That God Re Revealed

but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.

John 9:3b

Out of the seven signs of Jesus in the Book of John, we have concluded five of them. The fifth was Jesus walking on water, where we saw that Jesus is always with us even amidst the raging seas and chaotic waters of life. He wants us to recognize Him and call on Him to bring peace to our lives. Today, we will begin examining the sixth sign, which is the healing of the man born blind.

I am the firstborn of four in my family, and many people only know three out of the four of us because the youngest is autistic. For many years, I asked God, “Why? Why would You create someone like this? Why would You allow something like this to happen? Why this? Why that?” I wanted answers to all these questions. But God was quiet for so long because I was not truly willing to listen; I just wanted to blame Him for creating someone who didn’t seem normal in our eyes. After struggling with this for so long, He showed me two passages, one of which is this passage.

In this story, the man had been born blind, and just as I sought an explanation for my brother’s autism, the disciples also wanted to know why this man was born blind. The Jewish Rabbis had developed a theory that said, “There is no death without sin, and there is no suffering without iniquity.” This led them to conclude that the person must have been sinful or that the parents were sinful. The disciples adopted this ideology for this man as well. They assumed it must have been the sin of his parents. Although that might be worth considering, why would they think the man’s own sin was the cause, given that he was born this way? How could he have sinned before he was born? The Rabbis actually believed that the child could have sinned in the womb or that the child’s soul could have sinned in a preexistent state. This was similar to the reasoning of Job’s friends, as you might recall from the Book of Job.

Like the disciples, many of us have similar questions. It might not be directly like this, but something similar. But how did Jesus answer them? Jesus said in verse 3, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.”

Just as God did in the Book of Job, He never really answers the question posed to Him. You will not find the reason for Job’s suffering in the Book of Job, just as Jesus does not provide a direct answer here. God only reveals what the expected outcome of the situation should be. Just as He questioned Job and helped him see his own limitations, Jesus tells the disciples that the purpose is for the works of God to be displayed in the man.

You might wonder how this is supposed to answer the question in your heart. It isn’t meant to. It is meant to help you understand that what God values most is our faith in Him and our trust in His wisdom. God has the best intentions for us, and He desires to glorify Himself in our lives.

So, whatever you are going through in life, God’s desire is to glorify Himself in your life. He doesn’t necessarily want to help you understand why something happened. Instead, He wants to show you that He can glorify Himself even through it. As I said to someone one day, the reason you might not get a direct answer from God is that our minds and brains are often incapable of comprehending what is truly happening. Therefore, one of the greatest things you can do is to trust God. Like Job, we can come to say, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.” Trusting God is all that matters.

PRAYER