Trusting God Beyond What You Understand: Encouragement from John 9 (A Touch from Jesus Series - Part 4)

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Hello and welcome back to Grace for My Home. I'm Audrey McCracken, and I am so glad to be back with you again this week. I hope that you're doing well. We are doing great. Last week we had prom. I had one who was who went to prom last week. This week we are doing new floors in our home. That's quite the adventure. And so I'm spending the week trying to trying to maneuver that. And I'm excited about it. But it's like anything, it's not easy. You know, you're you want the end result, and it's going to be really nice. Um, we've had the same flooring, the same carpet since my children were born about 21 years ago, and it it's gone through three very active boys, and it is so past the time that we need a new carpeting. But this week is the week. So, but this week we are continuing and actually finishing a series that I started about four weeks ago. This is the last in this series, and I I called this series A Touch from Jesus, because in this series, we're talking about people who have had a problem, an issue for a long time, and it had actually become part of them and part of their identity. And Jesus comes on the scene, and the way he is, he is a healer, and he touches these people and changes everything. And so we have we've gone through three other instances, and today we're gonna talk about the man born blind, and his story is told in John 9. The whole chapter is about him. And I'm not gonna read the whole chapter to you because I don't want to lose you, but I will read the first part just to get us started. And this is what it says. Starting in verse 1. As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples ask him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents? That he was born blind. Neither this man nor his parents sinned, said Jesus. But this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, and no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world. After saying this, he spit on the ground, made mud with his saliva, and put it on the man's eyes. Go, he told him, wash in the pool of Salon. This word means scent. So the man went and washed and came home seeing. His neighbors and those who had formerly seen him begging asked, Isn't this the same man who used to sit and beg? Some claimed that he was. Others said no, he only looks like him. But he himself insisted, I am the man. You know, there's a part of our human nature, our flesh, that wants to put God in a neat little box. We want to figure him out. And we want to have answers. We want to have quick answers to our doubts, to other people's doubts and questions. And you know, we want to know the right answers. We want to know how God works, and we want to figure him out, and we're never going to be able to do that. You know, there is always going to be an element of mystery with God. You know, it's not that we can't know things about God. We definitely can know things about God. We can know his nature. You know, he gives us a lot of information about him and his ways and what he's like. But there is always more to learn. He is God. He changes not. It's not that he's changing on us, it's that we can't take him all in. You know, he changes not, but we are growing. We change. And we're as we learn more and more about him, our perception of him changes. Hopefully, our perception gets sharper and we understand him more and we grow in the knowledge of God. You know, that's the goal is to become more like him and to know him better. But in that process, we have to let go of our misconceptions when they're revealed to us. And we all have them. There are all of us

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have things that we believe are true about God that may not necessarily be true about God. And just when we think we have him all figured out, he will do something that we we just never never thought he would do, or do something in a way we've never seen before. You know, he keeps us on our toes, I guess you could say. And this is a situation where, you know, these disciples ask an honest question based on what they have been taught and what they believe to be true. Lord, this man was born blind who sinned? Where did the sin come from that resulted in this blindness? Was it him? I mean, he was born blind, so he didn't really have a lot of time to sin before he became blind, right? Or was it his parents' sin that was passed on to their child? But either way, they were confident that sin, a personal sin, resulted in this man's disability. Because that's that's how they believe, that's how they were taught. There are people in our world today who believe that suffering and sickness, that those things are the result of a personal sin. I have met them. I don't know if you had or not. And I do believe in consequences. You know, don't don't get me wrong. I do believe in personal responsibility. I believe that we have a lot of control over our life just by listening to God and making good choices. But I think there are some things that happen to us that are completely out of our control. And because we like things in nice little boxes with bows on top, sometimes we will try to draw assumptions or make correlations that that they don't they don't exist. We are born into a sinful world. God created a perfect world. Sin entered that world and marred the picture. And one of the results of sin in this world is death and sickness and broken relationships and evil. Evil was released in this world when sin opened the door. And we live in that fallen world and we're touched by it every day. Every bad thing that happens to us is not a direct result of our own personal sin. That's not how life works. And if we live that way, then we can become very judgmental. If we believe that's how the world works, we can become very judgmental because when we see people suffering or going through things, you know, our mind just automatically reasons that, well, they did something to deserve this. And we can, we can really, and that's not a good way to look on people who are suffering. Jesus didn't look on people that way. He cared. He spent a lot of time with sick people. You know, he, instead of trying to impress the Pharisees and the religious leaders, he spent a lot of time with those who could not give him anything in return. He spent a lot of time with people who were in need. And he met those needs. And if we believe that way, we can also live under a lot of condemnation because when bad things happen to us, we can think, well, I must have done something wrong. You see how those thoughts of this is how God works, when it's not necessarily how God works, it can affect the way that we see God and it can change our relationship with him and cause us not to be able to experience the intimacy and the closeness with him that we so want. And so Jesus is rearranging how these disciples of him see sin. And he tells them, this is not the result of his sin or his parents' sin. This is so I can show my glory. This is going to result in me being glorified here on earth. And that's what he wants to do in our lives. You know, the areas where we believe things that are not necessarily true, but we believe them because that's how we've always seen God. When he can come in and flip the script and show us that's not me, that's not how I operate, then it brings a whole it brings us to a whole nother level. We see him so much bigger, and we can draw near to him without fear. Another thing is Jesus did this healing completely different than he did other healings. In this series, even we've talked about how Jesus would reach out and touch the one who needed him, who needed healing, and they would be healed. We talked about the woman who reached out and touched Jesus and she was healed. There were even instances where Jesus wasn't even in the room. There were people who came to Jesus for their loved ones, and Jesus just spoke the word, and he wasn't even in the same area, and that person was healed. All Jesus had to do was speak the word. But in this particular situation, Jesus bent down, made mud out of his spit, and put it on the man's eyes. And the man was told to go bathe, wash it off, and he came back seeing, he came back healed. And, you know, this was different. Jesus did it different, but he's the healer, so he gets to choose. He gets to decide. But if we have in our mind that, you know, Jesus has done this before and this is how he did it, and this is how he's gonna do it again, then we can miss him because we are inflexible and we have already decided how it's gonna work out and how God's gonna do it. And if he wants to do something different, sometimes we won't allow him because it doesn't line up with the way we think he's supposed to do it, because it's not how he's done it in the past. And and maybe it's a way that we don't like, maybe it's uncomfortable. You know, maybe there were people standing around and saw Jesus make spit and mud and put it on the man's eyes and thought, that's gross. You know, maybe it was not to their liking. And maybe God is doing something in your life right now that's not to your liking, but it's an answer to your prayer and to your need. I encourage you to let him do it his way. Let him show you something new about himself that perhaps you you've not seen before. And it will, it will expand your understanding of him. It will make him so much bigger in your eyes. And when it's all said and done, you will see him as he truly is, and not how you think he is, or how you've been taught he is, or how you've learned up to this point that he is. I hope that's making sense. You know, Jesus wants to do a different kind of healing. He doesn't have to do it the same way he's always done it, and he usually won't do it the same way he's always done it. He is expanding us, he is stretching our faith. And you notice this man had to do something. He was blind, and Jesus tells him to go bathe in this certain pool. Read it for yourself in John 9. Like I said, I don't want to read the whole thing because I don't want to lose you, but the whole chapter is about this man and how Jesus healed him. Jesus told him to go bathe in this pool. So this man, blind as he is, had to go find this pool, bathe, and he was healed. But he had to work with Jesus. Jesus gave him instruction, Jesus gave him an assignment, and he had to go do the assignment to get the healing that he desired. And that was his faith. His faith was, I'm gonna do what this man says, I'm gonna do what Jesus says. And in the process, he's healed. And when he comes back, there are people who they don't even recognize him. They're like, this can't be the same man. This can't be the same man. And the Pharisees actually question him. And because Jesus did this on the Sabbath and they were always looking for reason to accuse Jesus, they question this man. They bring him in, and they even bring in his parents. And his parents are afraid of the Pharisees because they have said anyone who acknowledges Jesus as the Messiah is going to be kicked out of the synagogue. They can't come and worship. And so they they tell the Pharisees, you ask him. He is of age, he is a grown man. You know, we we know that he was born blind and that he can see now, but you'll have to ask him about the details. And so they do. And he tells them, they say, you know, glorify God for what has happened to you. But as far as this man, Jesus, we know he's a sinner. And then he, he's a very bold man. I gotta say, I guess once you've been blind and now you can see, it gives you the right to be a little bold. I mean, because you experienced the miracle, like you know Jesus is real. And he tells them, I don't know what y'all think he is, but all I know was I was blind and now I can see. And the only difference in between there was Jesus. The only thing that happened in between was Jesus. And he they say they ask him, Who do you think he is? And he says, I think he's a prophet. And that and they continue to question him. And he says, Do you want to believe in him like I believe in him? Do you want to be his disciple too? And they are irate. They kick him out, and they even they even condemn him. They say, You were born and steeped in sin because you were born blind. See, they believe that too. And they kick him out of the synagogue. And Jesus meets him at that low place where he's been kicked out by the Pharisees, and he tells the man who he is, and he worships him. See, he he's gone through something, he's gone through a process. You know, all of his life he's been told he's less than because he was born blind. All of his life he's been judged, all of his life, and now all of a sudden, he can see, and Jesus is glorified and he worships Jesus. See, his whole concept of God has been completely revamped because uh he he sees the one and his and his eyes have been opened. And you know, we read this and we see a man that God did a miracle for. But I want to tell you, God wants to do the same thing to us. Proverbs 2012 says, ears that hear and eyes that see, the Lord has made them both. He is the one that gives us eyes to see him and ears to hear him. And as we learn more about him, as we come to him for the needs of our heart and our life, as we allow him to do things differently than he's done them in our lives in the past, he opens our eyes to see him in a completely new way. We hear him in a completely new way. And he expands our understanding of him. See, when we try to put him in a box, then we limit how we know him. We limit what we will allow him to do in our lives. But when we say, Lord, your way, not my way, let me see you as you really are, not the way that I've made you, not the way that other people have told me you are. Let me see you for who you really are. That he opens our eyes and we get to experience him in such a powerful way. So I want to encourage you with this story. Please go read it for yourself. It's in John 9. I want to encourage you with this story. I want to encourage you in this whole series that Jesus meets your needs. He sees your needs, he cares about those who are brokenhearted, he cares about those who are suffering. He came to relieve suffering, or at least to suffer with us. We can know the fellowship of his sufferings. And he loves you today. He cares about the things that touch you, the things that are troubling you. He cares about those things. And when you come to him, he will minister to you. He will touch you, he will open your eyes to see things in a completely new light. You know, that is the greatest miracle is that we can know him, that we could serve him, that we could believe. That is the greatest miracle, is our salvation, that we can be children of God because he has given us faith. Isn't that good? So I want to pray for you before you go today. I do want to encourage you. If this message has spoken to you, if it's in if it's brought encouragement to your heart, would you please share it with someone who needs encouragement today? That would be the greatest way you could say thank you. Because I I do this because I want people to be encouraged, especially women, um, especially moms, but definitely not limited to. So if you have a friend who you think needs this message today, please send it to them and I would greatly appreciate it. But before I let you go, I want to pray today. I want to pray for you and believe with you for new things, and that you would know God is listening and cares about you. Father, in Jesus' name, my friend and I come to you today and we ask you for a miracle. God, I ask you that you would expand, Lord, the way she sees you. That Lord, you would touch those areas that need to be touched. And I pray, Lord, that she would see that you're not limited by her limitations. That Lord, you would bring a new revelation, a new understanding that you're on her side, that you're not judging her, that Lord, you have good things in store. And nobody can keep her from you, Lord. Nobody, nothing, no situation, no circumstance can keep you from her. And Lord, I pray, God, just for your hand on her this week. I pray for healing. I pray for healing in her mind, in her body, and Lord, most of all in her spirit. Lord, we thank you for your goodness in Jesus' precious name. Amen.