John 9, Verse 30

…Why, this is an amazing thing! You do not know where He comes from, yet He opened my eyes.

It is incredible to think that the most religious leaders and ‘experts’ in the law of God could not recognize the Savior of the world. The law and the prophets testified frequently of the coming Messiah, and the Scribes, lawyers and Pharisees diligently searched the scriptures to understand, where and how such a glorious occasion would take place. In all their persistent, scholarly labours they ‘missed the wood for the trees’; they utterly failed to embrace Immanuel veiled in flesh! “You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about Me, yet you refuse to come to Me that you may have life.” (John 5:39)

What is more astounding is how Jesus sought the blind man; normally the scriptures reveal how others without sight cried for the Healer’s touch. The so called theologians in Jesus’ day looked diligently for Him, but never ‘saw’ Him; the man born blind was found by the Creator and born anew to see and embrace the Light of life – the grace and mercy of God Who gives the second birth! We were all sought in the same way; we were too long dead in our sins to even begin looking for Him. One incredible advantage – that makes all the difference – is even though the blind man was not even considered ‘worthy’ to be compared with the theological experts of the day, he was enabled to see the One Who would grant him access to the very Holy of holies and worship in spirit and in truth.

We may not see nowadays Pharisees in their long robes of importance, but we are aware of the many who love titles, letters after their name, positions of prestige and recognition within the church, but I often wonder how many of those have even touched the ‘hem’ of His garment; how many of them can say they are personally known by the Son of God in an intimate way? How many of them can say God has written His name on their foreheads? It is one thing to know about Him, quite another to hear Him whisper to our hearts, “Son…daughter…” that speaks of the faith born only of the Spirit of God.

This man, now able to see for the first time in his life, was touched in a way that also gave him a heart to receive the Messiah, although he had not yet cast his eye upon Him. Salvation is where God’s eye first turns upon us; we are never the same afterwards. Perceiving Jesus to be a prophet, he would not deny that this Man was sent by God and did the works of God. His parents were too afraid to testify to the witnessed miracle; their tradition of the temple was more important than the God they professed to worship, but their son could never deny what and how it took place; it was a reality and experience that meant more to him than the continued security in the synagogue – the very life source of Jewish culture. He was given sight and now became an outcast from the people of prestige. Was it all worth it to see a world he only heard and to lose all he once knew? A man who can now find his way around, alone, abandoned – apart from a few curious spectators lagging behind – wondering who is this prophet that changed his life.

Isn’t this the cost that some of us face because we now see? Is not this a part of considering the cost – being misunderstood, treated with contempt, disowned by friends and family because we are an embarrassment to them, or even still, by those who make a profession of faith but proves false and void of power, who accuse us of insanity, viciously opposing us because we speak of Whom we have seen, not just what is read by the letter of scripture but what has been written on our hearts by the Spirit?

Towards the closing of John 9, we read that Jesus heard of the man being cast out, but He also searched for him, and on finding him confirmed and settled the heart of newborn faith; faith that not only believes but worships the God unseen with the naked eye. Unlike the Pharisees and great learned theologians of the day, his eyes were anointed; he was clothed in Christ’s merits and dignity and made spiritually rich unto God.

The gift and rewards of God, through grace, far outweigh any cost and the very breath we breathe. We may lose so much that we once held dear, but in light of the promise fulfilled in being loved by both the Father and the Son in a way that is more real and profound than the highest form of human love, and beyond understanding, makes us say with the apostle Paul: I count all as rubbish in comparison to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ.