Nancy Ferree-Clark - "Seeing Is Believing" (March 14, 1999)
MP3
Loading the media player...
Transcript
- Download transcript as:
-
Text
-
PDF
-
WebVTT (includes timecodes)
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
| Narrator | Our gospel reading for today comes | 0:09 |
| from the first half of John which is often called | 0:11 | |
| The Book of Signs. | 0:15 | |
| We use that term because this particular portion | 0:17 | |
| of John's gospel contains several stories | 0:20 | |
| which are miracles in and of themselves, | 0:22 | |
| but which also serves as signs pointing | 0:25 | |
| beyond themselves to a larger truth. | 0:28 | |
| That's one of the functions of a sign after all. | 0:31 | |
| Consider the significance of a hand shake, | 0:35 | |
| a kiss, a flag, a cross. | 0:38 | |
| Each is laden with meaning greater than the gesture | 0:42 | |
| or object itself. | 0:45 | |
| Our gospel story serves a similar function | 0:48 | |
| by weaving together a series of dramatic events. | 0:50 | |
| Even though Jesus isn't present for most of these events, | 0:53 | |
| the story is in every way about Jesus | 0:57 | |
| and his true identity. | 1:00 | |
| We encounter him and his disciples in Jerusalem | 1:02 | |
| where he has just made a quick exit from the temple | 1:05 | |
| after a heated debate there with the religious authorities. | 1:09 | |
| They had declared themselves the winner of that debate | 1:13 | |
| by picking up stones which they would just have soon | 1:15 | |
| have thrown at Jesus as not. | 1:18 | |
| Listen carefully now as I read this gospel story. | 1:22 | |
| Listen to the major players because there are | 1:26 | |
| several of them, and think about where | 1:28 | |
| you might have come down in the debate. | 1:30 | |
| As Jesus walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. | 1:37 | |
| His disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned? | 1:41 | |
| "This man or his parents that he was born blind?" | 1:46 | |
| Jesus answered, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned. | 1:50 | |
| "He was born blind so that God's | 1:54 | |
| "works might be revealed in him." | 1:56 | |
| We must work the works of him who sent me | 1:59 | |
| while it is day. | 2:01 | |
| Night is coming when no one can work. | 2:03 | |
| As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. | 2:07 | |
| When Jesus had said this, he spat on the ground | 2:12 | |
| and made mud with the saliva, and spread the mud | 2:15 | |
| on the man's eyes saying to him, | 2:18 | |
| "Go, wash in the pull of Siloam, which means sent." | 2:20 | |
| Then he went and washed and came back able to see. | 2:25 | |
| The neighbors and those who had seen him before | 2:30 | |
| as a beggar began to ask, "Is this not the man | 2:33 | |
| "who used to sit and beg?" | 2:37 | |
| Some were saying it is he. | 2:39 | |
| Others were saying no but it is someone like him. | 2:42 | |
| He kept saying, "I am the man!" | 2:46 | |
| But they kept asking him, "Then how are your eyes opened?" | 2:49 | |
| He answered the man called Jesus made mud, | 2:54 | |
| spread it on my eyes, and said to me, | 2:57 | |
| "Go to Siloam and wash." | 2:59 | |
| Then I went and washed and received my sight. | 3:01 | |
| They said to him, "Where is he?" | 3:05 | |
| He said I do not know. | 3:07 | |
| They brought to the Pharisees the man | 3:11 | |
| who had formerly been blind. | 3:13 | |
| Now it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud | 3:16 | |
| and opened his eyes. | 3:18 | |
| Then the Pharisees also began to ask him | 3:21 | |
| how he had received his sight. | 3:23 | |
| He said to them he put mud on my eyes. | 3:26 | |
| Then I washed and now I see. | 3:29 | |
| Some of the Pharisees said this man is not from God | 3:33 | |
| for he does not observe the Sabbath. | 3:36 | |
| But others said how can a man who is a sinner | 3:39 | |
| perform such signs. | 3:43 | |
| And they were divided. | 3:46 | |
| So they again to the blind man, | 3:48 | |
| "What do you say about him? | 3:50 | |
| "It was your eyes he opened." | 3:51 | |
| He said, "He is a prophet." | 3:54 | |
| The Jews did not believe that he had been blind | 3:57 | |
| and had received his sight until they called | 4:01 | |
| the parents of the man who had received his sight | 4:03 | |
| and asked them, "Is this your son who | 4:06 | |
| "you say was born blind? | 4:09 | |
| "How then does he now see?" | 4:12 | |
| His parents answered, "We know that this is our son | 4:14 | |
| "and that he was born blind, but we do not know | 4:19 | |
| "how it is that now he sees, nor do we know | 4:22 | |
| "who opened his eyes." | 4:25 | |
| Ask him, he is of age. | 4:27 | |
| He will speak for himself. | 4:29 | |
| His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews. | 4:31 | |
| For the Jews had already agreed that anyone | 4:34 | |
| who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put | 4:37 | |
| out of the synagogue. | 4:41 | |
| Therefore his parents said he is of age, ask him. | 4:42 | |
| So for the second time, they called the man | 4:47 | |
| who had been blind, and they said to him, | 4:49 | |
| "Give glory to God. | 4:51 | |
| "We know that this man is a sinner." | 4:52 | |
| He answered, "I do not know whether he is a sinner. | 4:54 | |
| "One thing I do know that though I was blind, | 4:58 | |
| "now I see." | 5:02 | |
| They said to him, "What did he do to you?" | 5:04 | |
| How did he open your eyes? | 5:07 | |
| He listened. | 5:10 | |
| He answered them, "I have told you already | 5:11 | |
| "and you would not listen." | 5:13 | |
| Why do you want to hear it again? | 5:15 | |
| Do you also want to become his disciples? | 5:16 | |
| Then they reviled him saying, "You are his disciple, | 5:19 | |
| "but we are disciples of Moses." | 5:23 | |
| We know that God has spoken to Moses, | 5:25 | |
| but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from. | 5:27 | |
| The man answered, "Here is an astonishing thing. | 5:32 | |
| "You do not know where he comes from?" | 5:36 | |
| And yet he opened my eyes. | 5:38 | |
| We know that God does not listen to sinners, | 5:41 | |
| but he does listen to one who worships him | 5:44 | |
| and obeys his will. | 5:46 | |
| Never since the world began has it been heard | 5:47 | |
| that anyone who opened the eyes of a person could be made | 5:50 | |
| well after being blind. | 5:55 | |
| If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. | 5:58 | |
| They answered him, "You were born entirely in sin. | 6:02 | |
| "And you are trying to teach us?" | 6:06 | |
| And they drove him out. | 6:09 | |
| Jesus heard that they had driven him out. | 6:12 | |
| And when he found him, he said, "Do you believe | 6:14 | |
| "in the son of man?" | 6:17 | |
| He answered, "And who is he sir?" | 6:20 | |
| Tell me so that I may believe in him. | 6:23 | |
| Jesus said to him you have seen him. | 6:27 | |
| And the one speaking with you is he. | 6:29 | |
| He said, "Lord, I believe." | 6:32 | |
| And he worshiped him. | 6:36 | |
| Jesus said I came into this world for judgment | 6:39 | |
| so that those who do not see may see | 6:42 | |
| and those who do see may become blind. | 6:45 | |
| Some of the Pharisees near him heard this | 6:50 | |
| and said to him surely we are not blind. | 6:52 | |
| Are we? | 6:56 | |
| Jesus said to them, "If you were blind, | 6:58 | |
| "you would not have sin. | 7:00 | |
| "But now that you say we see, your sin remains." | 7:02 | |
| This is the word of the Lord. | 7:08 | |
| Thanks be to God. | 7:11 | |
| As we hear the drama of this wonderful story unfold, | 7:15 | |
| our hearts go out to the man born blind. | 7:18 | |
| First of all because of the trials | 7:22 | |
| he must have endured as a handicapped person | 7:23 | |
| destined to sit by the road and beg, | 7:26 | |
| and then because of the indignities he had to suffer | 7:30 | |
| just because Jesus healed him without | 7:32 | |
| his even asking for it. | 7:35 | |
| With no forewarning, Jesus forms a cake of mud | 7:37 | |
| from dirt and his own spittle, and spreads it | 7:40 | |
| on the man's eyes. | 7:42 | |
| Go and wash in the pool of Siloam, Jesus tells him, | 7:45 | |
| which he does. | 7:48 | |
| And when he comes back, he can see. | 7:49 | |
| It only takes two verses in this long chapter | 7:52 | |
| to perform such a miracle as this. | 7:55 | |
| While it takes 39 verses to unpack | 7:58 | |
| the controversy surrounding it. | 8:00 | |
| As one member of my bible study said | 8:03 | |
| after reading this lesson on Friday, | 8:05 | |
| "Jesus sure liked to stir things up, didn't he?" | 8:07 | |
| Whether or not he liked doing it, | 8:11 | |
| it often seemed to work out that way. | 8:13 | |
| No sooner has Jesus left the scene of the miracle | 8:16 | |
| that the man's neighborhood is buzzing. | 8:19 | |
| After squabbling over whether this really was the man | 8:21 | |
| they were used to seeing begging on the corner, | 8:24 | |
| they decided to grill him on the details. | 8:28 | |
| How did it happen? | 8:30 | |
| Where is the man who did it now? | 8:31 | |
| About all the healed man can say is that | 8:34 | |
| the man called Jesus did spread mud on his eyes | 8:37 | |
| and told him to wash. | 8:40 | |
| Beyond that, he is clueless. | 8:42 | |
| At least for the moment. | 8:44 | |
| Notice the glaring absence of any sense | 8:46 | |
| of celebration among his acquaintances. | 8:48 | |
| No thanks giving that for the first time | 8:51 | |
| in his life he could actually see. | 8:53 | |
| No jubilation that he could find another livelihood now | 8:56 | |
| besides begging. | 8:59 | |
| Instead these neighbors, whom I would not go | 9:01 | |
| as far as calling friends, were consumed by the question, | 9:04 | |
| "Who is this man called Jesus?" | 9:08 | |
| And so aware that laws had been broken, | 9:11 | |
| the miracle was performed on the Sabbath after all, | 9:14 | |
| these same neighbors take the man to the Pharisees | 9:18 | |
| where they too could begin their investigation. | 9:21 | |
| After the man explains all that he knows, | 9:24 | |
| some of the Pharisees are indignant. | 9:26 | |
| This man speaking of Jesus is not from God. | 9:28 | |
| He doesn't even observe the Sabbath. | 9:32 | |
| But others see it a little differently | 9:35 | |
| and they raise the issue how can a man | 9:36 | |
| who is a sinner perform a miracle like this. | 9:39 | |
| The Pharisees are divided so they turn again | 9:43 | |
| to the man who has been healed. | 9:45 | |
| Becoming a little bolder now, he dares to call Jesus | 9:47 | |
| a prophet. | 9:50 | |
| Still unconvinced that the man had ever been blind, | 9:52 | |
| the Pharisees next interrogate the poor parents. | 9:56 | |
| They are reluctant to acknowledge anything more | 10:00 | |
| than the fact that he was indeed their son | 10:02 | |
| who had been born blind. | 10:05 | |
| They were afraid, afraid, because the authorities | 10:07 | |
| had already announced that anyone confessing Jesus | 10:11 | |
| to be the Christ would be cast out of the synagogue. | 10:13 | |
| Their response may seem hard hearted to us | 10:17 | |
| when they answer, "He is of age, ask him." | 10:20 | |
| But doesn't fear often cause us to say things | 10:24 | |
| we later wonder why we said it? | 10:27 | |
| And so in the next scene, we're back to the healed man | 10:30 | |
| and the religious authorities as the pressure builds | 10:33 | |
| and the tempers flare. | 10:35 | |
| We know anyone who breaks the Sabbath must be a sinner is | 10:37 | |
| the Pharisees clear position, which after all was based | 10:42 | |
| on centuries of teaching. | 10:45 | |
| In contrast, the man offers his testimony, | 10:48 | |
| "I do not know whether he is a sinner. | 10:50 | |
| "One thing I do know that though I was blind, now I see." | 10:53 | |
| You can understand how the authorities are in a real bind. | 10:56 | |
| Either they must accept that the man was healed | 11:02 | |
| and that the healer is God's agent, | 11:04 | |
| or they must hold the line and reject both the healer | 11:07 | |
| and the one who was healed. | 11:09 | |
| The formerly blind man challenges | 11:13 | |
| the Pharisees by insisting that if Jesus were not from God, | 11:14 | |
| he could have never performed such a miracle, period. | 11:17 | |
| But the Pharisees lash out at him in response, | 11:21 | |
| "You were born entirely in sin | 11:24 | |
| "and are trying to teach us?" | 11:26 | |
| Referring to the assumption in those days | 11:29 | |
| that anyone suffering from a physical affliction was | 11:31 | |
| a sinner whereas anyone who obeyed the law was not. | 11:34 | |
| Finally the Pharisees are pushed beyond their limits | 11:39 | |
| and they drive the man out of the synagogue. | 11:42 | |
| In the final scene, Jesus hears of the man's plight | 11:46 | |
| and seeks him out in order to fully reveal himself to him | 11:49 | |
| as Jesus likes to do. | 11:53 | |
| Do you believe in the son of man? | 11:56 | |
| I can imagine this man turning to Jesus | 11:59 | |
| with tears pouring down from his freshly healed eyes, | 12:01 | |
| now able to see the world with all its beauty | 12:05 | |
| and its turmoil, cut off from Torah, | 12:09 | |
| his own family, his own community. | 12:12 | |
| He finally affirms, "Lord, I believe." | 12:15 | |
| Though his eyes were healed instantaneously, | 12:19 | |
| the light of Christ has only gradually dawned upon him. | 12:22 | |
| Throughout the course of his harsh interrogations, | 12:26 | |
| the man grows more and more courageous in naming Christ, | 12:28 | |
| even in front of his opponents. | 12:32 | |
| First, as the man called Jesus, | 12:34 | |
| then a prophet, then a man of God, | 12:37 | |
| and finally Lord whom he falls down and worships. | 12:39 | |
| His healing is not an end in itself. | 12:43 | |
| Just like a conversion is not an end in itself, | 12:47 | |
| but only the beginning of a journey. | 12:49 | |
| Before the man can say Lord I believe, | 12:53 | |
| he experiences hardship and loss, | 12:55 | |
| opposition from people in power, | 12:59 | |
| and times of not having all the answers. | 13:01 | |
| He struggles but he never denies the reality, | 13:04 | |
| the one thing he knows for sure, | 13:07 | |
| that Jesus has healed him. | 13:09 | |
| And that one thing is enough to introduce him | 13:12 | |
| to a whole new world of faith. | 13:15 | |
| Now for those of us who are so sure | 13:18 | |
| we know what a person has to say and do and look like | 13:20 | |
| in order to be saved, this story lends | 13:23 | |
| an important perspective. | 13:26 | |
| As Jesus said, "I came into the world for judgment | 13:28 | |
| "so that those who do not see may see, | 13:31 | |
| "and those who do see may become blind." | 13:34 | |
| in other words, Jesus has a preference | 13:37 | |
| for those who are blind and know it. | 13:40 | |
| Even when they are theologically unsophisticated, | 13:42 | |
| socially unacceptable, or disrespectful of authority, | 13:45 | |
| like the man in the story. | 13:49 | |
| His preference is for those over those | 13:52 | |
| who are so sure their sight is 20-20 vision | 13:53 | |
| that they miss their chance to be healed. | 13:56 | |
| In Barbara King Sauver's most recent novel named | 14:00 | |
| The Poisonwood Bible, we meet a baptist | 14:03 | |
| missionary from Georgia named Nathan Price. | 14:05 | |
| Reverend Price has been called with his wife | 14:09 | |
| and four daughters to live and preach | 14:12 | |
| in the Belgian Congo in 1959. | 14:14 | |
| The story is a spell-binding depiction | 14:18 | |
| of life in central Africa 40 years ago, | 14:20 | |
| with all its beauty, its suffering, | 14:23 | |
| and its political turmoil. | 14:25 | |
| Reverend Price proves to be the most despicable | 14:28 | |
| character in the whole story, I'm sorry to have to say. | 14:30 | |
| He's an absolute tyrant toward the villagers | 14:34 | |
| of his mission and his family. | 14:36 | |
| From the moment he touches ground | 14:40 | |
| and is invited to a welcoming meal | 14:41 | |
| by the people whom he will be ministering to, | 14:43 | |
| he launches into an assault on his host. | 14:46 | |
| Starting with a fanatical sermon on nakedness, | 14:49 | |
| a fact of reality in that part of the world, | 14:51 | |
| he preaches sermon after sermon about the necessity | 14:55 | |
| of baptizing all the children in the Congo River, | 14:57 | |
| even though in a recent tragedy, | 15:00 | |
| a child from the village had been eaten by a crocodile | 15:02 | |
| in that same river. | 15:06 | |
| They were so terrified of his intentions | 15:07 | |
| that people stopped coming to his services | 15:09 | |
| and so he resorts to railing of the villagers publicly | 15:11 | |
| whenever he gets the chance. | 15:15 | |
| And finally performs mass baptisms unannounced | 15:17 | |
| on the children of the village | 15:20 | |
| in the midst of a long-awaited rainstorm. | 15:22 | |
| Reverend Price was convinced that God had called him | 15:25 | |
| to save the natives on his own terms, | 15:28 | |
| no matter what it took. | 15:30 | |
| But by the end, rather than saving anyone, | 15:32 | |
| he has destroyed the mission, his family, and himself. | 15:35 | |
| Using the bible as his chief weapon. | 15:40 | |
| You can imagine where the book gets its title. | 15:43 | |
| In the Johannine community for which | 15:48 | |
| John's gospel was written, their main source | 15:50 | |
| of tension was between Jews who called | 15:52 | |
| themselves disciples of Jesus and other Jews | 15:54 | |
| who remained disciples of Moses. | 15:57 | |
| Professor Richard Litscher of our Divinity School | 16:01 | |
| and other scholars say this lesson may reflect | 16:03 | |
| the historic parting of the ways | 16:06 | |
| between those who remained faithful to the synagogue | 16:08 | |
| and those who were cast out for following Jesus. | 16:11 | |
| As we apply this lesson to our own context today however, | 16:15 | |
| I don't think of Jews disagreeing so much | 16:19 | |
| about Jesus as Christians disagreeing about Jesus. | 16:21 | |
| We hear almost on a daily basis | 16:25 | |
| of grievous differences among Christians | 16:28 | |
| that in the worst cases cause violence to erupt among us, | 16:31 | |
| and at the very least, threaten the unity | 16:35 | |
| of the whole church. | 16:37 | |
| With those on each side usually being certain | 16:39 | |
| they hold the key to the truth. | 16:41 | |
| While King Sauver's Reverend Price may seem to us | 16:44 | |
| like something of a caricature, | 16:47 | |
| his attitude of we'll do it no way but mine, is more | 16:49 | |
| prevalent within the church than we like to think. | 16:53 | |
| We all have our biases, our own spiritual blindnesses. | 16:55 | |
| And in many cases, we like it that way. | 17:00 | |
| Thank you very much. | 17:03 | |
| When I first began to talk about going to seminary | 17:05 | |
| back in the mid '70s, one of the least | 17:08 | |
| enthusiastic people about that decision was my mother. | 17:10 | |
| At the time I thought she was being unsupportive, | 17:14 | |
| but her position really was that | 17:17 | |
| she had lived a lot longer than I had | 17:20 | |
| and she knew people were slow to change. | 17:23 | |
| She had lived in the rural south | 17:26 | |
| during the days of Jim Crow. | 17:28 | |
| She had seen how violently people had opposed integration. | 17:30 | |
| And she believed women in the pulpit | 17:34 | |
| just might face some similar resistance to change. | 17:36 | |
| And that wasn't something she wanted | 17:40 | |
| her daughter to go out looking for. | 17:41 | |
| As it turned out, her instincts were right, | 17:44 | |
| but not her conclusions. | 17:46 | |
| As an example of change in the Protestant church, | 17:49 | |
| the incorporation of women into the ordained ministry will | 17:52 | |
| stand as one of the landmarks of the 20th century. | 17:55 | |
| Yes, there have been proponents and opponents. | 17:59 | |
| There have been harsh words and stubborn attitudes | 18:02 | |
| along the way. | 18:05 | |
| But as a parishioner at my first church said, | 18:06 | |
| "Clergy women are going to show the church | 18:08 | |
| "that we can change." | 18:11 | |
| And with Jesus' help, he was right. | 18:13 | |
| As these women walked into situations | 18:16 | |
| where at first there were strong objections | 18:18 | |
| and then it eventually became strong support, | 18:21 | |
| it became clear that the love of Christ | 18:23 | |
| when given a chance, can overcome the staunchest opponents. | 18:25 | |
| The practice of clergywomen now has become | 18:31 | |
| so commonplace that many of you | 18:33 | |
| probably don't think twice about it. | 18:34 | |
| But it was a different story 20 years ago | 18:36 | |
| when women first began streaming out of seminaries, | 18:39 | |
| degrees in hand with no place to go. | 18:42 | |
| And it was remarkably different story 40 years ago | 18:45 | |
| when several of the main line protestant churches | 18:48 | |
| first allowed women to seek ordination. | 18:50 | |
| I wonder what people will be saying 40 years from now | 18:55 | |
| about the church's ability to maneuver our way | 18:58 | |
| through other mine fields such as doctrinal disagreements, | 19:01 | |
| race relations, homosexuality, abortion, | 19:05 | |
| the growing disparity between the haves and the have nots, | 19:10 | |
| or any other issue that threatens to divide us | 19:14 | |
| right down the middle. | 19:16 | |
| Will they look back and say Jesus performed a miracle? | 19:18 | |
| Those Christians received a vision. | 19:21 | |
| They learned to bear witness with one another | 19:23 | |
| rather than against each other. | 19:26 | |
| To the life giving character of God's in breaking rein | 19:28 | |
| for all the world to see. | 19:31 | |
| Or will they shake their heads and say what a waste. | 19:34 | |
| Those Christians were too blinded by their own | 19:37 | |
| righteousness to do what was right | 19:40 | |
| and the world simply passed them by? | 19:42 | |
| At the time of baptism, the officiant often places | 19:47 | |
| a lighted candle in the hand of the one being baptized | 19:51 | |
| or of a parent in the case of infant baptism, | 19:55 | |
| and says these words, "Let your light so shine | 19:58 | |
| "for all the world to see that you may give glory to God." | 20:02 | |
| In our baptism we are initiated into a community | 20:07 | |
| that shares in the light of Christ, | 20:10 | |
| or as we read in a letter to the Ephesians, | 20:12 | |
| "We are light." | 20:15 | |
| Even as we confess to our blindness, | 20:17 | |
| we receive a new vision and a new life. | 20:20 | |
| And together we seek to live as children of light. | 20:22 | |
| Knowing that even death on a cross could not extinguish | 20:27 | |
| the light of Christ, we have hope that his light | 20:30 | |
| shining through all of us will also endure eternally | 20:33 | |
| that our lives may be signs of his rein on Earth | 20:36 | |
| and that of the Judgment Day, we will have no need to say, | 20:40 | |
| "Surely we are not blind, are we?" | 20:44 | |
| Open your eyes, cherish your God-given sight, | 20:49 | |
| and tell the world the Good News of Jesus Christ, | 20:54 | |
| the one who heals us and sets us free. | 20:57 | |
| Amen. | 21:01 |