The Muddied Waters of Theodicy (John 9:1-41) - Pastor Kenneth Collins Maple

And if you would now take your Bibles and open

up to John chapter 9. John chapter 9 and we're

John 9 · chapter mention John 9 · chapter mention

going to look at all of the verses within that

chapter today as we continue in our sermon series

through some of the miracles of Jesus. And so

I ask you now, as you have those Bibles open

to John 9, that you would pay close attention,

because this is God's Word. As he passed by,

he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples

asked him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his

parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered,

it was not that this man sinned or his parents,

but that the works of God might be displayed

in him. We must work the works of him who sent

me while it is day. Night is coming when no one

can work. As long as I am in the world, I am

the light of the world. Having said these things,

he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva.

Then he anointed the man's eyes with the mud

and said to him, go wash in the pool of Siloam,

which means scent. So he went, and he washed,

and he came back seeing. The neighbors and those

who had seen him before as a beggar were saying,

is this not the man who used to sit and beg?

Some said, it is he. Others said, no, but he

is like him. He kept saying, I am the man. So

they said to him, then how were your eyes opened?

And he answered, the man called Jesus made mud

and anointed my eyes and said to me, go to Siloam

and wash. So I went and washed and received my

sight. They said to him, where is he? And he

said, I do not know. They brought to the Pharisees

the man who had formerly been blind. Now it was

a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened

the eyes, his eyes. So the Pharisees again asked

him how he had received his sight. And he said

to them, he put mud on my eyes and I watched

and I see. Some of the Pharisees said, this man

is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.

But others said, how can a man who is a sinner

do such signs? And there was a division among

them. So they said again to the blind man, What

do you say about him? Since he has opened your

eyes, and he said he is a prophet The Jews did

not believe that he had been blind and had received

his sight Until they called the parents of the

man who had received his sight and asked them

is this your son? Who you say was born blind

how then does he now see and his parents answered

we know that this is our son and That he was

born blind but how he now sees we do not know

nor do we know who opened his eyes ask him he

is of age he will speak for himself his parents

said these things because they feared the Jews

for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone

should confess Jesus to be Christ he was to be

put out of the synagogue therefore his parents

said he is of age ask him So for the second time

they called the man who had been blind and said

to him give glory to God We know that this man

is a sinner. He answered whether he is a sinner

I do not know one thing I do know that though

I was blind Now I see they said to him. What

did he do to you? How did he open your eyes and

he answered them? I have told you already and

you would not listen. Why do you want to hear

it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?

And they reviled him saying, You are his disciple,

but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God

has spoken to Moses. But as for this man, we

do not know where he comes from. The man answered,

Why, this is an amazing thing. You do not know

where he comes from. And yet he opened my eyes.

We know that God does not listen to sinners.

But if anyone is a worshiper of God and does

his will, God listens to him. Never since the

world began has it been heard that anyone opened

the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were

not from God he could do nothing. They answered

him, you were born in utter sin and would you

teach us? And they cast him out. Jesus heard

that they had cast him out and having found him

he said, do you believe in the Son of Man? He

answered, and who is he sir? that I may believe

in him. Jesus said to him, you have seen him

and it is he who is speaking to you. He said,

Lord, I believe. And he worshiped him. Jesus

said, for judgment I came into this world that

those who do not see may see and those who see

may become blind. Some of the Pharisees near

him heard these things and said to him, are we

also blind? Jesus said to them, if you are blind,

You would have no guilt, but now that you say

we see your guilt remains This is God's holy

word. Let's pray Father we praise you and we

thank you for this word And I ask that you would

open up our ears Open up our eyes and open up

our hearts to see Jesus this we pray in his name

Amen Some 2 ,000 years or so, give or take a

few years, before this man, before this man was

born blind, there was another man who suffered

terribly and also was accused of bringing affliction

on himself. The man I'm thinking of lost his

family. He lost his servants. He lost his wealth.

He lost his status. And he lost his health. The

man I'm thinking of, you may be thinking of,

is Job. The book of Job is called a theodicy.

And that's a big fancy term. But what it means

is the times when we try to make sense out of

pain and suffering and evil in this world that

is governed by God, we try to make sense of why

do these tragedies happen? Why is there evil

in the world? Another shooting happens, and we

say, why, Lord? Persecution happens to Christians

in Nigeria, and we say, how long, oh Lord? A

child dies, and we say, Lord, we don't get it.

Why do these things have to be this way? In those

ways, we're just like the psalmist in Psalm 13,

Psalms 13:1

verse 1, who says, how long, oh Lord, will you

forget me? How long will you hide your face from

me? No doubt you've asked these questions, too.

You've tried to figure out why do these things

happen. Job's case is especially tragic, just

like this man in John 9. It's tragic because

he undergoes so much suffering, and what do his

friends say about him? They say, you did this

to yourself. Listen to this. From Job chapter

Job 4:8

4 verse 8 one of Job's so -called friends Eliphaz

says this as I have seen Those who plow iniquity

and sow trouble reap the same In other words

you reap what you sow You did this to yourself

this kind of theodicy This kind of understanding

pain and suffering and evil by attributing it

all to a person's sin. This is very troubling.

This is what Job's friends did to him. And Jesus'

disciples, while they might not say it to the

man, these are the things that they say. Look

there in John 9 verse 2. His disciples asked

John 9:2

Jesus, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents,

that he was born blind. The only good thing I

want to say about this is at least the disciples

know where to go with the question. They go to

the rabbi, they go to the teacher, the master,

they go to Jesus. But their question is wrong.

It's incredibly wrong to say that if you suffer,

it must be, the emphasis on must, that it must

be because of your sin. It should also be noted

that the man was born blind. So in saying, did

he do this to himself? That seems rather impossible.

And so what the disciples are doing here is either

talking foolishly, accusing the man's parents,

or perpetuating bad theodicy. This sort of theodicy

is instructed. It is destructive. It amounts

to those who suffer the worst must be those who

sin the worst. And this is actually contrary

to what we might observe in this life. It's contrary

to what Solomon observed in this life. I want

to read this to you from Ecclesiastes chapter

seven, verse 15. This is what Solomon saw when

he looked around at suffering. He said, in my

vain life, I have seen everything. There is a

righteous man who perishes in his righteousness

and there is a wicked man who prolongs his life

in evil Doing and that may be our observation

as well that sometimes those who suffer the most

Are those who are the most faithful to God? We

also need to be careful we get ourselves into

trouble when we start answering questions And

we don't have the answers in Scripture. We don't

have the answers from Christ, right? Because

sometimes we just don't always know why a person

suffers the way that they do or the extent to

which they suffer. You might not know the reason

for your suffering. And this is where people

tend to muddy the waters of theodicy. We come

to hasty conclusions. We speak when we don't

know what we're talking about and we don't know

what God is doing. But here's the good news friends

in John chapter 9 We do know what God is doing

John 9 · chapter mention

Because Jesus tells us we see three things at

least three things from Jesus in this passage

Firstly Jesus is going to give this man his sight

Secondly Jesus is going to teach everybody a

lesson and thirdly Jesus is going to point out

true blindness Ultimately, Jesus will display

the works of God and teach us that spiritual

blindness is worse than physical blindness. Let's

look at this here at the beginning of chapter

9. You can see that once again Jesus's compassion

is on display. Everybody is blaming this poor

blind man. for his own blindness. But Jesus destroys

that bad theology and he gives sight to the blind.

Look in verse 6. After he says these things,

he spits on the ground and he makes mud with

the saliva and he applies it. He anoints the

man's eyes with it. There is no objection from

this man, is there? We might say, ooh, what are

you doing? No objection from this man because

Blindness is all he has ever known. He probably

would have done just about anything to be able

to see. This man has never experienced a sunset.

This man has never even looked on the faces of

his parents. And so Jesus applies this to him,

but the miracle's not done until he washes. And

so he sends him to Siloam. And so your Bible

probably says that Siloam, the name means what?

The word scent. I believe there's a connection

with the name of Siloam in verse four. Go back

to verse four. Jesus says, we must work the works

of him who sent me. We are to be reminded that

Jesus is sent by the Father for the purposes

of doing this very thing and of saving people

from their sins. We are reminded that Jesus comes

to do the Father's will. But also, what he goes

to do is symbolic, this washing. Because we're

ultimately going to see that as he's told to

wash, we should be reminded that there is a greater

miracle that's going on. There's something greater

than being able to see physically. It's being

able to see who Jesus is in our hearts. The cleansing

of our hearts is what we all need. And so the

man is sent. He goes to the pool of Siloam. He

washes. And then he can see. And the people are

amazed. They cannot believe that this is the

same man. The neighbors, the people, they can't

believe it. So what do they do? They take this

man to the Pharisees. And when he gets there,

you see some of the Pharisees are less concerned

with the miracle and more concerned with when

the miracle is done. They are, according to verse

16, divided on this. There's, we might say, Pharisee

group A that says, no way is this man from God.

And Pharisee group B is saying, well, he did

do this incredible thing. They're just not sure

what to make of it. But some of these ones, group

A, they're accusing Jesus. They're saying, you

can't be from God. Why? Because you did this

on the Sabbath. Don't they know the Sabbath?

was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. And

certainly, if it's acceptable according to Jewish

law to save the ox from the ditch, then it is

a good thing to give sight to the blind. It's

not really about the miracle anymore, though,

for the Pharisees. Look in verse 17. In verse

17. They said again to the blind man, what do

you say about him, since he's opened your eyes?

And he said, he is a prophet. Friends, we're

itching for the man to say more than that, aren't

we? We're itching to say, yes, this is the Christ.

But saying that he is a prophet is no small thing.

It's remarkable. There's only so many prophets.

The Pharisees could probably only dream of being

called prophets here. And so it's true that what

Jesus does is he's displaying the works of God

in this man who along the way is starting to

realize, I think, more and more who this Jesus

is. But the Jews don't believe this man. And

so what's the next step? Well, let's go to the

man's parents. They'll know. Maybe they're even

thinking, we'll go to the parents and the parents

will say, no, our son was never blind. And so

they interrogate the parents. Is this your son?

Was he born blind? And how is it possible that

he can see? And they say, yes, this is our son.

Yes, he was blind. How he can see right now?

No clue. We don't know. Why won't they admit

it? Why won't they admit that Jesus has done

this? Well, the text is very clear, though. They

fear excommunication. They fear getting kicked

out of the synagogue, right? And so what do they

say? He is of age. Go ask him there in verse

23. Now, we might be thinking, well, with a synagogue

like that, who wouldn't want to be kicked out,

right? With friends like these who needs enemies.

Additionally, this is their son we're talking

about. How many days, nights had they prayed?

or just long for their son to be able to see.

Remember what their son is doing with his time.

He is a beggar. He's sitting by the city gate

just hoping that somebody would give him some

money. Surely his good parents, they want something

better for their son. But they won't say it because

they're afraid of man, not afraid of God. We

must have a healthy fear of God. a respect, an

admiration. We must be in awe of God. But no,

they are in awe of the Pharisees. And so they

say, just go ask our son. Friends, anybody should

have been able to see this. This sort of thing

of giving sight to a person born blind, that

just doesn't happen. But the Jewish leaders are

too blind to see it. And so they utter this awful

statement. in verse 24. So for the second time

they called the man who had been blind and said

to him, give glory to God. We know that this

man is a sinner. Is there a more blasphemous

false statement than that? Here's a hint, there's

not. Calling Jesus a sinner is about the worst

thing you could possibly do. No doubt they're

remembering this healing that happened on the

Sabbath, right? But Jesus is the Lord of the

Sabbath. They have so much to learn. We have

so much to learn, too, don't we? We really do.

Because when we sin, we forget that Jesus has

come and He has lived perfectly for us to deliver

us from our slavery to sin. I already referenced

Ecclesiastes chapter 7. I'm going to go back

Ecclesiastes 7 · chapter mention

there again because Ecclesiastes 7 20 says something

important about Jesus. This is Solomon's observation.

He says, surely there is not a righteous man

on earth who does good and never sins. Yes, there

is. There is now. There is with Jesus, right?

Jesus is perfectly righteous. And when we believe

in Jesus, we have his righteousness. It is given

to us. It is credited to our account. The reason

that we can have salvation is because Jesus lived

for us perfectly. He kept the law, where Israel

did not. When Israel failed, Jesus was successful.

When we are not obedient, Jesus is. Jesus performs

miracles like this, but apart from Jesus, anything

that we do is nothing better than just a filthy

rag, according to Scripture. But here is where

the lesson comes in. Here is where we see that

Jesus is teaching all along, even when Jesus

isn't present yet in the story. We take some

time off from Jesus here, and yet what he has

been teaching is coming to fruition. Look at

verse 27. I love this verse. This is the man

speaking to the Pharisees. He answered them,

I've told you already. And you would not listen.

Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also

want to become his disciples? Nothing about this

makes it sound like they want to be Jesus's disciples.

They have just called Jesus a sinner. And so

I think there's some humor in there. This man

is being bold in what he has to say, right? And

yet he doesn't know everything about Jesus. They're

saying that he's a sinner and the man's saying,

I don't know if he is. But I can tell you, I

can tell you what Jesus has done for me. And

so what do they do with the man? They don't want

to hear it. And so they excommunicate him. The

very thing that his parents feared is what they

do to this man. And yet here comes Jesus again

with great compassion to continue teaching the

lesson. Look in verse 35, Jesus heard that they

had cast him out. And having found him, he said,

do you believe in the Son of Man? The man born

blind, as I said, so far he's starting to understand

who Jesus is, but he doesn't fully get it. And

so he says, yes, but where is he? Where is the

Son of Man? And Jesus says, in effect, you're

looking at him. You are looking at him. Friends,

as we study the miracles of Jesus, I want us

to do more than look at the responses of people.

I want us to respond. And so when Jesus asked

the question, do you believe in the Son of Man,

I want you to ask that question of yourselves.

Do you believe in Christ Jesus? And the answer

must be yes. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ

and you shall be saved. He is the way and the

truth and the life and the only way to the Father.

You see, ultimately, what's on the line in this

miracle is not just sight to see things, it's

eternal life. The man doesn't fully know it yet,

but he has been the object, a lesson for the

works of God. Verse three, the works are displayed

in this man. And so this man, while he doesn't

know everything about Jesus, when they question

him, he doesn't launch into a sermon. He doesn't...

He doesn't teach a systematic theology class.

What does this man do? He simply tells what Jesus

has done for him. That's what I want you to do.

Every single person in here who says that I believe

in Jesus, you need to have your story at the

ready. You need to have your testimony at the

ready. You need to be able to share what Jesus

has done for you. And then from that, launch

into the gospel. that Jesus saves sinners who

can't save themselves. This is the lesson for

us, that we would all be ready to share our story.

But I also know in a lot of ways we're weighed

down, aren't we? We are weighed down by all kinds

of pain and trouble and suffering. And so I want

to give you two pieces of encouragement here.

One, suffering is a result of sin. just not necessarily

your sin. Suffering is a result of sin, just

not necessarily your sin. All the trouble that

we experience comes from living in a fallen world.

Sickness, pain, death, these are products of

the fall. But while that's true, that doesn't

mean that every problem that we experience is

because of our sin. It could be that God does

punish for sin, and certainly there are consequences

for our actions. If you get behind the wheel

of a vehicle and you drive recklessly, you might

get in a crash and that might hurt. But that

doesn't mean that everything that we do brings

on punishment from God. D .A. Carson said this,

pain and suffering are not always or even usually

the immediate consequence of a particular sin.

That is a hideous piece of heresy. capable of

inflicting untold mental anguish. And so friends,

I know many of us, we've got these illnesses.

We've got these injuries. Or think about people

who are suffering in other parts of the world

for the sake of the gospel. They have not brought

this upon themselves. God is doing something

in our suffering. Consider Romans 828, how God

is working all things out for the good of those

who love him and are called according to his

purpose. The sovereignty of God necessitates

that whatever we go through, God is in charge

of that. And so remember, in your suffering,

remember the compassion of Jesus. Cry out to

him. Rest in what he did. And remember that he

is the righteous one who suffered in your place.

That even when you go through the valley of the

shadow of death, But he is with you. Perhaps

you remember Romans chapter 8, verse 18. Let

Romans 8:18

me read this for you. For I consider that the

sufferings of this present time are not worth

comparing with the glory that is to be revealed

to us. But how can we have that? We must believe

in Jesus. In order to have our eyes dried and

the suffering gone, our hearts must be open to

Jesus. We must believe. Look back at our text

at verse 38. You've seen the question, what's

the answer from the man? He said, Lord, I believe

and he worshipped him. This needs to be our response

to believing in Jesus, to the grace of God saving

us from our sins, that we would worship Jesus.

That's really what this is all about. This is

really what the miracles are all about, bringing

people out of their sin to trust in Christ and

to worship Him. And this is very plain to see,

isn't it? Because our eyes have been opened.

But for the Pharisees, their eyes are not. They

have seen the plain evidence before them of Jesus

doing something that is completely astonishing,

that perhaps has never, ever been done, giving

sight to a man born blind. And yet they are the

ones who are truly blind. Friends, the worst

blindness you can have is refusing to see. The

worst blindness you can have is refusing to see.

Many of them, they see the works of Jesus and

yet their response is to call Jesus a sinner

and excommunicate his disciples. And so Jesus,

this whole saga ends with them overhearing Jesus

and they ask this question, are we also blind?

Of course they are. They can't see what's right

there before them. They are unwilling to examine

their hearts. Additionally, these are Jewish

leaders They should have been looking for the

Messiah Isaiah 42 7 that says that there is one

coming who opens the eyes of the blind and there

he was right before them They said this man must

be a sinner Friends the evidence is right before

us because we have the scriptures the very word

of God And so we must respond with faith. We

must respond in worship because God alone is

worthy of our praise. But as I begin to wrap

up, the lesson's not quite done. We have not

thought about the disciples for several minutes

here and their question. The way in which they

respond, when they see the man, they don't respond

in a very good way, do they? And so we need to

understand how we should respond to others who

are in suffering. And so just one point of application

here. Friends, we must listen to the suffering

and we must avoid assumptions. Think of the harm

done to this man throughout his lifetime by people

who would not stop to listen to him. They continued

to operate under the assumption that sin by the

man had somehow led him blindness all the times

that this poor beggar heard people whispering

about him or avoiding him or telling him to his

face you're a bad person and you did this to

yourself like like Job's friends just wearing

him down friends we must be people who listen

to one another in our suffering look at verse

34 they answered the man you were born in utter

sin And would you teach us? Isn't it funny how

much we care about what God teaches us, but how

little we care about what God teaches other people.

We must be willing to listen. Oh, that we would

learn to listen to those who are in suffering,

that we would learn how to persevere in suffering,

that we would be reminded of the glory that awaits

us as Christians to be good friends. We must

take time to listen to one another, to love one

another through our suffering, avoid assumptions,

and in doing so give glory to God as we love

our neighbor as ourselves, remembering that Jesus

suffered in our place.