Semon: “Who Does Jesus See?”
A Sermon Delivered by The Rev. John D. Painter at Centenary United Methodist Church, Metuchen, New Jersey March 6, 2005 (The Fourth Sunday in Lent)
Texts: 1 Samuel 16:1-13; John 9:1-41
Nasrudin used to stand in the street on market days, to be pointed out as an idiot. No matter how often people offered him a large and a small coin, he always chose the smaller piece.
One day a kindly man said to him, “Mulla, you should take the bigger coin. Then you will have more money and people will no longer be able to make a laughingstock of you.”
“That might be true,” said Nasrudin, “but if I always take the larger, people will stop of-fering me money to prove that I am more idiotic than they are. Then I would have no money at all.”
I share this ancient Sufi tale with you this morning because I wonder if many of the peo-ple in his community had similar feelings about the man born blind. He was well known to them all, and many of them assumed that his affliction was the result of some grievous misdeed by someone. And many of the townspeople were unable (or unwilling) to recognize him after he was healed. This wonderful healing story from John’s Gospel offers us an opportunity to con-sider our proclivity to dismiss the poor or the disabled as problems rather than people, and it opens the door to exploring our tendency to ascribe hard and fast roles to people in general. Is it not the case that people often live up to our expectations, good or bad, because we won’t allow them the room or the opportunity to do anything else?
Consider the story of David’s anointing from 1 Samuel, where both the prophet’s and our own expectations are confounded. As Samuel examines each of Jesse’s sons, he is taken with their stature and thinks to himself, “Surely the LORD’S anointed is before me?” But this is not so. We know that David is waiting in the wings, but by the time he shows up we are expecting a scrawny little shepherd boy. David turns out to be ruddy and handsome, not puny and weak, proving that God is as apt as any to surprise us. The Lord is constantly defying our expectations, playing against type, choosing the youngest son over the firstborn, or using the weak things of this world to shame the strong. And then, just when we think we have God figured out, God re-veals the faith of a Pharisee like Nicodemus, or a rich man like Joseph of Arimathaea, or the kindness of a Samaritan.
Consider taking a closer look at the Pharisees, people we have typecast as enemies of Je-sus despite the fact that there are Pharisees within this very story who think well of him. But we wonder why many of them were so blind to the power of Jesus and so petty in their assessment of his miracle? They seem to want to turn this miraculous moment into an occasion for theo-logical debate.
Several weeks ago, as I was giving thought to this morning’s message, I came across a portion of a sermon by the Rev. Laurence DeWolfe that captured the heart of the power within this Gospel lesson, and I wanted to share it with you:
“Because of his blindness, you will see…
“What do the disciples see when they look at that man? They see the blindness. They see a question to be answered, a problem to be solved. Do they see a person? They see a sinner, a son of sinners. Do they see a person, in need? A living, breathing person, struggling to live with-out sight, struggling under the weight of other people’s judgment.
“When we look at a physically challenged person, what do we see? What do we see first? The white cane? The wheelchair? The bed? The hands that speak in signs? The scars?
“Do we look away, go inside ourselves, and say, ‘There but for the grace of God…’
“Sometimes we see a problem to be solved. We reach out to help, without asking if help is needed or wanted. We speak without listening. We speak a little louder, a little slower. Some-one who is less able physically than we are is obviously less able mentally, too.
“As I see the story unfold, I picture the disciples asking their question right in front of the man, assuming that, if he can hear them, he won’t understand. If he understands, he won’t be hurt. How can a blind man have feelings? Maybe he can learn something through their conversa-tion with Jesus, something that will do him good.
“Just the other day I was sitting in a fast food restaurant in Sarnia. I heard, then felt, then saw a commotion as a very sophisticated motorized wheelchair moved at a good clip down the aisle past my booth. Whoever was in that chair was a deft hand at maneuvering it.
“Then I saw who was in the chair. A young man—I guessed he was young, then cor-rected myself for assuming that he must be a boy and not an adult. He had no legs. For a mo-ment, it looked like he had no arms either. Then I saw him pick up a drinking straw, with what we able-bodied people so kindly call ‘flippers.’ ‘How can he eat?’ I wondered. I saw a problem.
“Of course, I didn’t want him to see me watching him. And I wanted to resist the tempta-tion to look. So I concentrated on reading the newspaper. Yet I couldn’t help looking for the wheelchair. What I saw, instead, was a family enjoying a meal together. One member of the family just happened to be sitting on one of the coolest contraptions I had ever seen.
“They were happy together. In my able-bodied arrogance, I had assumed that they would all be depressed and pitying. Look what they have to put up with!
“I think God helped me to see what I saw when I took a second look.
“Back to the story. What does Jesus see? Silly question. Who does Jesus see? Jesus sees someone for whom God will work a miracle. Someone through whom God will be glorified. Someone by whom the disciples will be released from their blindness.”
I believe today’s lessons and this nugget from Laurence DeWolfe challenges us, as much as Jesus’ healing of the man-born-blind, to re-consider all those people—be they enemies, the very old or the very young, able of body or physically challenged, those we label as too liberal or too conservative—people to whom we may have become blind and deaf. How can we look at those we think we know and find the grace to look beneath the surface, to see what is truly at work in their hearts?
What a gift it is to know that God does not see as we do, but looks upon the heart and plunges into the deep pool of human identity. Each heart, each spirit, is utterly mysterious, unique, and ultimately shared in the truest sense with God alone.
Who does Jesus See? God invites us to look with fresh eyes upon the heart and spirit of all we meet that we, too, may be released from our own blindness.
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PRAYER
Forgive us, gracious God, if we only see what lies on the surface of things. Help us to look deeply, as Christ looked, that we might see your ways and your will. Amen.
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