Born Blind

Taken at 5:30-ish last Sunday morning
This last week I read in John 9 about a man who was born blind. I can imagine a tiny bit what that might look like.

Back in the olden days, in Malaysia, we used to own a VW van. A handy all-purpose vehicle, it allowed us to transport any number of young people (no seatbelt laws) to and from the mission hospital and the church--the two locations around which our lives revolved--as needed.

Often we would pick up Andrew in the mission hospital parking lot where he'd be standing patiently with his white cane, waiting to be taken to church. Andrew was born to a mother who'd had a sexually transmitted disease. Unfortunately the disease went untreated, and several of her children were affected by it. I was told that somehow it caused them each to go blind because of their contact with the disease as they came through the birth canal.

Andrew never wore dark glasses that I remember. You could see his eyes sunken in, disfigured. But this young man was always pleasant and kind as he would interact with people, despite the fact that his entire life had a different quality than ours. His blindness left him outside the normal social circle of others his age.

I can picture the disciples asking Jesus, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" (John 9:1) I wanted to know why Andrew was blind, and the answer was that at least one of his parents had sinned. The tragedy was compounded by the fact that the disease had not been arrested before more children were born.

The answer Jesus gave surprised me. Essentially he said, "Nobody sinned. This happened so that God's work could be displayed in his life."

What? God intentionally made sure this particular child was born blind, so that His work could be seen? I'll admit straight out, I have a hard time with that. I don't know how to explain it in a way that the rationale isn't disturbing.

We tend, when tragedy strikes, to immediately look for someone to blame. Who did wrong? Was it someone else's fault, or was it the fault of the person hit by the tragedy? Why did this happen? Can we identify someone who will be made to pay for it? And if we identify God as causing the tragedy, what does that do to our worldview?

I've been completely amazed at times in life when I have met people whose lives demonstrate the principle Jesus referenced. Their response in the midst of tragedy is to still care for others around them. While they may seek to understand why, and while they always carry the pain of that tragedy, something happens inside them as they go through the utter darkness of loss. The way in which they respond is to deepen their caring for others in this world. Instead of looking to make someone pay for the tragedy, they end up turning their experience into something that will bless others.

It never ceases to astonish me. I'm drawn to stay around such people, to listen to them, to learn from them. I think it's because I realize that in some way, we are all "born blind," and I crave some understanding of how they have been able, in the midst of all that tragedy, to see the light.