The following is a link to our reading today:
John 9:1-41
“As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” John 9:1-2
As an ordained person, I have been in and out of a lot of hospitals. Most do not require the clergy who come in and out to have ID badges, but a few do. The hospital I visited the most frequently when I lived in Ohio did not require badges when I first began visiting people there. However, one day when I stopped at the desk to get a room number for the person I was visiting, I was told that I would need to stop by security and get a badge. I asked the volunteer at the desk why there had been a change. She explained that there was a clergy person who had gone room to room telling the patients that if they wished to get well they needed to repent of their sins, for the cause of their illness was their sin.
Most people, when they hear this story, are horrified. I was horrified. How on earth could anyone in today’s world think that the people lying in those hospital beds had caused their own illness? Didn’t he know he was just adding to their suffering rather than helping to relieve it? I was embarrassed on behalf of all clergy. I thought of the story of the healing of the blind man from John. When asked directly by his disciples about the cause of the blind man’s blindness Jesus replies, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned.” Human illness is not caused by sin, pure and simple.
Most people, when they hear this story, are horrified. I was horrified. How on earth could anyone in today’s world think that the people lying in those hospital beds had caused their own illness? Didn’t he know he was just adding to their suffering rather than helping to relieve it? I was embarrassed on behalf of all clergy. I thought of the story of the healing of the blind man from John. When asked directly by his disciples about the cause of the blind man’s blindness Jesus replies, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned.” Human illness is not caused by sin, pure and simple.
I will also admit that a part of me felt superior to that clergy person who was kicked out of that hospital in Ohio. “He must really be ignorant,” I thought to myself. But in reality, though most of us today don’t believe that sin causes illness, don’t we too fall into the same kind of cause and effect thinking that afflicted that clergy person in Ohio, Jesus’ disciples, and the Pharisees? Maybe our categories are different, but we are really not that different.
Think about it for a minute. Have you ever thought to yourself, “If people receiving welfare would just go find a job, then they wouldn’t need welfare?” Or perhaps you thought, “I know depression is an illness, but if she would just make a little effort to get up and get out she would feel better.” Or maybe you thought, “He must be lazy, that is why he is so overweight and now needs bypass surgery.” Or you might have even thought, “People who need to get food assistance at places like Bread for Life must have something wrong with them. They must be mentally ill, or lazy, or criminals. It isn’t safe for me or my children to be around them.” I think you get my point. All of us label other people. All of us put other people in categories. All of us fall victim from time to time to cause and effect thinking.
Think about it for a minute. Have you ever thought to yourself, “If people receiving welfare would just go find a job, then they wouldn’t need welfare?” Or perhaps you thought, “I know depression is an illness, but if she would just make a little effort to get up and get out she would feel better.” Or maybe you thought, “He must be lazy, that is why he is so overweight and now needs bypass surgery.” Or you might have even thought, “People who need to get food assistance at places like Bread for Life must have something wrong with them. They must be mentally ill, or lazy, or criminals. It isn’t safe for me or my children to be around them.” I think you get my point. All of us label other people. All of us put other people in categories. All of us fall victim from time to time to cause and effect thinking.
This seems to be part of the human condition. We seem to have an insatiable need to understand why something has happened. Most of the time this is a good thing and has led to many of the things we find good about modern life. Without the question of why we would not have antibiotics, modern surgery, cancer treatment, indoor plumbing, computers, airplanes and the list and so on and so forth. But some why questions cannot be answered, such as the question of human suffering. We don’t know why suffering exists. We don’t know why one person is born blind and another is not. We might know the medical reason, but we don’t know why the condition afflicts one person and not another. And we get ourselves into trouble when we try to give answers to these unanswerable questions.
So why do we try to answer these unanswerable why questions? I think it makes us feel safer when we feel like we have answers. If the man’s blindness was caused by sin, then I can avoid blindness by not sinning. If people who are hungry are hungry because they have done something wrong and are therefore bad people, then I just need to avoid doing the wrong things, and then I will never be hungry. If people who have heart disease are only the people who eat the wrong things or don’t exercise enough, then I can avoid ever having heart disease by living the right way. But the reality is that most human suffering is not easily reducible to this cause and effect thinking. The causes of our suffering are much more complex. When we reduce a person’s suffering to this kind of thinking we are blaming the person. This blame game usually only serves to increase their suffering as we attempt to convince ourselves that we can keep ourselves safe from suffering. And the blame game doesn’t keep us safe from suffering ourselves. Suffering is a part of life for every human things. Bad things can and do happen to all of us, no matter how hard we work or how good we are. There is no way to make for ourselves a completely safe and suffering free life.
And apparently this is not how God sees the world or us, thank God. Apparently, God does not view our suffering through the lens of cause and effect. God simply sees our suffering. I don’t claim to understand Jesus’ statement that the man in this story from John was born blind “so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” Presumably God does know the answer to the question, “why does suffering exist?” This story is not an answer to that question. But I do know from this story and other stories about Jesus, that God does not use suffering to punish us for the things we do wrong. Suffering is not a punishment for our sins. It just is.
And apparently this is not how God sees the world or us, thank God. Apparently, God does not view our suffering through the lens of cause and effect. God simply sees our suffering. I don’t claim to understand Jesus’ statement that the man in this story from John was born blind “so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” Presumably God does know the answer to the question, “why does suffering exist?” This story is not an answer to that question. But I do know from this story and other stories about Jesus, that God does not use suffering to punish us for the things we do wrong. Suffering is not a punishment for our sins. It just is.
I also learn from this story of the healing of the blind man that God calls us to admit that we do not know the answer to these big why questions and God calls us to learn to live with our unknowing:
Jesus said, “I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind.” Some of the Pharisees near him heard this and said to him, “Surely we are not blind, are we?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains. John 9:39-41
True faith, real faith, does not equal certainty. To be faithful does not mean that you know why everything happens. To be faithful does not mean to have all the answers. To be faithful is to follow Jesus, the Christian way, even when you do not know the answer to the question, “why?”, perhaps especially when you do not know “why?”. To be faithful is to say, “God, I do not know. Help me in my unknowing.”
Embrace the unknown. Embrace your uncertainty. Rest in the knowledge that God sees your suffering and the suffering of the world. Rest in the knowledge that God is present in your uncertainty. Rest in the knowledge that God is present in the unknown.
Embrace the unknown. Embrace your uncertainty. Rest in the knowledge that God sees your suffering and the suffering of the world. Rest in the knowledge that God is present in your uncertainty. Rest in the knowledge that God is present in the unknown.