Unbelief - John 9:17-18

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com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. Reading from John chapter 9 from verse 13. They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind.

And it was the Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. So the Pharisees again asked him how that he had received his sight. And he said to them, he put mud on my eyes and I washed and I see. Some of the Pharisees said, this man is not from God for he does not keep the Sabbath. But others said, how can a man who is a sinner do such signs?

And there was a division among them. So they said again to the blind man, what do you say about him since he has opened your eyes? He said, he is a prophet. The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight and asked them, is this your son who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?

His parents answered, we know that this is our son and that he was born blind. But how he now sees, we do not know, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him. He is of age. He will speak for himself.

His parents said these things because they feared the Jews, but the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Jesus to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue. Therefore, his parents said, he is of age, ask him. So for the second time, they called the man who had been blind and said to him, give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner. He answered, whether he is a sinner, I do not know.

One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see. They said to him, what did he do to you? How did he open your eyes? He said to them, I have told you already and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again?

Do you also want to become his disciples? And they reviled him saying, you are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from. The man answered, why, this is amazing thing. You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes.

We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. They answered him, you were born in utter sin, and would you teach us? And they cast him out.

Amen. This is the word of our Lord. And our Lord himself said that heaven and earth will pass away, but not one word of his words will pass away. Let's come before him now and ask his blessing on our time together this evening. Lord, we ask that you would be among us this evening by your Holy Spirit.

Teach our hearts the word, Lord. Give us eyes to see, ears to hear. Give us hearts to receive that which comes from your mouth. I pray, Lord, that only that which corresponds to your truth will be spoken, and that you would apply your word in the hearts of your people as you see fit. We ask these things in Jesus' name.

Amen. So brothers and sisters and friends, we continue our time through the ninth chapter of the gospel according to John. We've been in this chapter for many weeks now, so the context and the content of the chapter should be fairly fresh in our minds. We know the overarching story, although we started a portion of the way through. We know the narrative, we know chapter nine speaks about this one miracle, this miracle.

of a man who's born blind, who sees his sight at the hand of Jesus Christ. So there's probably no need for us to have a very long intro to what this chapter is about. We can pretty much start from where we got to last week, and we got to verse 17 last week. However, having said that, we will barely touch on verse 18 this week. And the reason for this is because there has been some points that I referenced last week, or at least made mention of overarching principles and truths that carry through this whole chapter that I just want us to be made aware of.

hoping that they will become clearer in our minds. This chapter is indeed a chapter that speaks to the religious authorities in this day. What did religion look like? What were the authorities in these days? How did these people live?

What did they receive? What was the example given to them? And it is indeed the Pharisees in particular who are in question. It is the Pharisees in particular. And so we'll see here by God's grace, I hope this evening, we will see the depth of unbelief, the depth of what had come to be called true religion, which was nothing more than religiosity, nothing more than cold ritualism.

And then we'll go on to see towards the end how deep unbelief sinks into the human soul and how it is that not only were these religious leaders in this day succumb to it, but every single human being who's ever walked the planet in Adam is also troubled with unbelief, apart from the divine intervention of the Lord. So where are we? We're at now, we're at the point where the religious elites, the spiritual heavyweights, those who are teachers of the law, those who are the experts in scripture, the Pharisees have been enlisted to do an investigation on behalf of the people. The people have enlisted the services of the Pharisees for good reason. What is the reason?

I said last week, it is hard to know exactly, but it would be fair to assume the reason was something grand had already taken place. This man who was born blind has now received his sight. And the people who are witnessing to these things, the neighbors in particular, they had brought this man to the Pharisees because they'd come to know him. likely for years as a staple on the pathway there in Jerusalem. A man who they come to know with his hands always out receiving the arms from people hoping they give him a few points for him to get through a few more days.

The man they come to know as the blind beggar. is now claiming to see. Not only claiming to see, but proven he can see. That in and of itself is a miracle of grand proportions and it boggled their mind. But beyond the miracle is this.

When asked, how did this come about, this man was so clear and concise that he came straight to the point and he said, the man they call Jesus is the one who's responsible. He's the one who mixed up some mud with his saliva, put it on my eyes, anointed my eyes, said to go down to the pool of saliva and to wash, and I came back seeing. Massive, massive miracle. Incredible miracle. And now they are baffled in and of themselves because they're thinking, could this be Messiah?

Could this be the anointed one from God? Could this be the one we've been waiting for centuries to come? Has he come in the power of God? Could this be the Messiah? Who better to tell them and answer that question than the ones who are deemed to be the religious experts the ones who have committed their whole life to Torah, the ones who committed their whole life to the Scriptures and the prophecies of old that speak to a Messiah to come, and when the Messiah was to come, what you would expect from the advent of Messiah.

If anyone was going to be able to identify Messiah, when he came, the Christ, when he came, it'd be none other than those religious experts that we look up to, the Pharisees. And so they call upon the Pharisees and say, will you help us? They bring this blind man to the Pharisees, and they present him to them. You can almost hear in their voices, their cries, tell us, please tell us, is this the man they call Jesus? Is this the one we're looking for?

Please tell us, is this the Messiah? We're trusting you now. Tell us, is this truly, is this truly The Messiah, tell us. We know up until this point that you've rejected his claims. You've made that fairly clear.

We know that you've rejected his teachings, you've rejected his proclamations, you've rejected his invitations, and you've told others to do the same because you've taken it upon yourselves as the holy men of Israel, as those who are spiritually discerned to protect this nation from anything that is false. And you've claimed already that this Jesus brings forth falsities, that he's a fraud, that he's a hoax, he's not the real deal. Well, we know that that's what you've said to us. How can he explain this miracle? How can we explain a miracle that created sight from where there was never sight?

A man who'd never seen the light of day can now see his eyes were turned off, no life, and now there is life. Only God can do this. How can we explain it? Maybe you'd reconsider. Maybe you'd ask this man and do your investigations, and maybe you'd be convinced and then inform us of the truth.

Can anyone else, can anyone else other than God Almighty perform such a miraculous wonder like this? Investigate for us, please, and tell us what you find. Is this Jesus the one? Wow, how sad. How sad that it seems that these religious men were the hope of lay people at this time.

So sad that they're looking to them to reveal truth, and these so-called religious men had already made up their mind. They'd already rejected Jesus. They'd already formed an agenda, and they're actioning that agenda. And as far as what we can see, there is nothing, no one, or no persuasive influence that can change their mind. You see this religious sect, the sect of the Pharisees, they may have been quite well intended when they were established.

They've been around at this point for around 200 years, depending on what you look, could be up to 250 years even. They've been around for a while, and as I alluded to last week, the name Pharisee simply means separated. the ones who are set apart ones. And the reason why they put upon the poor themselves that was because they were going to separate themselves and encourage Israel to be separated from anything that is unholy, anything that is unrighteous, anything that is contrary to the Word of God. We need to separate from that.

We need to We want to pursue Torah purity, not just in our lives as examples of those who are the people of God and how they should live according to the precepts and the rules and the commands of God, but we also want to encourage the people of Israel to do the same because their idea was if we can bring Torah purity, we usher in the messianic kingdom. The kingdom of Messiah would come and he would come and see a pure nation. But beloved, we know already that these people, these Pharisees, had established a system. It was a man-made system. As I said, they may be well-intended and sincere when they began, but then after a while, they took a system of do's and don'ts, a system that would follow the letter for the sake of the letter, would be strict for the sake of strictness, that would build hedges around the law of God because they were so fearful that God's law would be broken.

But rather than know God and love Him, they would build hedges around it and fences around those hedges. If you broke something that was a rule or a precept, you hadn't gone as far as breaking the law of God and that will protect the people, they thought. We saw this so clearly as we worked our way through this gospel already. We've addressed John chapter five, another miracle that took place on the Sabbath day. But if we read through the synoptic gospels as well over and again, you'll see how highly elevated these people recognize the Sabbath to be.

And it ought to be because it was a law of God. But we saw the abuse, of the Sabbath day, the abuse of this form of religiosity, this cold religion was seen through their practices on the Sabbath day, that day which was supposed to be a day of joy. We know how the Sabbath was established among the people of Israel, do we not? Do we not know as they were freed and rescued from the land of Egypt where they knew nothing but bondage? Seven days a week they labored on the sweat of their brows, no rest.

And God says, I am gonna give you a day of rest. I'm gonna covenant with you. And the glory of knowing Yahweh is that he will give you all good gifts. And one of those good gifts is the Sabbath day, one day in the seven, you will rest. and you will rest from your labors, yourself and your manservants, your maidservants, your animals, you will rest, and on that day, you will give thanks to God for His goodness and His grace.

Give thanks to God that He has chosen to covenant with you, to place His love upon you. On that day should be a day of joy and thanksgiving. And the oppression that they placed on the people with all these rules, it no longer was a day of joy. It was no longer a day of rest. It became a burden, it became a fear.

And as I said the other week, it was as though they're walking on eggshells and only a matter of time, one of those shells will break and you're gonna be seen as a lawbreaker. How difficult was that? How horrible to live under those conditions. It is because it was a rule, a system that was very much concerned in obeying the letter for the sake of obeying the letter, but love. Love for God was not present.

Truth is this, the religion in this day was one that adopted and espoused by the Pharisees was one that had lost sight of true religion. And what it turned out to be was abominable in God's eyes. We know this because we see how Jesus speaks to the Pharisees. The woes, remember the woes, the seven woes, and what seems to be quite harsh judgments that Jesus proclaims upon them. We see this throughout the scripture.

But I think the apostle John has here, in John chapter nine, he's given us an elaborate description of the circumstances around this miracle, a full chapter dedicated to one miracle. And I think he has it there for a reason, so that we can look at the lives of the Pharisees, that we can see how they conducted themselves in this first century, what they believed, and how they were treating God's people, so that we too will learn from that, I believe, as a warning to every single one of us, everyone who comes and reads this word. So that we will know, above all things, that God hates this type of religion. God hates this type of religion. The religion that does not, it does not accept, sorry, the religion that God does accept is a religion that is spirit wrought.

It's a religion that is a religion that is founded and rooted in a genuine faith and a faith that is working through completed. Love. It's a faith that is working through love. Faith given by God and the love of God that permeates the heart overflows. Love for God and love for neighbor.

The combination of the law is what? To love God and to love neighbor. If you take what God has written, you try to apply what God has written, and you dislocate or devoid what is written from faith, working through love, then what you have is something cold and ritualistic and something that God despises. And what we see here is the religious leaders of the day have come to the point where they've lost sight of true religion, and they have now begun, or not begun, for a period now, imposed something that is cold and stony, devoid of love, and God hates this type of religion. You see, at the essence really is that people who had really forgotten, I would think, their origins.

It's important for us because we've been working our way through the Pentateuch, the books of Moses, and we've seen the origins. We've seen the covenant that God made with Abraham. We've seen how that was established, and we've worked our way through through man, and then his family, and the extension of his family, and they go into Egypt, and they're under bondage, and now they're released from Egypt, and now they're in the wilderness. We've seen God covenant with them and give them their law, and now they're at the brink of the Jordan River, about to cross over into the West to take possession of the land. We've seen how this has worked out, and we must say that the reason God chose these people was not because they were righteous, he says so.

It was not because they were strong or more plentiful than others. No, it wasn't that at all. The reason why God chose Abraham and his descendants, that he would choose them as his own people, was simply because God chose them. That's it. He chose to pour his love out upon them.

He chose to give them the promises. The promises through a covenant, a great blessing land that he would be their God and they would be his people if they would just obey. But it wasn't because they were an obedient people, we've gone through history, they were far from it. But when God chose these people, He chose them simply because He chose to place His love upon them. They did not merit His favor.

They are unworthy and undeserving, yet He chose them anyway. He chose to set His love upon them, to pour out His favor upon them that they had not earned. And that's what we call grace. The only response, the only rightful response to a God who's shown that sort of love is what? It's not cold-hearted, ritualistic obedience, ticking the boxes saying, God, I will do, just give me what I need to do and I'll just do the no.

It is a heart that is fully engaged, a heart that loves Him, a heart that is embracing Him, a heart that embraces the Lord God for who He is and what He has done. Beloved, it's a heart that is overflowing with love for a God who's poured out so much more than you ever dream or imagine. Because when the heart is bricked with love for God, when a heart is given over, and predispose or dispose the disposition of the heart is that of love for Yahweh, truly for what he has done, for the grace that he's poured upon me that I do not deserve. Then and only then will obedience follow. Then and only then will obedience begin to flow because you become a child of God and that obedience is empowered not by your strength of mind, but by the power of God that is dwelling in you.

Take love out of the equation you're left with called religion, a type of religion that we see in these days. that looked clean on the outside, that looked holy, that had the respect of the people. Their system was well built and the people knew no better than to submit to what they said and what they did. But they did not love God. And therefore, beloved, let me tell you this.

Their religion was worthless. Good for nothing. good for nothing, a worthless religion. They were a loyal group of men, you've got to give them that much, but their loyalty was to a worthless religion and not to an ever worthy God. Their loyalty was to the system they had built up, the religion they had built, and their loyalty was not to Yahweh.

And the devastating thing is they couldn't differentiate between the two. Loyalty to religion and loyalty to Yahweh himself. It was one and the same for them. It can't be. a religion of do's and don'ts, and they led the people down that path.

They had the responsibility to teach the people the Torah. They did have the true scriptures, and they preserved it, thanks be to God. But they taught them according to their own understanding. And as I said earlier, do's and don'ts. They were very good, very good at pointing the lay people to the book.

Not this whole book. The first portion of the book, 39 chapters, indeed, the Old Testament. They were very good at pointing people to the book. And that's not a bad thing. But they weren't able to point them to the author of the book.

Do you know why they weren't able to point them to the author of the book? Because they did not know him according to Jesus' words. The author of the book was foreign. to these religious leaders. Brothers and sisters, all that to say that we must be very careful not to pursue religion for religion's sake.

That the pursuits of our hearts, the pursuits of our soul, the very being that we have that the Lord has given us will pursue, not religion, but a true, living, eternal being. That our pursuits are pursuits of God himself through his son, Jesus Christ. As I said, religion is worthless without Him. The purpose of this book is not primarily to teach you how to live. It does that.

But the purpose of this book, or the primary purpose of this book, is to reveal God through His Son, Jesus Christ. Let's not get it the other way around. You fall into a mess if you get it the other way around. The treasure of this book is not found primarily in the instruction, although it is an instructive book. The treasure of this book is in the instructor.

And then you'll understand and be empowered to obey the instruction. How easy is it to get so excited in the detail? How easy is it to get so excited in connecting the dots and neglect the treasure that we've been given, the one who actually breathed this word and has opened up to make himself known to his creatures, the greatest privilege to mankind. It's so easy to get lost in the details. Often when our kids were young, on special occasions, we would give them gifts.

My wife would often be the one who'd wrap them. I learned very early I'm not gifted in that area at all. So Annie was the one who would wrap the gifts and often she would get the wrapping that would appease to the child. depending on the child, it might be some cars, colourful cars with this bright wrapping, some ribbons on top, or it might be flowers for the girls, whatever it is. It always amused me how often we would give the gift to the child, and just watching them unwrap the gift, more often than not, we'd have a little camera in our hand to capture the moment.

And you'd see the child all excited, beaming with smiles and laughter and happiness. And going through, unwrapping the gift, really well wrapped, so it took them some time to rip the wrapping off and take the ribbons off and so forth. And it always used to amuse me how often they would get through the wrapping, put the gift to one side, and then come back and play with the wrapping. And it's almost like, no, no, no, you're missing the point. That's a valuable gift over here.

Enjoy that. This is worthless wrapping. This is not the main deal. Come over here. Let's take a photo.

Are you enjoying that? Not this. This is embarrassing. Beloved, it was amazing to see how enamored and entertained they were with the worthless wrapping. They missed the whole point of the gift.

You see, no matter what the religiosity or the rooting of the religiosity comes from, like these Pharisees, they went to the book. They went to the Old Testament, no deriving what they thought were principles from the Old Testament. But can I tell you, you take You take the God of the Old Testament away from this book and you're left with worthless religion. You're left with worthless religion. And that religion as a whole is being enamored with the wrapping rather than the gift itself.

I'm not saying you have a worthless book. Whether or not they acknowledge it, this is the word of God, and we recognize it as the word of God. But I'm talking about the collective religion as a whole that they've derived from this book. You remove the treasure, who is God, and God alone, and you're left with nothing of value. Nothing.

And if you have an influence over others, And the scary thing is you're leading them down the wrong path also. Here's the thing. Just because that type of religion is an empty religion, that's built on precepts, do's and don'ts, and devoid of love, devoid of faith, and really has kicked God out of the equation, it is worthless religion. But here's the thing, it doesn't mean it's worthless to the one who holds it. You can be deceived into thinking it's all about the wrapping.

I mean, that's true. No, that's a fact. But beloved, that religion becomes very dear to one's soul, even though it's worthless. That's the nature of deception, and it's the scary thing. Because that religion, although there's no benefit in it, although it's not true, although it's despised by God, is held near to the heart.

And one will allow that worthless religion to bind their own conscience. One will allow that worthless religion to capture their affections, to grip their emotions, to shape their devotions, to influence their thinking. You'll go to great lengths to defend that which is worthless and think you're doing something prudent. You'll even rejoice with those who adopt it and take it on board, and you will look down upon those who question it, even though it is worthless religion. Beloved, it will even give you a sense of safety and security, counterfeit it may be, but you will still in one way or another rest upon it, even though it is worthless and powerless religion.

If you have an influence on others, as I said, you'll teach it. You'll defend it with vigor. All the while, you'll be damaging the person or the persons who hear it, whilst condemning your own soul to an eternity of hell. And this is what we see before us in the Pharisees. Our Lord issued to them a very terrifying rebuke that reads like this from Matthew chapter 23.

He says, but woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you shut the kingdom of heaven in people's faces, for you neither yourselves. Sorry, for you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, for you travel across land and sea to make a single proselyte. A proselyte is a convert. And when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much child of hell as yourself.

What a heavy rebuke. That is the essence of false religion, of empty religion. It's damning to the soul, because it is devoid of the treasure of true religion, which is God himself, the triune God, who's made himself known through Jesus Christ. And this Jesus Christ now presents himself to these Pharisees, and they'll have nothing to do with him. As I said earlier, and that is because they did not know God, and therefore they will not know His Son.

They didn't know the essence, the spiritual essence of the Word of God. And so when the Son spoke, and the same DNA is in the Word. They could not identify the truth, even though it stared them straight in their faith. That's the type of religion that was going on in this day. And that's the approach that the Pharisees took towards investigating whether this Jesus is truly responsible for the healing that took place with a man who'd previously been born blind.

So you could say, really, because they have a religion, a system that they will defend at all costs, because remember, their safety and security is in this establishment rather than being in God himself. Then when someone like Jesus comes along the line and threatens to mess up their system, they go into damage control. And that's what we see before us, damage control, because Jesus has no place for their religion. If Jesus was to be accepted amongst their peers and others, everything they built would come collapsing down. We heard the rebukes that Jesus rebuked them with.

Jesus looked them in the eye and said, your father is the devil. If Jesus was responsible for this miracle, he would indeed turn the hearts and the minds of the people towards him. They can't have that. The name of Jesus must never be spoken in this way. It certainly must never be associated with a creation miracle such as what has already occurred.

So Jesus needs to be disapproved at all costs. Beloved, we see two two differing views. We looked at them partially last week. One was that some, which is probably the majority of the Pharisees, would say this Jesus cannot be from God because he broke the law. He breaks the Sabbath.

We looked into that mildly last week. The breaking of the Sabbath was simply that he broke what they believed to be the Sabbath, those hedges that they built around the Sabbath day. Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath. He works on the Sabbath. He said, my father's working.

I am working. We know that and established that point. But Jesus, they deemed Jesus as a lawbreaker because he broke what they deemed to be law. But then you have this other group of Pharisees, the others who saw things a little bit different. Despite the claim that Jesus had broken the Sabbath and could not be from God because he was a sinner, yes, that's what their peers are saying, but then you've got this whole thing about a man being born blind who can now see.

You just can't take that out of your mind. And they're looking at what you've done and thinking, how could this be? This man is prancing around seeing, and we know by the testimony of those who know him that he was once blind. Those who fit in that category, those Pharisees who are thinking this way, had their consciences pierced, and they just couldn't dismiss it. A man being born blind can now see?

That's a big detail, and it requires explanation. Are they new enough to know only Yahweh has the power to bring about a miracle? They knew enough. They knew enough to know that Yahweh is the one who is able to bring sight to the blind. They knew enough from their understanding of the Old Testament.

We looked at some of the passages last week, or at least one, Isaiah 35, that they knew that when the advent of Messiah would come, that he would come with all sorts of healings. So how can they just completely dismiss this? What do you remember? Came to Jesus by night. Who was it?

Nicodemus. And you remember the first words that Nicodemus spoke to Jesus when he came by night? He had the same thing on his heart. In fact, this is what he says. He says, now there in John chapter 3 verse 1, now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a rule of the Jews.

This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God. But no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. We know you're a teacher from God. How do you know Nicodemus? We've seen the signs.

That's the power of God. God must be with you. God must be with you. And so now back in chapter nine, you have this internal struggle happening in the heart of some of these Pharisees who have seen that God must be involved in this. And if this man who was previously blind swears black and blue, then it is Jesus who is the one who made him see.

And that point will hurt their minds and put in their minds a question like we read in verse 16, how can a man who is a sinner do such signs? Then you have that division that's going on. And as I said the other week, house divided among itself cannot stand. The Pharisees are, for the most part, united. They have some differences in doctrine.

But they had been united in one thing, and that is to kill Jesus, to conspire to remove him and his influence out of the way. He was too destructive to their system. And they've already made that decision. We've already worked through many instances where they tried to bring him to death. in the last chapter that ended by them carrying stones to stone him.

They had already made up their mind that for that to be action, time had not yet come, but for that to be action they needed some form of unity one with the other. So they could not have a fracture among them, so they all needed to come on the same boat. So what do they need to do? This is a critical thing that they needed to do to remove Christ, and they needed to have some form of unity, a collective concerted effort to get this done together. And there's only two ways that they can bring about this unity.

And I'll do it through the investigations and the interrogations. Either, phase one, either they'll refute the miracle had it even occurred in the first place, there was no miracle, it was a hoax, it was fake, it just didn't happen, nothing further required, just convince the people that it just did not happen, and they wouldn't have a hard time doing that, they were pretty highly respected. Or phase two would be, if they're not successful in convincing people that the miracle did not take place, then what they would have to do is convince everyone that Jesus is a sinner. That would also work for them. Because if Jesus was a sinner, then he could not possibly have been responsible for this miracle.

Okay, they would have to concede that the miracle took place. They would take that blow. But it's okay, they'll accept that as long as Jesus is not responsible to be the power behind the efficacious miracle that took place before the people. As long as Jesus doesn't take the credit. Can you see the contriving?

the difficulty they have in their mind, because they have an agenda, and they have to get rid of Jesus, because Jesus is too destructive to their beliefs and to their agendas. That's the lengths of their unbelieving hearts will go to, to go tell the truth. After speaking with the man in question, and they got no further with him, they didn't get very far, because this guy was like, these are the points. This is what happened. Night in my eyes, wash my eyes, now I can see."

It was Jesus' clearest day. And his confidence, by the way, gets stronger and stronger as the story goes on. Keep that in your mind. But after speaking to this man, and they got nowhere with him, they thought, okay, we need to go and turn our attention to his parents. If they can get the parents on their side, even through coercion, they could with their testimony, testimony of the parents that is, cast serious doubt upon the testimony of this man that can make him look like a fool possibly.

They can make him look like a crazy person. After all, this is his parents and this is what they say. So that would be the agenda. This is the course of action that they begin to take. And then we have before us verse 18.

The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight and asked him, is this your son who you say was born blind? How then does he now see? Still in phase one. Phase one of the plan is to discredit the miracle, to try to convince that the miracle did not take place. That was the resolve.

And interestingly, we're told in the beginning of verse 18, and that's probably as far as we're going to go today, the Jews did not believe that he had been blind and received his sight. They hadn't believed it. They'd spoken to the man, they still hadn't believed it. But then we have something very interesting. We have the word until.

They hadn't believed that this man, this blind man, had received his sight until, until they called the parents. Now you might read these words and you might think to yourself, okay, so they came in unbelief, but once they'd spoken to the parents, possibly they'd become believers. Not so much as believing in Christ, but believing that this man was indeed blind. and that he was made to see, and that the one responsible for his seeing was none other than this Jesus Christ, who he claims to have done this, but that would be so far away from what's going on here. It's not the case.

He'll be, or they'll be, interrogating the parents, and they will walk away believing, I believe anyway, that this man was blind. They're not gonna deny the miracle, but there's no way in this world they can attribute that miracle to Christ. None. In fact, right after they speak to the parents, in verse 24, we're told, speaking to the blind man or man who once was blind, they look him in the eye and they say, we know this man, speaking of Christ, is a sinner. And God doesn't go hand in hand with sinners.

Miracle did happen, but Jesus is not responsible for the power and the sign and the wonder that you have seen. Thinking about the whole narrative, I kept asking myself over and over again, it lends one to say, what will it take? What will it take for these religious men to finally believe? And not only the miracle took place, but it was Christ who brought it about. What will it take?

And what more? What more do they want? What more evidence does it require for them to come to the belief that indeed the miracle took place and the one who effected the miracle was the power of God through the Son of God, Jesus Christ. What more do they need? They have the scripture.

I said that before. They've read it. They've studied it. They knew it. They knew the prophecies.

Isaiah 35, we spoke about last week. I said that the advent of Messiah would come with the blind seeing, the deaf hearing, the good news proclaimed to the poor and the captives set free. There are certain signs and wonders that would come, the lame walking and the lepers cured. And they knew, they knew when they saw this in abundance that this Jesus, this Christ, this Messiah was among them. Yet that was not enough.

Neighbours, they had the neighbours. They had those who had known the blind man rightly for years and they're the ones who enlisted them because, hey religious leaders, we can't deny it. Can you please investigate and tell us? They had the testimony of the neighbours. That wasn't enough.

They had the testimony of the man himself. He's the one who proclaimed, it is I, it is I, I'm the one, I was blind, and now I am made to see, and it was none other than this Jesus who made me see. And they'd spoken to him in their first interrogation of him, and he said that he is a prophet, he is from God, that means he speaks for God, something that they're denying, this man cannot be from God, he's a sinner, but they didn't believe him. they had the testimony of the parents and you might say hold on that didn't go very far because all they did was confess that this is our son and yes he was born blind you can now see but that's as far as they went right but but then you But they knew that's as far as they went because of the coercion and the fear that they had in the hearts of these people. We're told in verse 22, the reason why they said, go speak to our son, it was because fear of these Jews.

And these Jews could smell fear from a mile away because they're so used to cornering people in this day and seeing them act in a way that is fearful. If they weren't fearful, they would have said, yes, this is our son. And yes, he was born blind. And yes, he's told us that this Jesus is the one who brought him sight. But they couldn't go as far as that.

Why? Because of the fear of the Jews of being put out of the synagogue. That persecution was coming if you declared Jesus for who he is. And we'll look at that next time we're in the Gospel of John. The persecution coming for those who proclaim the Lord.

So they still don't believe. What will it take? Back to that question. What will it take for them to believe? Perhaps it will take a greater miracle.

Maybe that's what is required. The miracles are getting greater and greater, aren't they? I mean, they're probably none as abundant and abundantly witnessed as the one in John chapter six, the fitting of the 5,000. The miracles are extraordinary. Now we see a creation miracle, but maybe it needs to be deepened.

Maybe the miracle, perhaps, if it was a greater miracle, maybe that's when they will believe. I think some of your minds are going to Luke chapter 16. Let's open our Bibles to Luke chapter 16 to answer that question. I don't often take you to the passages, but I think it's best that we read this narrative of the miracle. Luke chapter 16 from verse 19.

It's self-explanatory, so I wouldn't have to explain it. Lift up to 16, from verse 19, will a greater miracle bring forth faith. There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day and at the gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus. He was covered with sores, who desired to be fed with that which fell from the rich man's table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores.

The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried, and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. and he called out, Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue for I am in anguish in this flame. But Abraham said, child, remember that you were in your lifetime received your good things and Lazarus didn't like manner, bad things, but now he is confronted or comforted here and you are in anguish. And besides all this, between us and you, is a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.

And he said, then I beg you, Father, send him to my father's house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment, that they may believe, that they may have faith in what is to come. But Abraham said, They have Moses and the prophets. What is that, beloved? They have the word of God. Let them hear them, he said.

no father abraham but if someone goes to them from the dead there's your greater miracle then they will repent then they will believe somehow they will conjure up that miracle of faith within them a genuine faith within them father abraham sent someone from the dead 31 he that is abraham said to him if they do not hear moses and the prophets god has always kept the testimony Neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead. It wasn't a greater miracle that is needed. But I would even before the resurrection of our Lord which they will also deny. in only a few chapters time, we're in 9, in chapter 11, you have that 7th of 7 miracles that are recorded for us in the gospel according to John before the crucifixion of our Christ. In there, in that chapter, in chapter 11, we do have an example where one does come back from the dead.

His name is Lazarus. Not the same Lazarus. Lazarus. And we're told when he does come back from the dead that these Pharisees, the religious leaders, they are unimpressed. The evidence is all stacked up against them that this is the real deal, a greater miracle.

Is it a greater miracle that is required to produce faith in these men? The question that we originally asked. Will they get the greater miracle? And what is their response? Their response is now they have a list, a hit list.

And on that hit list was a Jesus Christ. Now let's put Lazarus on there. And they plotted from that time to kill him. Let's kill the power, the one who resurrected Lazarus from the dead. And let's also get rid of the evidence.

This is unbelief on display from the religious leaders. And it's especially on display here for us to see, beloved, here in chapter nine. I get it. The emphasis is on the Pharisees. The emphasis is on the cold religion.

The emphasis was on the oppression. I get it. We're meant to see the dismal state that religion had come to in the first century when Jesus roamed the earth. But beloved, This type of unbelief is a universal problem. It's a universal problem because it's not the magnitude of the miracle that one witnesses that will convince a person to believe.

but nonetheless it is required that a miracle take place and it is a grand miracle but it's not one that is witnessed through your eyes or your senses out there. It's a miracle that's witnessed in here. It is still a miracle that is required. but one that is done by God through the power of His Holy Spirit, through the proclamation of His Word about His Son, Jesus Christ, the only Savior, the only one who can bring about faith to the heart and the knowledge of who He is. There is no other way.

The default condition of man in Adam, every single human being who's ever been born since, the default condition is one of unbelief. Pitch darkness, not a spotlight. Pitch darkness. And darkness cannot be pervaded. It cannot be pushed away unless the divine hand of God moves.

and they have an encounter with him through his son and by his Holy Spirit. The triune God of the universe needs to move, beloved brothers and sisters. If you are sitting here this evening and you proclaim Christ as Lord and Savior, and you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you've had an encounter with him, that the Lord has united you into the life of Christ, can you share this? Spirit of Christ and you become the family of God, adopted as children of God, then you need to know that He's the triune God of the universe that moved in order for you, every single one of you who knows Christ, to be saved. No other way.

Faith comes no other way. God needs to move in and of yourself. You have no power to move the hand of God. The Spirit moves as He pleases, as He wills. You know not whether He comes from there or there.

He moves as He pleases, and He will save all that the Father has given to the Son, every single last one, and not one will be lost. Because we have a perfect Savior. It's a concerted effort. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Anything less, anything less, and you're left with the same type of religion that these Pharisees were espousing and pushing upon the people.

And I can tell you upon the testimony of the scripture that is before us, that that religion is powerless to save. Powerless. It's safe. Beloved, God needs to move. God needs to move.

It's not the magnitude or the quantity. It's not the type of miracle that he's witnessed. We weren't there. Have you seen any of the miracles that are written about here? I haven't.

Well, we believe. You know, have you ever thought about how the gospel according to John ends? The fourth gospel, it ends like this. It's very interesting. Verse 25 of the last chapter, which is chapter 21.

We read, now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. There are many other things that Jesus did. Of course, that includes Jesus spoke many things, but this is emphasizing that Jesus did, speaking about the miracles, the supernatural wonders, the signs, the incredible healings, the casting out of demons. Seven of those miracles are listed for us here, and many, many more in the gospels, right?

In the synoptic gospels. Many, many, many miracles. How many more? The apostle John is saying if they were all to be written in the books, all the books of the world would not be able to contain them. Let's just take a few verses of Luke chapter 6.

A few verses in Luke chapter 6 tells us that in there was a great multitude of sick people from all Judea and Jerusalem and the seacoast of Tyre and Sudan, and they all came to Him, that is Christ, and He healed some of them. He went into towns and cities and healed everyone. Beloved brothers and sisters, if you're following after Jesus Christ in this day, oh, you were in for a treat. You saw so many miracles that it was unbelievable. Miracle after miracle after miracle after miracle.

Yet, apart from those who believed in Samaria, and about 120 in the upper room, When Jesus was crucified, where were all those who had placed their faith in him? Where were they? Tens of thousands had been present, had witnessed with their own senses the miracles that Jesus had performed. Some 15 to 20 saw him change or multiply the bread. You remember that in John.

of people. Why were there so few from the countless witnesses who had actually come to believe? You can't but wonder if it is the miracles or the wonders or the signs that produce faith. Then all of Israel would have been saved. And Jesus would not have had any enemies.

And Jesus would not have been crucified. if it was simply that the miracles could convince one that he is God. That's not what we see, is it? Simply said, beloved, it's not the miracle that brings forth faith. It's God himself.

As I said, it's God himself through the gospel of his son. and through the power of his spirit. No other way. The God of the universe needs to move to save one wretched, unworthy sinner of whom I was once and still am. That God will move to save an unworthy sinner God himself who comes to redeem his people, God, who is the great God, who our minds just cannot fathom the fullness of who he is, has made a way to save you and to save me by sending forth his Son.

In human flesh, in the incarnation, you have the fullness of all that it is to be God in the person of Jesus Christ. That's what was required to save sinners like us. Let that amaze you. Let that bring your jaw down and amaze you. Don't let those truths become common.

Don't let the fact that you've read that passage over and over again Don't let the passage that you've read over and you've known the whole world knows, for God so loved the world. Beloved, that's it there again. Love. Why did God do this? For God so loved the world.

For God so loved the world. Motivated by love, he sent forth his son. For God so loved the world. But I'm unlovable. I'm unworthy of his love.

I'm a wretched sinner who waved my fist at God. I'm an enemy of God in and of myself. What is there about me that is lovable? Remember, it wasn't that you were lovable that he loved you, just like the Israelites were unrighteous and lovable when God chose to pour his love out on them. It's simply that he chose to love you.

before you were even born. Elected in love, you're elected in Christ. Let that marvel us and let that create in us a love for Him, a devotion to Him, and let it never cease to amaze us, beloved. The love of God in Christ Jesus that was demonstrated through His Son who was willing to become curse upon that cross to shed his blood for unworthy sinners like us. And let's keep that in mind through an attitude of worship and love of him when we evangelize our friends.

Yes, we try to persuade. Yes, we plead with them to come to Christ. Yes, we continue and continue and press and continue. But remember, if God does not move, there's no way they can believe this truth. You didn't believe it because you were smarter than the person next to you.

You believed it because the light of the world shone that light in your heart. And he revealed, he revealed the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. You couldn't see it, you were blind. Just like this blind man was blind, he couldn't see Christ walk by. He didn't call out for him.

All he knows is that Jesus took notice of a wretched blind man and he stooped down to his level to bring sight to his eyes. He stooped down to your level and mine. and became a human being in the condescension of the incarnation so that the living God will become man to die upon that cross and be the substitutionary atonement for all his people. Let that amaze us.