by Jose Kurian Puliyeril

Gospel Reading: St. John 9:1-41

In the beginning of today's reading we hear about sin. The Apostles asked our Lord: "Master who did sin, this man or his parents that he has born blind." (Verse 2) We might have heard/studied so many definitions for the term sin. In short we could say that our words, deeds and thoughts which are not without God, the real love are the sins. If it is true, how many sins we are committing in our daily lives? Let us try to find time to examine ourselves. Please be reminded that it is the right time for our penitence and true repentance followed by the confession. Do the sins make us sick? It is a scientifically proved fact that the psychological influence of sins is beyond words and they do influence the health of our body as well as mind.

Our Lord's answer to his blessed Apostles was "neither has this man sinned nor his parents, but that the works of God should be made manifest in him" (Verse-3) Our Lord made it clear that the particular blind man who was with our Lord then and there was not having the physical disability due to his or his parents' sins.

What are the works of God, referred by our Lord in the above verse? Our Lord has given us a clue about in the next verse where we read "I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day; the night comes when no man can work". According to St. Matthew the following are the works of our Savior. "The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them" (St. Matthew 11:5.)

In verse 5 we read "As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world". Isaiah the great Prophet foretells about our Lord as the light of the gentiles. (Isaiah 42:6) and also as a salvation unto the end of the world (Isaiah 49:6) St. John gives a wider meaning for the light as the light shines in darkness: and the darkness did not comprehend the light as that was the true light which was sent to everyman in the world. (St. John 1:5, 9) In St. John 3:19 we read "And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil" We must try to determine our position in the light of the above verse. We know that our Lord is the light of the world, but still do we not desire to live in the darkness? If we find that we were interested to live in darkness, let us turn back to the real light with the true repentance so that we could have a fresh life with our Lord God.

Immediately the blind man got his eye sight, he was questioned by his neighbors as well as the Pharisees. Pharisees came to the conclusion that He was not from God and tried to convince the man who was blind also that Lord Jesus was not from God. But the man had a conviction about his healer and hence he asked "how can a man who is a sinner do such miracles?" And he confirmed that his healer is a Prophet. The man's faith and trust in his healer is note worthy and appreciable. When we get blessings and graces in abundance we all will be happy and the next moment we forget about the gift from God. When enjoying blessings we must convert such incidents as means to go closer to our Lord God. When the man was compelled to give praise to God as they knew that Lord Jesus was a sinner, the man who got eye sight said , "I don't know whether he is a sinner or not, but I know one thing, I was blind, but now I can see" (Verse – 25)

In the following verses we could find the man's arguments with the group of Pharisees who tried continuously to establish that our Lord was not from God. But the man got more wisdom and knowledge by the time and questioned them finally "If this man was not of God, he could do nothing" (verse 33) See how God strengthened him when he submitted himself for God's disposal. He was nothing but a beggar, but within a short span of time became qualified to bargain with the scholars of the religion of those days. Like wise if we could submit ourselves completely to His disposal, He will strengthen us, He will make us worthy to do His will and He will make use of us for His greater glory. Due to his brave talks, he was cast out from the religion and society.

Hearing the news our Lord asked the man "Do you believe on the Son of God?" Our Lord had been asking and still asking us, each and every one of us the same question. Let us decide that we could and we would answer Him before the end of this Lenten season. As the man who was blind said let us also confess, "Lord, I do believe". (See verse 38) If we could confess so, our Lord will heal us from our all sorts of spiritual and physical illnesses. We are spiritually crippled, palsy, lepers, blind and deaf. Let our Lord God touch us and heal us. Let us try to earn brightness from Him and try to reflect His light in darkness.