecting Jesus. 

If you come to Jesus and trust Him, your eyes will be opened. 

If you can see spiritually, you will have life everlasting. 

I. Jesus makes men see. John 9:1-7 

We begin this story with a puzzler presented to Jesus by His disciples. (vss. 1-2) 

In their question is an assumption. Physical illness is a result of sin. 

This is not altogether nonsensical. We know that the corruption of the body, illness, is a result of sin. 

If the first man and woman had not sinned, we would not have illness, corruption, or aging. 

For this reason, most people in Jesus’ day thought that illness, in this case, blindness from birth… 

It was a result of someone’s specific sin… the man or his parents. 

However, we find in Jesus’ answer that they are not understanding correctly how all this worked. 

He says clearly, “No.” It was not that. It was not the sin of this man or his parents. 

No, this blindness, that is a result of the corruption in the world by sin, happened for another reason. 

It happened so that “the works of God might be displayed in him.” 

In this case “the works of God” mean the work that Jesus is about to do. 

But, in other cases it may mean something else. 

Joni Erickson Tada was crippled in a diving accident at 17. 

God has used her injury, which is horrible, to display the works of God in so many amazing ways. 

Jesus goes on to explain in verses 3-5 that in this case “the works of God” are the works of Jesus Himself. 

What is the day? It is when Jesus is alive and revealing God in His ministry. 

What is the night? It will be when Jesus is suffering and then crucified. 

Jesus then reminds His disciples that He is “the light of the world.” 

John 1:5-13 Jesus is the one who shows men the truth and gives eternal life. 

John 8:12 Jesus rescues us from the darkness caused by sin, deception, and the corruption in the world. 

The “darkness” is the blindness in this world caused by people who will not truly seek God. 

They seek to justify themselves. 

They seek their own ideas about God. 

They will not humble themselves and listen to what God says, which is what Jesus His Son says. 

What we read of in verses 6-7 is the sixth of seven signs recorded in John’s Gospel. 

The first was the turning water into wine at the wedding at Cana. 

Then Jesus healed an official’s son in Capernaum. 

In chapter 5 He healed a lame man at the Pool of Bethesda. 

In chapter 6 Jesus fed the 5,000 near the Sea of Galilee. 

After this He walked on the water and met the disciples on the Sea. 

As we learn in John 20:31, these signs have been written down for us so that we would believe. 

“that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing we would have life in His name.” 

Now we have the sixth of these signs. 

Jesus is showing that He can open the eyes of the blind. 

Now it is important to understand that blindness is used in the NT as a metaphor for spiritual inability. 

A person who is spiritually blind cannot see the truth. He cannot see the Messiah. He cannot see God. 

The Messiah will come and open the eyes of the blind. 

This will happen literally. Jesus will actually heal human physical blindness. 

This is no surprise because God made eyes in the first place, these wonderful organs by which we see. 

Julia and I have discussed sight at length. She is training to be an Ophthalmologist. 

Scientists and physicians, with all of our technology, do not really understand how we can see. 

How do we turn light and images into the complex data transmitted by nerves? 

And how does the brain figure out how to turn that data into graphic thoughts? 

It is astounding. 

But God knows. God made all this up! So He knows how to fix it. 

And this removing of blindness is meant metaphorically as well. 

It is the removing of spiritual blindness, which only Jesus the Messiah can do. 

Consider Old Testament prophesy. 

Psalm 146:8-10 God opens blind eyes. This is how His Kingdom works. 

Isaiah 35:4-6a The Messiah will come. When He does, He will open the eyes of the blind. 

The first of the Servant Songs in Isaiah… Isaiah 42:5-9, 16 This is about what the Messiah will do. 

Luke 4:14-21 Jesus is here quoting from the LXX translation of Isaiah 61:1-2. 

Thus, in healing this man, Jesus is identifying Himself as the Messiah, the fulfillment of prophesy. 

Only the Messiah can make spiritually blind people see the truth. 

II. Those who do not believe cannot see. John 9:8-17 

This sign leads to a struggle, a debate, among those present. Actually, a series of discussions. 

The first is about whether the guy is indeed the guy that people think he is. (vss. 8-9) 

“This is the blind guy!” 

“No, he just looks like him.” 

All the while the man himself is saying repeatedly, “I’m the guy you are all talking about!” 

So, then, another discussion begins, “How did you get your eyes healed?” 

And he tells them. (vss. 10-12) 

And they demand to know where the guy is who did this. And the man doesn’t know. 

In fact, the man cannot even know what Jesus looks like. He has never seen Him. 

When this man met Jesus earlier, He was blind. 

So, they bring the man to the Pharisees, and the Pharisees question him. (vss. 13-16) 

The questioning quickly becomes this, “How can a sinner do such signs?” Like healing a blind man. (vs. 16) 

Of course, their premise is wrong. Jesus is not a sinner. But their blindness keeps them from seeing this. 

So they have an argument among themselves. 

Then they turn to the man just healed and ask him. (vs. 17) 

You cannot miss the dark humor in the situation. What does this guy know? 

But he answers, “He is a prophet.” It is a good answer. But they don’t like it. 

Why? They are spiritually blind. 

They do not believe, therefore they cannot see the truth that is right in front of their faces. 

This is not unusual. It has been the condition of Israel for most of their history. 

Isaiah 29:9-10 The leaders of Israel are blind. 

Isaiah 56:10-12 Again it is those who ought to shepherd Israel who are blind. 

Hear the prophetic confession of sinful Israel. Isaiah 59:9-15a 

Those who will not believe are the ones who cannot see their Messiah, their Savior. 

This remains the problem of people even to this day. 

People cannot see Jesus because they do not want to see Jesus. They want to remain in their sins. 

People want to remain in their sins and darkness because the alternative is humble repentance. 

III. Those who cannot see act like idiots. John 9:18-23 

Now they go to the man’s parents and have a ridiculous discussion. 

Quite obviously they are doing all that they can to sustain their denial of what is actually the truth. 

Which is what people do in this world to avoid coming to terms with Jesus and their own sin. 

They want from the parents an explanation. (vss. 18-19) 

The man’s parents do not have one. (vss. 20-21) 

“He was born blind.” This they know. 

“The man is old enough, ask him.” This is called obvious, sensible, advice. 

But that is all that the Pharisees will get from them because they are scared. (vss. 22-23) 

Notice that the Pharisees had already agreed that they cannot admit the truth, that Jesus is the Christ. 

This gets to the discouraging fact of human nature as we are confronted by God’s demands. 

We are sinners, and we do not like to be reminded of this fact. 

As sinners, our default situation is that we get things wrong and make mistakes. We don’t like that. 

And then, because of our condition, we try to cover up or sin. We blame others. We make excuses. 

You can see this behavior even in the garden of Eden. 

Because of all of this we are not interested in Jesus, the Messiah, our Savior. 

Because to need a Savior is to admit that we are in need of saving. 

But we like to be in control. We do not want to submit to the authority of one who would save us. 

And so we, in our blindness, reject our Savior Jesus, who in love has come to save us. 

It is the height of foolishness, and it is our natural human nature. 

But today, you can turn away from your pride and trust Jesus your Savior. 

You can respond to the working of the Spirit of God who is revealing these things through the Bible. 

You can trust Him and believe and be saved from sin, death, and hell. 

Today can be your day of salvation! 

Maybe you just need to confess sin, repent, and reaffirm your faith in Jesus Christ today. 

Please talk with me after the service. I would love to pray with you.