dedicated to the saving of this
blind man. The Lord opens his eyes or tells
him to go to the Pool of Siloam and wash after he had put the
clay and the spittle upon his eyes. And he does, and he comes
back seeing, but he doesn't see the Lord right off. He comes back and he gets into
a discussion with the Pharisees and his neighbors, and it causes
a division, as the gospel always will. The gospel is a dividing
gospel. It is a separating gospel. It
is not a popular gospel. The gospel not. Now modern day
gospel is. It's a health, wealth type gospel. But that's not the gospel of
God. God's gospel is offensive to human nature. And it's really
offensive to religious lost people. It's very offensive. Now, one
of the things I believe we can see here, there's a lot of things
that is jumping out at me as I've read this thing. I wrote
three or four outlines on it, and I finally brought this one.
But I like to sit down and read and read and just write and write,
read and write, read and write. And then finally, I think I see
it. It takes me a little while, but
one of the things I can see in this is salvation happens in
three tenses. I have been saved, I'm being
saved, and I shall be saved. The Lord opens this man's eyes
because if the Lord doesn't open your eyes and my eyes, we're
not going to see anything, are we? Dead people don't see. There's
got to be life given in order to believe. Faith doesn't create
life. Faith doesn't make salvation
happen. Faith is the evidence God is at work. It's the evidence
God has saved me. It's the evidence of the work
of the Spirit of God. It's called in the Scripture
the operation of the Spirit of God. Faith is the operation of
the Spirit of God. That's how it is. And this man,
and everyone whom God saves, was saved before creation. This man was saved before creation.
He had been saved in the covenant of grace. And the Lord comes
along and gives him his sight, but he still don't know much,
but he's being saved. He didn't realize it. All he knows is this, I was blind,
but now I see. He didn't know that. That's more
than the Pharisees knew. Chapter 8 is given to the blindness
of the Pharisees. We see that all the way through
Chapter 8, their blindness. Christ said, I'm the light of
the world. They didn't receive him as the light of the world. Sent
by the Father. They didn't receive him as sent
by the Father. He spoke of them as being the
children of Satan. He said, Satan's your father.
They didn't believe that. No, he's not. God's our father. Everything
he said to them, they rejected. They rejected it. then they took
up stones to stone him you see that in the last verse of chapter
8 then took they up stones to cast at him but jesus hid himself
and went out of the temple going through the midst of them and
so passed by and you see that connects it to that to what's
still going on this connects it to what's still going on Jesus it says here in verse 1
and as Jesus passed by I can spend The whole night the whole
evening on this You know how many times I didn't have time
to look it up today I meant to do it, but how many times it
says that the Lord passed by Jesus passed by He's passing
by he's passing by tonight. I believe that He may not pass
this way again Who said tomorrow's coming? But he's passing by right
now. The Lord is passing by. What
a blessing. What a privilege that I know
that not one person in this room, including me, recognizes and
realizes that the Lord is passing by. He's here with us tonight
in spirit. In spirit. He's with us. I believe
that or I wouldn't be here. Why would we be here if the Lord's
not going to be here? It's just been an empty, useless
service. But the Lord passed by, our Lord saves and He moves
on. Today, today is a day of salvation. Now, now is the accepted time. Don't ever presume, let us never
presume that we have the next minute. Went on. Henry was telling about
a lady in the message that I was listening to him, and he said
he preached to her that morning, or it was either morning or evening,
preached to her, and she went home, opened her door, died. And died. Our Lord saves and he moves on.
Let's not take his presence for granted. And I want you to notice something
else here. Our Lord was never so preoccupied with His own well-being
that He passed by the needy and had no time for them. You see,
they had taken up stones to stone Him. They were going to kill
Him. That's what was in their heart. They were going to murder
Him, kill Him. And as He passed by, and He says He, going through
the midst of them, so passed by, here's He sees this blind
man. He saw him, it says, he saw him.
You know, that doesn't mean he just looked over and saw, saw,
oh, there's somebody black. He gazed at him. He looked at
him. His heart was attached to that
man. If we could ever get a hold how
the heart of God is attached to us, how he sees us, thou god
seest me he sees us and our lord saw him and he didn't make haste to try
and get out of there he stopped he stopped he's in control of
this whole situation it's not a mob out of control it's a mob
under his control you see the light was shining in the temple
for a while but it was rejected and now he goes to the street
He goes out into the highways and hedges. That's what he does.
He moves out into the street. And our Lord is gonna demonstrate
right here with this man. And we see this and the church
has seen this since it happened. It's been recorded, it's been
read, it's been preached from for 2,000 years, nearly 2,000
years. And our Lord demonstrates here
His sovereignty. You know how many of the Lord
passed by and yet He stopped and saw you? You know how many
have been passed by? He'll have mercy on whom He'll
have mercy. And what else does it say? In whom He will, He'll
harden. Now, brethren, if that doesn't
strike fear in your heart, you're dead. Because I realized that's
one of the first things I realized when God saved me, when God gave
me light and God gave me understanding, I realized He could pass me by
and be just. He doesn't owe it to me. He gave
it to me. He demonstrates here His sovereignty.
He demonstrates here His power. And He demonstrates here His
mercy. this man is a nobody he is absolutely nobody he's a beggar
he's nothing more than a blind beggar from birth blind from
birth and whatever age he he made it to then they put him
out there on the street begging since he couldn't work he had
to beg and he's out there begging and this is god's child You know,
when I think about these different ones in the scriptures we have
in the gospel, I think of Lazarus laying at the rich man's gate,
the dogs licking his sores. This is God's child, and it's
always been his child. Been his child before creation.
And yet there he lays. And here's one that's blind.
There was another one that had been over for 38 years. There
was another one who had an issue of blood. Just these different
ones and their trials and their needs and their troubles. And
the Lord, they are the Lord's children. They're His children. This man was this way on purpose. That's hard for religion to take. That's hard for them to take. And there's something else I
want you to notice here. I said it's a demonstration of God's of the
Lord's sovereignty and of his power and of his mercy. And it's
evident because this man. Never cried unto the Lord as
he passed by. He never said a word. He didn't
ask for his sight. He didn't ask for his sight. He didn't know the Lord from
anybody. I thought of that scripture.
I was found of them. That sought me not. I was not looking. I was not
looking for the Lord when he saved me. And you weren't either. You weren't looking for him.
You may have been looking for an experience or you may have
been looking for another Jesus, but you weren't looking for this
one. Not looking for him. I found him and wasn't even looking
for him. That's what he said. I found of them that sought me
not, it made known unto them that ask not after me. This man was saved. He was given
his sight. He didn't know much, but he sure
did learn fast. He sure did learn fast. Now let's
take a look at this. As Jesus passed by, he saw a
man which was blind from his birth, which is an example of
every one of us whom the Lord saves. It's really an example
of all humanity. WE HAVE NO SPIRITUAL SIGHT, NO
SPIRITUAL UNDERSTANDING. PAUL SPEAKS IN EPHESIANS, IN
HIS PRAYER, HE SAYS I PRAY THAT THE EYES OF YOUR UNDERSTANDING
BE ENLIGHTENED. that God would give you an understanding
of His grace, of His gospel, of His salvation, of His redemption,
that God would enlighten the eyes. You see, there's another
set of eyes than what's in my head here, in front of my face.
These eyes see trees. I see you. But there was a time
I could not see God. But by the eye of faith, I see
him. I see him in his word. I see God in creation. I see
him in the lily of the valley. I see him in the rose of Sharon.
I see him, I see him in, in all of his creation. I can see him
in you, your graciousness, your kindness, the joy you take in
the word of God. That's Christ in you. That's
what that is. That's Christ in you. But this
man was blind. He couldn't see. This man did
not seek for help no more than we do. This man was hopeless
just like us. There was nobody, there was no,
there was no cure for blindness. No one could give him a new eye,
a new eye or eyes. Nobody could do that. And then we have the Lord here.
He passes by, he sees this blind man, just like he sees us. He
passes by in mercy and grace, he passes by him on purpose.
And as he does, the disciples ask a question. Who sinned? Who sinned? This man or his parents? In their mind, in their understanding,
they believed that his blindness had to have happened or had the
reason for it had to be because someone did a great sin. They believed at that time there
was a popular belief that you could see it in the womb. they
had all kind of weird I read several weird things that they
believed and some of they brought from the Babylonian captivity
reincarnation some believe that I tell you this until God saves
you you believe anything you believe anything you believe
there is do you believe there really are Martians you believe
there's a man on the moon you believe anything And when God saves you, he puts
you in your right mind and you believe the truth. And that truth
sets you free from superstition, ignorance, and stupidity. It
sets you free. Prove it. Who's to blame? This man or his parents? Who's
to blame? Who's to blame? It doesn't matter. Don't stand here. Our Lord. Our Lord. He looks at this blind
man. And he looks at him on purpose. This is not just happened to
be. This man was from all eternity
purposed of God to be in that place at that time. And to be
blind. It was the will of God. I know
we can't explain. I'm not even going to try to
explain some of these things. They're over our head. But it
was the will of God for him to be blind at that time, his child. Because the glory of God, the
power of God is going to be manifested in this man's healing. And Christ
is going to get the glory. He's going to get the glory.
So who sinned, him or his parents? He said neither one. The disciples
believed that somebody had to have done this. Isn't that what
Job's friends believed? Didn't Job's friends believe
Job? You're going through this horrible
trial and losses here because you really did something wrong.
You've really sinned. You're a hypocrite. Something's
wrong, Job. No, it's not. It's for God's
glory. It's for God's glory. You reckon the parents beat themselves
up over their child being born blind? How many parents have probably
beat themselves up over their children being born with a birth
defect? Well, here we learn, we get a
little insight that for this particular man, And for all of
God's children, it's God's will. This is God's will. It's His will for Him to be born
blind. This man's blindness was for His eternal good and God's
glory. Turn over to 2 Corinthians. Now
this is hard for the natural man to take, hard for the religious
man to take. But for you who believe God,
you understand it. You understand it. Here's one
of the things you understand. All things are of God. Everything
in my life is of God. Verse 15, for all things are
for your sakes. That man's blindness was for
his sake. that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving
of many be down to the glory of God, for which cause we think
not. But though our outward man perish,
yet the inward man renew day by day for our light affliction. Would you call being born blind
from birth a light affliction? I bet you if you could talk to
him now, if you could talk to that man right now, he'd tell
you that was a very light affliction compared to the glory he's enjoying
right now with the Lord Jesus Christ. Our time on this earth
is little. It's short. Now, it may seem
like suffering is never going to stop. You know, we may, you
know, when you hurt, it just makes the day seem longer and
the night seem longer. It's just like pain just never
goes away. You know, But when it's over and we are in glory,
I'm telling you, it's a light affliction. For our light affliction
was yet but for a moment, that's all it is. Our life on this earth
is but a moment. I don't care how long you live,
it's but a moment. It worketh for us a far more
exceeding and eternal weight of glory. His blindness was working
for him. He didn't realize that. His parents
didn't realize that. I don't know that they ever realized
it because they said he's of age, you ask him. They was afraid
of being kicked out. But God saved that man. While
we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which
are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal.
Whether it be blessings, whether it be a good day or a bad day,
what we call a bad day. It's just temporal. It's temporal. Whatever pain we have, whatever
heartaches we have, it's just temporal. You know, one of these
days, we won't even remember these
pains. We won't remember them. Because it says the former things
won't come into mind. They won't come into mind. But
the things which are not seen are eternal. You see, this is
working for this man's eternal glory. I mean, eternal good and
the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. All of our afflictions, and that's
what this is, this is an affliction, are appointed by our Father and
they are for our good and His glory. Now I'm not saying that
God made him blind. I do know this. Now listen, all
suffering, all afflictions come from sin. Original sin and actual
sin. But this affliction, he says,
did not come from any actual sins this man or his parents
did. God in his wisdom, by his will
and purpose, allowed this man to be born blind. This is his
child. This one's gonna be born blind.
Another one was born crippled. Remember the Lord walked up to
that one man, that lame man, healed him at the pool of Bethesda,
and healed him, and he walked away and left all those other
sick folks there. All those others. And not one
of those other sick folk asked for help. When they saw that
man get up and walk, why, you'd have thought that all of them
would have said... None of them. None of them asked,
the Lord, would you heal me? Lord, would you save me? None
of them. But that one, the Lord healed
and he got up and he walked off and the Lord left. He left. And then that woman with the
issue of blood, 12 years. Twelve years that woman, and she went
through all the physicians and was none the better, but rather
grew worse. That's his daughter, because
he called her daughter. He said, daughter, be of good
cheer. Daughter. That's his daughter. And our Lord is glorified every
time a sinner is saved. Every time. Every time. And listen, he says here, and
Jesus answered, neither hath this man sin, nor his parents,
but that the works of God should be made manifest, not to him,
though they were, you know, the work of God is made manifest
to you every time the gospel is preached in him. That the works of God, Should be made manifest in him,
you know every time every time you you show kindness You know
the work of God is manifest in you Every time you give from
the heart the work of God is manifest in you You are a work
of God You're a work of his power his spirit his grace and the
works of God are manifest in you as in Him. If God has saved
me, if God has saved you, His work will be manifest in us.
It will be manifest. And our Lord said, I must work
the works of Him that sent me. I have a work to do, a work of
redemption. He must keep the law perfectly in every jot and He must suffer for our sins. And he's got to
die. He's got to die. It's a work
of redemption. Did he do it? He said, it's finished. It's
finished. My salvation is finished. My
redemption is finished. He has no more to do than to
just save me. He's done all the work. Now he's
got to do a work in me. You see, he did a work for me.
And now he's doing a work in me. And the works of God are
being manifest in us who believe, in all his people who believe.
Now the night, he said here, while it is day, I must work
the works of him that sent me, while it is day, he had a time
to work. You know, you look at day and night, that's what it
is for. You have a certain time to work, and then a night time
comes, you have a time, that's it, work is over with. Christ
had a time to work on this earth. For 33 years, he lived on this
earth, and he worked the works of God, which is our redemption,
our righteousness, our salvation. And the night cometh when no
man can work. That's the end of it. And as
long as I'm in the world, I'm the light of the world. He's, you know, he said earlier
in the temple, I'm the light of the world and they rejected
him. He's a light in a sense that he is the true light, which
lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He's the one
who gives us understanding. You understand the gospel, don't
you? Christ gave that to you. He gave that to you. There's
a people throughout this world that Christ is the light of.
He gives them light. And you're children of light.
You're called children of light. That's why he says over in Matthew
5, that to let your light so shine. Let your light, because you're
children of light. When he had thus spoken, he spat
on the ground. He spit on the ground, and he
made clay of the spittle. To the Pharisees, that was offensive. To any natural man, to spit on
the ground and make some clay out of it and put it on his eyes,
not his eyelids, he put it on his eyes. He had an eye problem.
He couldn't see, his eyes were totally gone, black, couldn't
see nothing. And he took that clay and he
spit on the ground and he made some, then he rubbed it on his
eyeballs, rubbed it on his eyeballs. To the Pharisees, to the natural
man, that's foolishness, isn't it? That's foolishness. He's gonna, how did he do it?
You notice what they kept saying? The neighbor said, how? As you
see down through here. How did he do this? The Pharisee
said, how did he do this? You know what he said? A man named Jesus did it. Man, you see, they talk about
how, he talked about who. Who saved you? It's not how'd
you get saved. It's who saved you. That's all
the difference in the world. It's not how, it's who. And he spat on the ground and
he made clay of the spittle. I see here also the offense of
the gospel. Spit and mud put in a man's eyes. It didn't offend the blind man.
But others would say, really? You want us to believe that?
The Pharisees brought him twice before them and said, now tell
us. First time they said, tell us how this happened. He told
them. And they said, well, let's get the parents in here, because
they didn't believe him. They didn't believe he was blind.
They got the parents in there, and the parents, you know, they
said, well, this is our son. This is our son. He was born
blind, but ask him. He's of age. You see, they took
the monkey off their back, so to speak, because it had been
reported that if anybody believed on him, they would be excommunicated,
kicked out. They'd be kicked out, and they
didn't want to be kicked out. It's amazing. The Lord reached
into their home, saved their child. We have no evidence that he saved
them. God demonstrates his sovereignty in our homes. Some he saves and
some he passes by. Some he saves the whole house.
There's some in the scripture where he saved the whole house
and there's some he does not save. There's some he'll reach
in and save this one and leave that one alone. Demonstrating
his sovereignty because salvation is of the Lord. And these parents,
they said, well, just ask him. He's of age. And they called
him again and asked him. They asked him how this happened
again. And that's how you do when you
interrogate somebody, see if their story changes. You just
keep coming at them. Eventually, if it's a lie, it
won't hold up. It won't stay the same. There'll
be a flaw in it. You know when you tell the truth,
you never have to worry about how you told it? You never have
to remember how you told the truth. You have to remember how
you told a lie. And so they bring him back again
and they interrogate him again. And this man, listen, this man,
this nobody, this man is literally nobody. He's a beggar. That's
all he is. He's a beggar. He's never been
anybody but a pain. He's always had to beg. They've
always had to carry him. They've always had to take care
of him. They've always had to just it's just difficult. He's just been it's just been
a difficult life. But he has more insight. He has
more insight than all those Pharisees who studied the scriptures. You
know, he says they call Christ a sinner. He said, well, now,
if he's a sinner or not, I don't know about that. You can call
it whatever you want, I guess. I don't know about that, but
there's one thing I know. I was blind. Now I see. I see. I can see. I believe. I believe. Do you believe? There's a time
I didn't believe. I believe. To say I don't believe,
I'd have to lie. I know I'd be lying, because
I can't help it. I believe. The Lord has given
me sight. He's given some of you sight.
You can see. You can see. A man said, wow, there's a mark,
he said here in verse, look here in verse, well, they said here
that they were Moses' disciples over there in verse 28. I'm just
jumping around right now, but he said he's Moses' disciples,
law, law disciples, what the hell, we're lawmen, we're lawmen. They were the worst of it. They
broke the law more than anybody. Now we know God spoke to Moses,
but as for this, we don't know where he's from. That's the same
group that said, we know you, you're the carpenter's son. They
can't, see what I'm saying? They can't keep it together.
Bunch of liars can't keep it together. Now we know that Let me go back here. The man
answered and said unto him, verse 30, Why, here's a marvelous thing. You don't know where he's from,
and yet he opened my eyes. How'd this happen? You know it
all, so you're not supposed to know it all. And you don't know
where he's from? Well, there's a flaw in your
knowledge. And we know, we know that God hears not sinners. This
is this man speaking, this blind, the man that was blind, he's
speaking. He said, now I know that God doesn't hear sinners.
And he said, that's what you say. Now, if he's a sinner, like
you say he is, a wicked man is what they're calling him. They're
calling him a wicked man. But if any man be a worshiper,
God does he will, him God, him he heareth. If he's a sinner,
he couldn't do this. He couldn't do this. This man's
got some wisdom. This nobody sitting on a street there has
more wisdom than they ever thought about having. He said, well,
since the world began, it's heard that any man open, it's not heard
that any man open the eyes of one that's born blind. That's
never happened. Moses didn't even do that. Moses didn't do
that. If this man were not of God,
he couldn't do anything. So he answered and said to him,
well, you're all together born in sins. That's your problem.
Yeah, you can tell or you can tell when people revert to name-calling They've missed it they missed
it Now I was all together born and sinned just I'll teach us
and they cast him out they Excommunicated him when the Lord heard they
cast him out The Lord found him. He knew where he was. He knew
what was going on This man's faith is being tried what little
bit of faith he had he didn't have much It was in the bud And
there's just a little bud, but that bud was stronger than all
those Pharisees. He's able to shut them up. And the Lord heard that, cast
him out, and he found him. And he said to him, dost thou
believe on the son of God now? It's like this woman at the well.
It's like a conversation going on, this woman at the well. I read two or three different
translations. And they said, just I believe
on the son of man. I don't like that switch. He's got a man standing in front
of him. He can see he could see the Lord. There's a man. But
what he's saying, do you believe on the son of God? Because the Lord is going to
reveal to him not that he just a man. He's the God man. He's God in human flair. He's
the Messiah. Now this man knew something about
the Messiah coming. He knew that. Dost thou believe on the Son
of God? And he answered, said, Who is he, Lord? Who is he? You see, when the Lord put that
on his eyes, he told him to go to the Pool of Siloam and wash.
You know what? He went. Right there was an exercise of
faith. There was a faith in his butt. He did exactly what he
was told to do without fussing about it, like Naaman did. Naaman
was told to go dip seven times, and he's like, really? Why do
I have to dip seven times? We have better river back home
than that one, God said to him. And the Lord said to him, go
wash. After he put that mud on his eyes, spitting mud, clay,
And the man got up and went to that place and did exactly what
the Lord said. That's faith in his bud. And
he answered and said, Who is he, Lord, that I might believe
on him? Tell me who he is. You know that you are told that
every week. You are told that every week. There'll be no excuse if we perish. Who is he, Lord, that I might
believe on him? And Jesus said unto him, and he said this pretty
much the same thing to that woman at the well. Thou hast both seen
him, you're looking at him, and it is he that talketh with thee. Thou hast both seen him. The
Lord gave him an understanding. You know, when the Lord gives
life, he gives us an understanding. HE GIVES US FAITH TO BELIEVE
THE GOSPEL. Thou hast both seen him, and
it is he that talketh with thee. And HE SAID LORD I BELIEVE. I
BELIEVE. HE TOOK HIM AT HIS WORD. YOU
KNOW THAT'S WHAT SALVATION IS. LET'S NOT COMPLICATE IT. LET'S
NOT COMPLICATE My granddaughter said this to
Jeremy, she said, and I won't get it exactly word for word,
but she said, I realize that most people, and this is after
sitting and listening to the gospel now for a while, she said,
I realize most people are waiting for some epiphany to happen,
like this awe moment. She said, I realize it's just
like the dawning of the day. It's just, You start to see,
little by little, little by little, you start to see, you start to
understand. And the next thing you know,
you believe, you believe. But most are waiting for this
knock you down moment. And it's not. The Lord said,
I'm he, I'm the one speaking to you. And he said, Lord, I
believe. And here's the question. Here's
a question of questions. Henry has a message on that with
that title. Do you believe on the son of
God? Do you believe on the son of
God? And it says here, and he worshiped
him. He worshiped the Lord. All right.