Sermon by Pastor Seth - March 18, 2026
Sermons
Disrupting Just Deserts
John 9:1-12
Already in trouble with Jerusalem’s religious elite, Jesus boldly affirms his identity in a debate with a crowd of Jewish skeptics — blaspheming the patriarchs in claiming, “before Abraham was, I am,” (John 8:58). Not taking too kindly to his proclamation and convinced he is possessed, the gathered Jews pick up rocks to stone the man so blatantly challenging tradition — the execution attempt narrowly escaped by a high-tailing Jesus off to wander in low places. With all of the heat on him, the logical, self-preserving thing to do would be to let the dust settle. Of course, instead, Jesus decides to add fuel to the fire and heal a man on the Sabbath.
Pitted in opposition against the prevailing authority on spiritual correctness, Jesus and his posse encounter a man born blind, sitting on the curb with a cup of loose change and a sign that reads, “disabled, anything helps.” As scores of passerby’s pay the man no mind, ignoring his pleading smile and attempt to afford a scrap of bread, the disciples ask Jesus what they believe to be a philosophically nuanced question of religious ethics: “Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” (John 9:2). Without breaking his gaze from the man so utterly cast aside by his community, Jesus answers them with a brief word and a miraculous act.
As we read this passage from the Gospel of John depicting a messiah with a penchant for disruption and a blind man blamed for his condition, I invite us to consider the question: why does Jesus heal the man?
Congregational Response
Why does Jesus heal the man?
- God works through us all
- Invitation back into community
- God does not cause suffering but can transform it into something good
- The spiritual blindness of those who refuse to see another’s humanity
Theological Reflection
Driving through Nevada on their way back home to Washington state, Anna Holmes and her husband hit a patch of black ice, causing their car to flip into a ravine. While her husband escaped with no serious injuries (aside from broken eyeglasses), Anna was not so lucky — the crash breaking her spine on impact. Rushed to a small hospital in Ely, Nevada by EMS, Anna was given medication for the pain and taken in for x-rays to assess the damage. Unable to get a clear rendering of her condition, the doctor decided that Anna needed an MRI and would be better treated at a larger, more equipped hospital — giving the couple the choice of being airlifted to either Salt Lake City or Las Vegas.
Flown to Las Vegas in under an hour to prevent the possibility of paralysis, Anna underwent test after test. When she was stable, her husband, who could not see much on account of his unusable glasses, left Anna’s bedside briefly to go get a new pair. In the midst of her morphine induced haze of delirium, the billing department chose to go over insurance coverage details with Anna without her husband present — the information they shared not registering on account of her medicated state. Anna was eventually stabilized enough to be discharged, and she and her husband made it back home to Washington only to find a bill for $60,000 waiting on them in the mailbox.
They knew it was likely going to be expensive, but $60,000 seemed outrageous considering they had pretty decent insurance. Calling their insurance company in shock hoping that this was a clerical error, the representative proceeded to tell them that being airlifted was considered “elective” and they wouldn’t be covering it since the couple could have taken the four hour ambulance ride instead. Anna and her husband appealed the decision, saying that they were not even given a choice between being airlifted or an ambulance, enlisting the support of Anna’s original ER doctor in Ely, who advocated on her behalf, saying that the airlift was absolutely medically necessary. But, to no avail. They appealed the decision again and again, all the while the bill accrued more and more interest. All four appeals were denied; $60,000 quickly turned into well over $75,000, and Anna and her husband were left with no choice but to declare bankruptcy in the face of this mountain of medical debt.
Just one of many examples of insurance horror stories, Anna’s situation is a reflection of how the system often treats health and wellness in the United States. Between astronomical bills, hoops of prior authorization, disqualified pre-existing conditions, cut after cut to funding, and skyrocketing premiums that make coverage untenable and care neglected, it seems as if your life and healing is only worth what you can afford to pay for it. Health has become a commodity, care a debt to be collected — reserved for the deserving.
When the disciples speculate on whose sin is to blame for the blind man’s condition, a roundabout way of saying his suffering is deserved, Jesus dismantles the notion altogether first in word, then in deed. Cast to the curb and destined for beggary by a society unwilling to see the ways in which God loves and works through him, the man smells the salty sweat of a person kneeling down before him in proximity as gentle, calloused hands anoint his face with wetted earth. At Jesus’s invitation to wash the mud from his eyes, the man emerges from the waters to look, for the very first time, upon the face of someone who deemed him worthy of tending to — healing perhaps not only his eyesight but also the wound of disregard he has lived with all these years.
Jesus does not demand prior authorization; he does not run the man’s credit score to make sure he can fit the bill; he does not ensure the man has the right theology nor does he require the man’s allegiance before offering him care. He simply heals someone in need of healing — in more ways than one. I imagine there was some outrage amidst the disbelief of those around him: How dare this peasant prophet interrupt God’s justice against this man’s sin! After all, it is so much easier to blame someone for their suffering than it is to call out the injustice that creates the environment for suffering to thrive to begin with.
I’ve been hearing a lot lately from certain government officials how we need to bring back Christian values in this country. You know, things like posting the Ten Commandments in classrooms and forcing students to pray in public schools, regardless of the diversity in religious or non-religious affiliation. Things like criminalizing medically necessary procedures under the guise of preserving life, while waging war in foreign countries where death is inevitable because “that’s the way it is.” Things like kidnapping people with brown skin and caging their children so we might secure the border because, after all, “heaven has gates.” You know, all the things Jesus prioritized in his ministry, including condemning those in poverty as deserving of their suffering. Pull up those bootstraps; earn your worth.
No, no, no. If you want to bring back Christian values, how about affordable healthcare, where people don’t have to choose between buying their medication or buying groceries? How about accessibility rights, where having a disability does not disqualify you for employment? How about sanctuary for the foreigner, where diversity is considered a necessity? How about food for the hungry, drink for the thirsty? How about tending to the things Jesus actually gave a damn about? How about mercy and compassion, grace and understanding? How about focusing our attention on the systems that keep people in suffering rather than blaming them for trying to survive — how about that for Christian values?
In a shocking display, Jesus undermines this system of just deserts — grace incarnate to show the world that mere existence is what merits compassion and care, inclusion and lovability. How we are all ordained in the light of original goodness if only we give ourselves permission to claim it, permission to believe that we are worthy of wellness, worthy of being tended to and recognizing the worthiness of one another without qualification.
Why does Jesus heal the man? — because he was a man in need of healing. For wherever there is suffering, it is love’s demand to tend to it, including our own. Imagine what our systems, our country, our world, might look like if we put into practice what Jesus really cared about: not profits, not producing, not placating the powerful, but people. People.
May it be so.