Would You Be His Disciple?Mike Wisdom

January 15, 2012

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Welcome Visitors & MembersLesson Text: John 9 “Healing A Man Born

blind”Topics for this Evening Are:

Messiah & Prophet definedThe blindness of the JewsFaith, courage and obedience of the blind manThe fear of the parentsThe reason Jesus performed this miracleWhy did Jesus pick this particular man?

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Messiah Defined: Means “anointed one”; in this case, the anointed one of God Translated into Greek from Hebrew the word is “Christos”

or, in English, the Christ To be “anointed” was to be approved of by God Many scriptures were related to the coming Messiah

Dan 7:13-14 “I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven One like the Son of Man was coming, and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which will not pass away; And His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed.”

Dan 2:44 “In the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed, and that kingdom will not be left for another people; it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever. “

Isaiah 53 has an account of the messiah that is one-for-one an account of what happened to Jesus over 700 years after the book was written

The Messiah was to rule over a spiritual kingdom 3

The Prophet Defined: One who is called to speak Deut 18:15-19

15 “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your countrymen, you shall listen to him. 16 This is according to all that you asked of the LORD your God in Horeb on the day of the assembly, saying, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God, let me not see this great fire anymore, or I will die.’ 17 The LORD said to me, ‘They have spoken well. 18 I will raise up a prophet from among their [l]countrymen like you, and I will put My words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. 19 It shall come about that whoever will not listen to My words which he shall speak in My name, I Myself will require it of him. 20 But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in My name which I have not commanded him to speak, or which he speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.’ 21 You may say in your heart, ‘How will we know the word which the LORD has not spoken?’ 22 When a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the thing does not come about or come true, that is the thing which the LORD has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.

We see from the scripture that there were many prophets raised after Moses culminating in Jesus the Christ

The Prophet had special meaning to the Jews because it related to Messianic prophesy

With these definitions as background – read with me John 9 4

The Blindness of the Jews Jews believed in an earthly messiah - a king and warrior -

and an earthly kingdom to be protected by God Their earthly expectations were typified by the passage just read in

Dan 2:44 They could not see Jesus for what he was because they were

looking in the wrong place Consider the blind man’s reasoning given in John 9:28-33

Vs 33: “If this man were not from God, He could do nothing.” The Jews responded that this man had been born entirely in

sins and that had no right to be teaching them (9:34) Later on, as Jesus is teaching the Jews once again after the

account given of the blind man in John 9:39-41, the question of blindness comes up again

Jn 9:38 “ And Jesus said, “ For judgment I came into this world, so that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may become blind.”

The Jews asked (Vs 40) …“We are not blind too, are we?” Jesus answers in Vs 41 …”If you were blind, you would have no sin;

but since you say ‘We see,’ your sin remains.”

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Faith, Courage and Obedience of the Blind Man Consider his faith:

(9:10-11) The blind man initially does not say anything about who Jesus is but rather describes what he did

(9:15-17) You can see the blind man’s faith growing at each step. He declares that Jesus is a Prophet.

(9:24-27) At every step, the blind man is growing in faith and now considers himself a disciple of Jesus

(9:35-38) At the final paragraphs of this story, we see the blind man believing that Jesus is the Christ

Consider his Courage: He was questioned incessantly; he was taken before the Pharisees.

We know that the Jews were already planning to kill Jesus (John 5:18) so it is unquestionable that the questioning was intense

Pressure was applied to his parents. I believe that in part this was so that they would apply pressure to their son to deny Jesus and to have him recant his story

It took a great deal of courage for the blind man to stand firm and reason with the Pharisees when he asks them if they would like to be disciples too. I don’t believe that he was trying to be mean in his response – I firmly believe that he was asking the question seriously

He stayed firm even though it meant being ostracized and put out of the synagogue

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Faith, Courage and Obedience of the Blind Man (Cont’d) Consider his Obedience:

He never questioned what Jesus told him to do (Jn 9:6-7)And he stayed with Jesus and acknowledged Him as Lord (Jn 9:38)

The Fear of the Parents I don’t doubt that this man’s parents loved him They were terrified of being put out of the synagogue and they

knew that if they stood up for Jesus they would be considered His disciples and would be put out of the synagogue (Jn 9:18-23)

Why Were Synagogues so Important in Jewish Life? The synagogue defined: Extracted from Rabbi Scheinerman’s

“History of the Synagogue”Synagogues were established during the time period when the

Israelites were in exileEarly synagogues began by Jews meeting on market days

(Monday’s and Thursday’s) for a combination of worship and studySynagogues were first and foremost institutions of learning but

also filled a role as the locus of Jewish life; combining study, social services, socializing and served as a community gathering place.

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Why Were Synagogues so Important in Jewish Life? (Cont’d)To be “put out” of the synagogue was akin to social

death. People would shun you and you would not be able to socialize or participate in community functions

To be “put out” also meant that you probably could not learn very much either because they were essentially schools

To be “put out” did NOT mean that you could not worship. You could worship at the temple.

I think that the reason these institutions were so important to the Jewish people is because they were the embodiment of social interaction for their society – not something to be taken lightly.

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The Reason Jesus Performed this Miracle Jn 9:1-5: to show WHO HE WAS and that the power of God the

Father worked through Him Consider what happened when the disciples of John the Baptist

asked Jesus if He was the One: Matt 11:2-5 “… the blind receive sight and the lame walk, the lepers

are cleansed and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them.”

Is 35:5-6 “… then the eyes of the blind will be opened and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped. Then the lame will leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute will shout for joy…”

Jesus knew His time on earth was limited and that he had to make the best use of it in preparing the world for the coming kingdom

Why Did Jesus Pick This Particular Man? Jn 9:1: the man was blind from birth – no one could say that he was

faking the healing because they had seen him begging in the street all of his life

By healing this man, there was no doubt that the power of God had been manifested

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The Jews couldn’t see Jesus as the Messiah Because they Were looking in the wrong place They expected an earthly king, a warrior who would make them a

great nation once again What about people today? Consider where some people are

looking today for salvation: Hinduism, Islam, etc. Some believe that Jesus was a prophet but not the Son of God Atheists also have a faith – although they probably don’t consider it

as faith – and that is that once they die, that is the end and they are not responsible any more for their deeds in life – aka no punishment

Christians too sometimes pick and choose what they want to believe because it fits their perception of reality

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Are We Victims of Peer Pressure Today? As children we are subjected to peer pressure to do many things

and to act in many ways – not all of them good What adult cannot remember being dared to do something not too

smart when they were a child? How many broken limbs, scraped elbows and knees did we get from

climbing trees that we knew we shouldn’t and did anyway on a dare?

How many times did we say something to someone on a dare and see the hurt on their face when we did it?

How many times did we knuckle under when we knew we should go home at a certain time but we waited until much later, causing our parents much grief worrying where we were and if we were safe or not?

How many times did we ask ourselves why we did something so dumb in the first place?

Am I the only one who remembers some of this stuff with much regret?

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Are We Victims of Peer Pressure Today? (Cont’d) What about adults? Surely we don’t bow to anything so dumb as peer

pressure? Sadly, I’m afraid we still do. Yes, we are a little wiser than we were when we

were children but I venture to guess that all of us have still submitted to peer pressure in some way or another.

There are any number of examples of adults doing things that they normally would not do unless taunted on by the people around them

Consider the prison activities in Iraq and recent events in Afghanistan – who in their right mind would ever treat other human beings in such a demeaning way? … and take pictures of it.

Consider the many business executives that are now in prison because they were pressured to do something illegal

Yes, I dare say that adults too are influenced by peer pressure in the physical things

What about peer pressure in regard to the spiritual things? What happens to people – young or old – when they have previously been

involved with other faiths and finally understand the truth and are baptized into Jesus?

How many families apply pressure to the converted person not to do this? How many disown and ostracize them because of the change? To experience this type of pressure is to understand why the blind man’s

parents were so afraid. No one wants to lose family and friends.

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Would we defend Jesus today as the Blind Man in John 9?Remember what the synagogue meant to the Jews.

It was THE center of the Jewish social sceneIt was THE center for learningIt was THE center of social services if you needed helpIt was THE community gathering place

It took a great deal of faith and courage for the blind man to defend Jesus like he did. It wasn’t like you could hop into the car and head for

another synagogue. These people lived within 20 miles of their birth place their whole life. The people around them were all that the most folks knew.

He full well understood what it meant to be “put out” of the synagogue – as did his parents.

BUT HE DEFENDED JESUS ANYWAY! 13

Would we defend Jesus today as the Blind Man in John 9? (Cont’d)Would we be bold enough to defend Jesus like he

did?Let’s look at his reasoning again (John 9:30-33)Are we knowledgeable enough and do we have enough

courage to respond as the blind man did? If we KNEW that it would cost us our friends, our

community involvement and any social services - would we still be bold enough to defend him?

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Let’s Recap the Lesson PointsMessiah defined

Jesus was sent to earth to fulfill the plan of salvation for mankind. His kingdom was to be a spiritual kingdom.

The blindness of the JewsMost of the Pharisees could not (or would not) see the

Messiah for who he wasThey were looking for an earthly king, a warrior who

would establish an earthly kingdom such as typified by Dan 2:44

Some of the Jews may have believed that Jesus was the Christ (reference Nicodemus in Jn 3) or at least were curious about him and his miracles. Even in John 11, the chief priests and Pharisees seemed not to question the signs that Jesus did; even while they plotted to kill Him

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Recap (Cont’d)Faith, courage and obedience of the blind man

It didn’t matter how many times the man was questioned, his faith in Jesus never wavered – in fact, it GREW

His courage was unquestionable in his defense of Jesus

His obedience was perfect. Jesus told him what to do and he did it

By picking this man, no one could say that the man had been faking blindness all along because this man had been blind since birth

The fear of the parentsThis is a perfect example of what fear of reprisal can

do to us 16

Recap (Cont’d)The reason Jesus performed this miracle

Jesus performed this miracle to demonstrate His power and to prove who He was

Why did Jesus pick this particular man?By picking this man, no one could say that the

man had been faking blindness all along because this man had been blind since birth

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The Lesson is Yours I hope that you were enlightened by the lesson as I was in preparing it John 9 is a beautiful story of faith, courage and obedience While we may never face the trials that the man born blind faced, we should

understand the message that we too could face adversity for our faith someday and that we should be prepared to defend it courageously if necessary

In order to defend our faith we have to know the Word of God

We Would Like to Extend an Invitation to You Tonight Are you a now a Disciple of Christ? Would You Be His Disciple?

If You are Not a Christian then We Invite You to Come to Become One Tonight. You first have to hear the gospel of Christ (Acts 8:35; Rom 10:13-15) You have to believe that Jesus is the Son of God (Acts 8:37; Rom 10:16-17) You have to repent of your past sins (Acts 2:38; Lk 13:3, 24:46-47) You have to confess before men that Jesus is the Christ (Acts 8:37; Rom 10:9-10) And you have to be buried with Jesus in the watery grave of baptism (Acts 2:38;

1Pet 3:21)

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