March 24 | John 9:35-41

Pam Mann
4 days ago
3 min read

DAILY READING

REFLECTION

I See Something that You Don't See

By Pam Mann

“I see something that you don’t see and the color of it is...” This is the line in the kids’ game that you may have played often. One kid says this line and the other kids look about for whatever obscure item the first kid has picked. In the game, everyone needs to be seeing. The blind cannot play.

The Pharisees, who are present for the Sabbath hubbub over the newly granted sight to a

man born blind, likely feel that Jesus is playing at a different game, something that they don’t quite get. In fact, Jesus seems intent on keeping them off their game. You gotta love their query: “What? Are we blind too?”

We, reading the text, are shouting to these clueless fellows: “You're blind as bats!” But Jesus says to them that if they were blind, it would be better for them, because they would not be guilty. But the problem is that they are convinced that they have everything figured out. They see all; they know all. If they insist on the know-it-all approach to life with God, then they’ve got the full weight of their guilt upon themselves.

Perhaps we might receive this Pharisee conversation in the John 9 saga as a cautionary tale. How often have we thought that we’ve got God figured out? How often do we pray as if we know what needs to happen? Because we’re praying (as were the Pharisees), we may think that God will work thus and so in our lives. And then, things go sideways. Events occur to remind us how broken our world is, how sinful we are, and how little we have things figured out. At this point, we can do one of two things. We can either double down into the self-assured (aka blind-as-bats) approach, or we can take the refreshingly honest approach of newly sighted guy, asking honest questions of Jesus while throwing ourselves at His feet.

Could it be that God wants us to be neither blind nor all-seeing? Obviously, Jesus wants the blind man to be healed and to see. He heals him, after all. And the Pharisees? These are the guys who stand facing the incarnate Son of God and insist that they need to set him straight on a few things. That’s a serious vision problem here. Unfortunately, the Pharisees are not alone in their limited understanding of how God is on the move at any given moment. We are all in that same boat, seeing through a glass dimly, as Paul described it in 1 Cor. 13:12.

Let us joyfully admit how limited our sight is and rejoice that we are held in the hands of the One who sees all, knows all, and guides all.

PRAYER

Lord, we worship You. We bow before You, as the newly sighted, once blind man did. You, Lord, see something that we don’t see. Give us faith to trust You for the unclear, uncertain aspects of our lives. We want to trust You as our Savior at every blind corner.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PAM MANN

I first joined UALC when my husband (then my fiancé) and I were college students involved in youth ministry. God has used UALC to nurture our family’s faith, even in our years outside the U.S. I’ve participated in UALC ministries with kids, art, prayer, exercise, ESL, and Bible teaching. I do all the fun church things.