Sermon for Lent 4a

A couple of weeks ago Father Keith really challenged me in one of his sermons. He said, quite frankly, that God was always running away from us. Now I knew he might be heading that way in that particular sermon, but I wasn’t ready for just how hard that statement would hit me. God is constantly running away from us. It hit me like a ton of bricks.

Fortunately, the same God who is always on ahead is also right here waiting, ready to help those of us who need some time to rest – some time to think, and God was gracious enough to give me this fabulous set of lessons this Sunday. They begin with a line that defines for me the way in which all the rest must be read, “The Lord said to Samuel, ‘How long will you grieve over Saul?’” There are plenty of places in the Bible when humans cry out to God asking, “how long…?” This week, however, it struck me that the roles were reversed; it wasn’t a human asking God, but it was God asking his prophet – his own mouthpiece – “how long…?” Though it goes unsaid in the rest of our lessons for this week, God could easily begin each lesson with a variation of the same question.

To Samuel – “How long will you grieve over Saul?”

To the Psalmist – “How long will you worry about the things of this life?”

To the Church in Ephesus – “How long will you sit in darkness? How long until you will rise from the dead?”

And Jesus could easily ask his disciples, “How long will you worry about whose sin it was?” Or to the Pharisees he could ask, “How long will you sit in judgment without seeing your own sin?”

How long indeed! And how many times has God had to stop and wait for me, only to ask, “how long?” “How long will the image of me running out ahead of you bother you?” The possible endings to the how long question are without number.

The story of the man born blind has many opportunities to ask “how long?” As we often associate ourselves with the blind man it is easy to ask disparaging questions of the disciples and the Pharisees, but what if we aren’t him. What if we fill another role within the story, say that of a member of the crowd? Then more questions become available – the story opens up in front of us.

Jesus and his disciples are walking and happen upon a beggar who has been blind since the day he was born. We know this man. He has been a nuisance in the street for years – always asking for spare change – we pass him by - he’ll probably just buy booze or meth with it anyway. But Jesus’ disciples don’t just pass by; they want to learn from this man’s plight. “Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” “Both,” we might mutter under our breath, “the whole lot of them are a pain in the neck.” Jesus answers very differently, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.” Or, if we were going to fit our question for today, Jesus’ response asks the question, “How long will you seek blame for the bad things in this world? How long will you judge a man who has done no wrong? How long will you miss the message of God’s Kingdom that I have preached?”

To our amazement, Jesus approaches the man and without another word – without warning - he spits on the ground, mixes up some mud and places it on the man’s eyes telling him, “Go wash in the Pool of Siloam.” And then, just as quickly as he appeared on the scene Jesus is gone. The man returns having never seen the man who healed him. But much to our chagrin the man returns with his sight restored. Our understanding of life has just been altered. God had judged that man already; that is why he was born blind. Things were not supposed to get better for him and his wretched family; rather he was getting what they all deserved. This just isn’t right! So we pepper the man with questions, none of which suit our understandings. Still we are at a loss, things aren’t right. To the Pharisees; they’ll know what to do with him!

Just as we suspected, the Pharisees know how to handle this situation. Not only did this healing turn upside down our long held understanding of how the world works, but to be healed on the Sabbath – or rather to heal on the Sabbath – is a direct violation of one of the ten most sacred laws of Moses. Yah Pharisees! Go for the kill!

Plan A – Get them both on the sin factor – for as we know being born blind is the result of sin AND healing on the Sabbath is a sin. But then how did the healing happen; a sinner can’t do such miracles!?

Plan B – It wasn’t a healing at all – this is an elaborate scam to get that radical preacher Jesus more followers. So they call the man’s parents, but uh oh, he is that man. He was blind from birth. We have stepped over him for years hoping he would just go away and die.

Back to Plan A – go for sin again. But as if the man’s spiritual eyes have been opened in this moment he responds to the obvious attempt to discredit the event with great conviction, “Now that is remarkable! You don't know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly man who does his will. Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.”

On to Plan C – GET OUT! The Pharisees have stumbled upon the same problem we, the crowd did, this thing happened and it doesn’t fit in our system.

And suddenly Jesus, as if he has run ahead to be right here - right now reappears in front of the man. Having only heard a few words from him, we forgive the man for not recognizing his voice. Having never seen Jesus, we understand that he might feel like he’s back under attack in the streets as Jesus asks him, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” Just as quickly as the man was healed, and just as fast as Jesus turned our understanding of the world upsidedown – Jesus once again asks “how long?” “How long will you who claim to see hold onto your blindness?”

We have been eager to get life back to normal. For us, that means that the blind are punished by God. It means that the God only works through the approved channels. It means that we’ve got it all together – that our understanding is the one true faith. But even the defenders of our faith, the Pharisees can’t set things back in line. They are left only to admit the miracle, but expel the man anyway. Things will never be the same.

When God enters our life it is always a surprise. Often, without any warning, without even asking for help, we are sent to Siloam to wash the mud from our eyes. Then God goes on ahead and many are left to ask, “How can this be so?” God ponders a different question, “How long will you wait for things to get back to normal? Don’t you understand that once I’m a part of your life things will never be the same?” Where do we fit in that story? Are we the man born blind – dumbstruck by our new circumstance? Are we the crowd – uncomfortable with what these new things mean for us? Are we the disciples – on that journey yet still blind? Whoever we are, it is clear, God wants our eyes to be open so that we can see him on ahead because he is growing tired of asking, “How long?”