A Blindness

Responsive Reading: Psalm 27:1-4

Scripture: John 9:1-41

A Prayer for Ukraine (written by Rev. Mindi Welton-Mitchell)

O God of all nations, we come before You, crying out for an end to violence. We confess that we have put our trust in worldly leaders, worldly understandings of power, dominance, and greed. We confess that we resort to violence instead of Your ways. Forgive us for turning to the ways of the world that we human beings created, instead of embracing the earth You made for all of us.

Guide us in our thoughts and prayers to act for peace. Help us to “depart from evil, and do good; seek peace and pursue it” (Psalm 34:14). Remind us that violence is not Your intention for us. Your intention is an abundant life.

We pray for all the nation’s leaders, that they will seek Your wisdom and guidance and work to end this violence, this war. We pray that we might seek You in the face of one another, especially in the faces of those we call enemies, and strive to end war forever.

Our ways are not Your ways, O God. Guide us away from the path of humanity to use violence and domination and fear, and into Your ways of love, justice, and peace. In the name of the Prince of Peace we pray. Amen.

War

On Thursday of last week (February 24), Russian president Vladimir Putin launched a large-scale invasion of Ukraine. As reported by news organizations around the world and across the political spectrum, it was “the biggest attack on a European state since World War Two” (Reuters, Fox). In parallel with these attacks, Putin has made considerable express and implied threats, including that of nuclear retaliation should any nation interfere (here). 

As one whose childhood was overshadowed by the Cold War, an Iron Curtain, and regular nuclear attack drills at school, I have appreciated the voices of our American Baptist leaders these last days, as they remind us of our heritage. Our general secretary Jeff Woods, for example, reminded us that: “American Baptists have a long history of proclaiming peace and denouncing war.” [from here]

In an official statement, he quoted a resolution adopted by our denomination way back in 1922—a time when the world still reeled from a World War, and a time when divisions and violence continued to threaten near and far. One hundred years ago, we adopted a statement that read:

“We record our conviction that war as a method of settling international disputes is barbarous, wasteful, and manifestly contrary to every Christian ideal and teaching. We reaffirm our belief that our country should have its part in an association of nations for expressing our common humanity, adjusting difficulties, and outlawing any nation that resorts to arms to further its own interests.”

Adopted by the Northern Baptist Convention in 1922

It seems to me that touching on our history—both recent and that of a century ago—only underscores the importance of today’s message. Our world—once again—is shattered by a violence fueled by propaganda and a lust for power and control. 

• What do we make of it all? 
• How can we find truth amidst the various public voices and the polarized reporting of our current news climate?
• How do we respond to a crisis like this in ways that are appropriate to our faith? 

I hope these are questions you are asking too. 

And I hope God gives you some direction, as we once again explore how truth is dismissed and reality is distorted by the powerful of the world. 

How to Dismiss Truth

This has been an an undercurrent to the scripture-stories this month—all of which have involved the intentional undermining of truth in an attempt to maintain power and control in a disrupted world. In this week’s reading, that undercurrent becomes a massive tidal pull—a veritable masterclass in how to dismiss truth.

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When the man shows up at his neighbors’—now able to see—he experiences a mixed reception…… and that’s being gracious. Shockingly, some of them refuse to believe it is him at all that stands before them. People who know him literally deny that he is who he says he is. That his life is changed and for the better is a truth that they refuse to accept. And they persist in this refusal, insisting that it cannot be true until they understand every dimension of how it happened. 

Friends, this is a story I have heard devastatingly frequently over the years. 

A person finally begins to get their life together—getting on top of their addictions, or turning around their priorities, or beginning to manage their mental health, or finally investing in their spouse or family—and then the very people they love the most refuse to accept their changed and bettered self. 

Maybe these neighbors hold a worldview that refuses to allow for anything so miraculous and unexplainable. 

Maybe (and in ways they probably aren’t even conscious of) they have long seen themselves as superior to this poor fellow, and his healing disrupts their sense of personal identity or worth. 

We don’t know enough about them to know how they benefit from his blindness—only that his healing disrupts their equilibrium so significantly that they fall into gaslighting and denying the man’s very existence as he stands before them.

And as conflicts tend to do, this situation escalates—and quickly. Alongside the sorts of denial and gaslighting of the man’s initial reception, such rapid escalation can be another technique to dismiss and undermine truth. By rapidly raising the stakes, it is hoped that the “other” will back down.

In this case, such rapid escalation results in the man—whose only “crime” is becoming “bettered”—finding himself the subject of a formal inquiry…… And here lies another technique: sometimes the easiest way to dismiss truth is to bury it in tedious proceedings. 

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And yet there is something even more sinister afoot here. When we consider the statements being taken and the questions being asked, it becomes very clear very quickly that this man is an unwitting victim of the witch hunt to destroy Jesus. This man—who I remind you has just experienced the single best and most significant event in his life—he is now being used as a pawn in a game that has nothing to do with him. All his inquisitors care about is whether they can bend his testimony into a weapon—even if it breaks him.

At one point, they feign interest in what the man himself thinks of his healer. He chooses to answer honestly, rather than saying what they want him to say. And this causes them to immediately attack again: “What do you know?!”

On the heels of his unwillingness to capitulate and their renewed attack against him, a further escalation is carried out: they bring his family into it and threaten them. Now I will admit that the text does not explicitly say these leaders directly threatened the man’s parents; but it does detail quite clearly how his parents were afraid and that there was a previously-established pattern of social and religious punishment being inflicted by anyone who crossed these leaders regarding the matter of this Jesus. The implication here is undeniable.

Reading on, we see that the man’s parents manage to avoid being snagged themselves in this power-play, but only by distancing themselves from their son—essentially throwing him to the wolves in order to save themselves. 

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This then leads to a second formal inquiry—the man being brought again before this “jury of his elites” as they hope to convince him to change his story and side against his healer. 

Initially, the man seems to respond respectfully, while sticking to his story and resisting getting further entrapped in this matter. But this time, when his inquisitors persist, something in the man’s speech changes.

• Maybe he’s just that annoyed that no one believes him.
• Maybe he is that angry about his parents being threatened.
• Maybe enough time has passed that he’s begun processing this amazing thing that has happened to him. 

But whatever the case, the once-blind man is emboldened. He sees not just the truth of what happened to him, but the truth of who his inquisitors really are and what they are trying to do. And it just doesn’t add up. 

There’s some lovely sarcasm in his responses over the next few verses, but it wins him no favors. And in a move that would be hilarious were it not so damaging, these leaders employ some creative circular logic to slander the man again: “You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?”

• You see, they are accusing him of being born in sin because of his blindness…… but he’s not blind anymore. 
• It just goes to show you that those intent on dismissing truth will use any tool, any accusation, any anything to slander those with which they disagree.

Jesus

One of the things I appreciate most in this text is that Jesus doesn’t let this be the end of the matter. Verse 35 of the reading tells us that “Jesus heard that they had driven him out,” and so Jesus deliberately seeks out the man.

Friends, when the world has driven us out, when we feel slandered and abused by the powers that be, when we feel crushed by the weight of the world on our shoulders, chewed up by machinations of economy and politics—we will find that Jesus seeks us out too, inviting us into an allegiance with truth and life and love.

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Blindness = Certainty (the Inquisitors)

This story certainly intends to make a play on the ideas of blindness and seeing:

• A biologically blind man gains seeing.
• Leaders whose biological sight is fine are described by Jesus “blind” to truth.
• A once-blind man, accused of being the disciple of Jesus without even knowing his name, gains the ability to see Jesus for who he is.
• And despite how obvious the reality of Jesus should be to these leaders, they remain persistently blind to it.

“Surely we are not blind, are we?” they ask. 

And Jesus says they are not…… and that is the bigger indictment. 

Jesus says they know what they are doing, and that is the reason they are guilty.

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Friends, there is a kind of blindness that comes from certainty.

When you believe you’ve got it all figured out…… when you think you’ve found all the “right answers”…… when you are certain you are on the side of God (or, more frighteningly, that God is on your side)…… there is a blindness that distorts your ability to see the things and people that are right in front of your face.

• Who aren’t you seeing right now?
• Who is shut out by the answers you are certain of?
• What realities do others face that you refuse to acknowledge because it doesn’t fit your ideology or theology?

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Seeing = Humility (the Healed Man)

Standing opposite those blinded by their certainty, we see the example of the once-blind man—now visible to us as the one who sees and sees truly.

Though his words become bold, they are framed not by certainty but uncertainty. Over and over, he insists:

I don’t know how it happened.
I don’t know who the man was.
I don’t know where you can find him.
I don’t understand any of this.

All I know is that once I was blind, and now I see.

Just as surely as there is a kind of blindness that comes from certainty, there is something in humility that opens up a sort of seeing within us. There is something about coming to an honest awareness of the limitations of our own knowledge and abilities that enables our inner eye to begin scanning for something more…… something beyond our knowing…… something beyond our experience…… something beyond what we once thought were the limits of faith……

Mystery

These last days, as photographs and videos of the devastation in Ukraine have begun to find their way to my eyes, I have found myself contemplating Job.

Much like this biblical character, there are already refugees of this war that have lost everything: their families, their homes, their jobs, their churches, their communities, their resources—everything. A force of destruction has ripped through their lives, and in moments it has undone everything they have worked for and everything they have loved.

I can only imagine the questions they are asking of God right now. 

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But I do know something of the questions asked of God by Job. 

Surrounded by peers whose own certainty blinds them to compassion and the truth of Job’s suffering, Job calls out again and again for an audience with God. He wants God to answer for what has happened. He wants God to explain it to him, so he can understand it and do whatever it takes to ensure that such tragedy never comes his way again.

If you’re not familiar with the story, God does show up. But God does not offer Job answers. Instead, God offers Job a deeper glimpse into the mystery.

• I use the word “mystery” to refer not to things we have to puzzle out, but to refer to things that will forever remain beyond our knowing—and yet worthy of our ongoing contemplation. 

Our faith is full of such mysteries:

• For one: God—a mystery whose depth washes over Job like a whirlwind (beginning in chapter 38). 
• There’s the mystery of God’s love for us, 
• the mystery of the incarnation
  and the redemptive work of Jesus, 
• the mystery of we creation being in partnership and relationship with our Creator, 
• the mystery of the power of love and of presence,
• the mystery of the Trinity,
• the mystery of God’s reconciliation of all things to Godself

It is a mystery, to quote Desmond Tutu, that:

“Goodness is stronger than evil.
Love is stronger than hate.
Light is stronger than darkness.
Life is stronger than death.
[And] victory is ours through him who loved us.”

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To experience Jesus, there is a certain amount of mystery we must enter into. There is a certain amount of humility we must discover if we are going to have eyes to see what God is doing in us and in the world. There’s a certain amount of certainty we will have to let go of, if we too will have our eyes opened to Jesus and his love.

But the good news is that our God continues to be in the eye-opening business. 

And as our eyes continue to be opened to the tragedy of our neighbors in Ukraine, let us look to see with God’s eyes to find and hold to those stories where peace and love and our common humanity gain the upper hand:

• A soldier telling off a Russian warship before being bombed.
• A woman telling a Russian invader to put sunflower seeds in his pocket so flowers would grow where he dies.
• Countless civilians, parents, students, and a president demonstrating what it means to value and defend democracy.
• Citizens of Russia taking to the streets and risking arrest by protesting the injustices perpetrated in their name.
• A platoon of Russian soldiers surrendering to the Ukrainian military because they “didn’t know that they were brought to Ukraine to kill Ukrainians.”

May God give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and guide our feet in the way of peace. (Luke 1:79)

Prayer

God of vision, 

Too often we are spiritually blindfolded, unable to see you at work in our world. Remove barriers that keep us from seeing. Grow humility in us, that we may learn to be open to your mystery and your work. Help us to be light for others. And may the impact of our lives in the world be that of peace. Amen.