“There are none so blind as those who will not see.”

They brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind. Now the day on which Jesus had made the mud and opened the man's eyes was a Sabbath. Therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. "He put mud on my eyes," the man replied, "and I washed, and now I see."

Some of the Pharisees said, "This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath." But others asked, "How can a sinner do such miraculous signs?" So they were divided.

Finally they turned again to the blind man, "What have you to say about him? It was your eyes he opened."

The man replied, "He is a prophet."

To this they replied, "You were steeped in sin at birth; how dare you lecture us!" And they threw him out.

Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, and when he found him, he said, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?"

"Who is he, sir?" the man asked. "Tell me so that I may believe in him."

Jesus said, "You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you."

Then the man said, "Lord, I believe," and he worshipped him.

Jesus said, "For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind." (John 9:13-17, 34-39)

"There are none so blind as those who will not see." This old quote summarizes very neatly the harsh word of Law that Jesus proclaimed when He said, "For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind." And yet it would be a mistake to only see condemning Law in Jesus’ words, because Scripture also teaches us, "For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him" (John 3:17). The task before us, then, is to understand what Jesus meant when He said the words recorded in this section of the Gospel.

John the Gospel writer begins with a man who has been blind from birth. Right away, John intends us to understand this man’s blindness on two levels—physical and spiritual. From his birth, this man had been unable to see; he had been unable to see the world, he had been unable to see himself. Being born blind, this man did not have a concept of what ugliness was, because he had never seen beauty. Growing up blind, this man had learned that it was best to form daily routines and never deviate from them—to walk to the town well by a different route than usual was to risk getting lost or falling over an unexpected obstacle. Having lived his life in blindness, the man had never seen himself in a mirror, never developed the faintest idea as to what he looked like. And the saddest fact of all was that he had no idea what he was missing. Never having seen light, the blind man had no concept as to what light was. Moving in darkness was his normal state of existence.

All this describes the man’s spiritual state as well. This man had also been born spiritually blind. From his birth, this man had not been able to see the world in spiritual terms, nor was he able to see himself in spiritual terms. Being born spiritually blind, this man did not have a concept of what the ugliness of sin looked like, because he could not see it contrasted against the beauty of God’s holiness. Growing up spiritually blind, this man had learned to find comfort in walking and re-walking the familiar ways of his sinful life along with his sin-filled friends, because he was afraid to try to live any other way, to walk an unfamiliar path alone in the dark. Having lived his life in spiritual blindness, the man had never looked into the mirror of God’s Law, never seen himself as God saw him—a miserable lost soul who was completely unacceptable to God, but who God loved greatly nevertheless. The saddest fact of all was that the blind man had no concept as to what God’s forgiving love looked like. Living in sin was his normal state of existence.

Jesus came to this blind man. Jesus came to him, because the blind man could never have found Jesus. Jesus bestowed on this man a miracle—He gave the man sight. But Jesus did not merely give the man eyesight; Jesus also opened his eyes to see spiritual things. In a remarkably short time, the man who had been spiritually blind all his life was at Jesus' feet, worshipping Him as his heaven-sent Savior! Because of Jesus’ power, the man not only could see Jesus, he could also see who Jesus was—the Son of God living among mankind.

The blind man, although a real person, also represents every repentant sinner. All people are born spiritually blind. If left in this state, they wander through life aimlessly, lost in the darkness of their sins. No sinner can ever find Jesus on his own. But Jesus seeks us out and offers us a miracle—the miracle of spiritual sight. With our new eyes of faith, we can see ourselves in Jesus’ light—we can see how repugnant our sins make us. With this realization, we are moved to repent of our evil ways and ask Jesus to show us mercy. Then Jesus takes us by the hand and leads us along a way through life that we have never seen before—the way of Christ, which leads to His Father in heaven.

Saint John contrasts the blindness of the man with the blindness of the religious leaders of the Jews, the Pharisees. The Pharisees were learned men. They had devoted their lives to studying God’s word, and they took pride in living their lives in strict adherence to their interpretation of God’s laws. As far as they were concerned, they were the ‘enlightened ones’ of Israel, those few who could see clearly how they could keep God happy, and themselves thereby blessed by Him. But these men who prided themselves on their ability to see clearly were, in fact, blind. They were blind, because although they knew their Scriptures inside out, they could not see that Jesus was the fulfillment of those Scriptures. Their blindness was starkly revealed when they interviewed the man who had been given eyes of faith by Jesus. When the formerly blind man said, "He is a prophet", their response was: "You were steeped in sin at birth; how dare you lecture us!" And they threw him out. The blind man had been given true sight, but the men who thought they could see refused to go to Jesus for their blindness to be lifted.

Why? Why is it that some people welcome sight, while others prefer blindness? It all depends on the condition of their heart. When Jesus came to the blind man, he was lost in a darkness that was both physical and spiritual. A life of blindness is hard, especially in a time and place where a man’s choices were to work, beg, or starve. The blind man had lived a life of suffering and humility—there was nothing about his life in which he could take pride. When Jesus came to him with an offer to restore his sight, the man was only too glad for the opportunity to see. He was not too proud to accept Jesus’ offer of unearned mercy.

But the majority of the Pharisees were a different matter entirely. They thought that they had it all figured out. They and their ancestors had studied God’s Scriptures carefully, trying to determine how every command of God could be lived out in a person’s daily life. When God ordered man to avoid working on the Sabbath, the Pharisees had calculated how many steps a man could take on Saturday before walking disobeyed God’s command and became work. Over many years, the Pharisees had drawn up hundreds of specific rules for living, as interpretations of God’s words in Scripture. Their purpose in doing this was to make it possible for them to live perfectly according to God’s Laws, by interpreting God’s Laws in such a way that a man could live his life in complete obedience to them. By thus ‘humanizing’ God’s Laws, a Pharisee could earn a place of honor in Jewish society and a seat in heaven by careful living. This appealed to a Pharisee’s ego greatly, because he could prove his worth to God and his fellow Jews.

Then along came Jesus, upsetting everything. Jesus taught the people that the Pharisees had lost the essence of God’s Law through their attempts to turn it into a legal code. Jesus taught that no human being was capable of living his life in a way that was pleasing to God. He accused the Pharisees of writing their rules of conduct for outward show only, saying: `These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me’ (Mark 7:6). Jesus desired a deeper devotion than mere outward show; He told the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well that "a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth" (John 4:23-24). This wasn’t the sort of worship that the Pharisees offered God. The Pharisees offered works that met their human interpretation of being ‘good’, while their hearts were filled with the sin of pride, the sin that tells God "I don’t need Your help—I’m good enough to get into heaven on my own."

The Pharisees did not want to "see" their need for Jesus. To "see" Jesus’ teachings as correct, a Pharisee would have to admit to himself, and to everyone who had looked up to him as an example, that he had not lived a life pleasing to God, as everyone thought he had. To look at life by the light that Jesus offered would mean walking on a new path that the Pharisee hadn’t been able to see before in his spiritual blindness, a path of humble and loving submission to God. For most Pharisees, accepting Jesus’ unmerited gift of spiritual sight meant also accepting humiliation and a radical change in lifestyle. For most Pharisees, the cost of true sight was frighteningly high, too high. Living their lives in spiritual blindness, the darkness now seemed welcoming and comfortable and safe. Jesus threatened that comfort, that safety. And so the Pharisees rejected Jesus, and those who followed in His light.

And so judgment enters the world in Jesus’ wake. Jesus did not come to condemn the world, but to save it. He came to save it by the pouring out of His holy blood on the cross of Calvary, God’s own life given in place of the lives of sinners. Jesus, who never displeased God in any way, gave His life to appease His Father’s anger at our sin. Now that the Father’s judgment of death on human evil has been carried out, Jesus lives once more to represent us before His Father. We can follow Jesus into His Father’s divine presence without fear of punishment, because Jesus has already suffered all our rightful punishment. When we declare ourselves to be unworthy evildoers and trust in Jesus’ mercy, we have the joy of knowing that because of Jesus’ self-sacrifice, the Father welcomes us before Him along with His Son. Because of God’s undeserved gift of mercy to us, which we receive through trust in Jesus, we are judged—"not guilty."

But although Jesus did not come into the world to condemn it, condemnation does come to those who reject His gift of grace. Sinners who love the darkness more than the light, sinners who don’t want to see their sinful ugliness or see a new way to walk through life, such sinners are in grave danger. They are in danger of the grave that opens to hell. There is only one path to heaven, and it can only be followed by those who walk in Jesus’ light, their eyes opened by their Savior. Every other path is a path of darkness that ends at the lip of Satan’s eternal Pit. Such is the path that most of the Pharisees walked. Such is the path that far too many people walk today. Jesus does not want to judge sinners as "guilty"—He has already paid the price for everyone’s’ sins. But God will allow no unholy thing into heaven, and we are only seen by God as holy when our sins are covered by Jesus’ blood. Without faith in Jesus, the verdict is "guilty".

But even for those who reject God like the Pharisees, time has not yet run out. Jesus spoke for the benefit of the Pharisees when He said, "those who see will become blind." On first reading, Jesus appears to be pronouncing final, eternal doom on those who refuse His gift of sight—and so He is. But Jesus says these words as a warning to the Pharisees and to everyone who has so far rejected His light. Jesus issues this warning because it is not too late to repent and receive true sight. Why does Jesus warn the Pharisees with these words of Law? Because He loves these sinners, and wants them to realize, before it’s too late, that they too are spiritually blind. This is the purpose of God’s Law: not to send people to hell, but to make them see their need for the Gospel of Christ. The Law only condemns those who persistently reject Jesus and the forgiveness of God that He brings. Jesus gives us sinners the Law so that we are prepared to receive the love of the Gospel. Jesus gives us God’s Law in our blindness to help us come to desire the sight that only Jesus can bestow, the sight that enables us to see our sins and repent, the sight that allows us to follow Jesus towards heaven.

Each of us was born a Pharisee. Each of us started life with a natural desire to find out how the world worked, so that we could learn how to manipulate the world to get our own way. It is in our sinful nature to want to approach God on our own terms. It is indeed good for us that our God is a patient God. There is no reason that He needs to put up with our arrogance—no reason except His infinite love for us. God wants to bless us, not threaten us. God shines His light on us to show us what we look like—sinful and unclean—because He loves us and wants us to understand that we need to change. God wants us to look upon our sins with disgust, and He wants us to look upon His perfect Son for hope and inspiration. God wants to bring every person to a place in their lives where they realize that their daily walk in darkness is leading nowhere. And just as importantly, God wants to bring every person to the realization that they cannot see the path they need to walk to come to God, unless they allow Jesus to light their way. Jesus removes our spiritual blindness so that we can see our sin and our need for Him. And if we do not stubbornly close our eyes again, we can ask Jesus to make us clean and acceptable to God, knowing that He will.

Jesus came among us to save us. Some have rejected Him and been lost; many have rejoiced in His light and have been saved. Thank You, Lord Jesus, for opening our eyes by means of Your grace to us; let our old, blinded ways never again appear as attractive to us as Your Way of Light.