The Man Born Blind (6)

The blind man has made the journey to the pool of Siloam. He came there through obedience by faith which God had planted. The life of faith is a life of strife, yet it is a strife because of faith. The apostle could say, “I have fought the good strife.” So, the blind man in his way going to the pool reveals his given faith. True faith will be exercised to receive the benefits and embrace the Mediator. Then strife ceases for the moment, and faith may look beyond the human impossibilities and the reasoning provoked by unbelief. The Lord will lead His chosen inheritance through these ways. He washed in the pool of Siloam, and now the Bible says

He washed in the pool of Siloam, and now the Bible says he “came seeing.” What a change! What he never had seen before he now can see. Before his healing it was dark; everything was under the obscurity of darkness. When the Bible says here that he came seeing, it is the wording to describe what the Lord had done in his life. Notice that in one text it says, “he went” and “came.” The Lord Jesus had given instruction; he obeyed and went, but now also it says that he returns. However, he returns as one seeing. That returning was with joy. It lies so close together—the blindness and the sight, the darkness and the light, the “he went” and “he came.” The power to change is God’s power. May it therefore serve to encourage those who experience their blindness, who have to say, “I have no sight; I miss my sight.” Here it lies so close together. The Lord needs only one word in the strife of faith for all to change. Maybe there is a reader who says, “I have sat so often under the means but have no sight and light; it remains so dark.”

In this miracle you can see how circumstances changed so remarkably for a blind one! Yes, also for my dear unconverted reader, the sovereign power of the Lord is such that it can change one from one moment to the next. He was blind from birth, but on that particular day, known from the stillness of eternity, a blind one received sight!

Seeing describes a new activity for this man. He never had seen before; now he sees the houses, the trees, the water, etc. He also sees something else; He sees himself. This miracle contains something which, I hope, we all may consider. We all, to some extent, have had remarkable things happen in our lives. Some will be able to speak of remarkable deliverances when there were financial difficulties or when there was great need for help in other matters. Others have experienced remarkable healing or recovering mercy. Others will be able to say how wonderfully the Lord provided for them in certain situations that came up in their daily life. So the list can go on of how often we are helped by the Lord. Often, in the moment, we acknowledge that it was the Lord who helped. However, when we recall the events to other people, then that part is not said because God was only a helper to get us out of the situation. We speak much of the events and how all went, but God is left out. Then we take the honor ourselves which was due to the Lord. This reveals that with all that we receive we have not received a true view of ourselves and of the wonder.

The former blind man reveals something of a deeper lesson in this healing, a lesson which the Lord is going to teach by bringing forth a question from his neighbors. The lesson is one in humility. He must own who he was; he must acknowledge where he was found. Whenever the Lord exalts grace in a sinner, He exalts it by the fruit of humility.

The neighbors see him also; they ask amongst themselves, “Is not this he that sat and begged?” They talk about his former life. Begging in Israel was a shameful work; it was a work of desperation. Now that is used to identify him.

We are proud creatures; we do not want to remember our shame; we cover it. Here it is uncovered! Blessed people who are uncovered by the benefits. That the blind man can now see is a token of God’s undeniable power, but he must be brought back to where God found him. He must admit who he was.

Dear reader, we are enemies of this. We love to talk about the benefits, but then God is not honored. May the Lord uncover us, too; it will go through a way of owning who we were. God’s true people never forget where God found them, and that is used so they cannot stand an inch above their fellow man. The former blind man acknowledges that he was the beggar but as one who is healed. Then, in God-given humility, this man can say what the Lord has done for him. Do you see how this man is given to testify? Not as a converted individual but as the former blind beggar. The words which he now is going to speak will reveal the wonder of that one-sided, divine truth that the Lord Jesus stated at the beginning of this miracle: “I must work the works of Him that sent Me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.”

Dear reader, do we speak of benefits? What comes across in that? Does it mention God as a helping means for us to be delivered from embarrassing or distressing circumstances in our life? Or do the benefits leave in our life the fruits of humility—benefits by which we must own who we were, where God found us? How unfit we were for service to God; we were on our way to eternal destruction without God and hope in the world, but He came with divine power to stop us. My dear reader, then you will not speak of the benefits which mentions God as a helping means but as the Source of the benefits. That life will receive lessons through whom the Lord can grant saving benefits, not just through God, but through God and Man in one Person, Precious Immanuel!

(To be continued)

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