His Friends Must Also Die

John 9

The healing of the man who was blind from birth, in John chapter 9, poses an important question that sooner or later will confront the sincere Christian.

In order to understand it properly, let us summarize this man's history.

The testimony of a former blind man

When the blind man was healed, an extraordinary effervescence took place among all those that knew him. First among his neighbors, and then among the Pharisees. They all interrogated him about what had happened to him.

His testimony about Jesus, in the beginning, was weak. When they asked him: –How then were your eyes opened?

He said: –The man they call Jesus put mud on my eyes, and told me to go to Siloam, and wash. So I went and washed, and then I could see.

Later on, the Pharisees asked him: –What have you to say about him?

He answered: –He is prophet.

When the Pharisees asked his parents, they said: –We know he is our son, and we know he was born blind; but how he can see now, or who opened his eyes, we don't know. Ask him. He is of age, he will speak for himself.

The Scripture adds: "His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews, for already the Jews had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ would be put out of the synagogue." (9:22).

Later on, when the Pharisees again asked the formerly blind man about Jesus, he tells them: –If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.

When he said this, they threw him out of the synagogue.

Notice that when the formerly blind man referred to Jesus as, "this man..." he didn't have great problems, nor when he said that he was a "prophet." But when he said that he was from God, that which was the equivalent to saying he was the Messiah, then they threw him out of the synagogue.

The importance of being in the synagogue

In Jesus' times, the synagogue was the center of the religious life and the Jewish social life. To be expelled from it was to become marginalized, an outcast. For that reason the Jews feared being expelled from it. The formerly blind man's parents, in spite of the joy that they felt when seeing their healthy son, didn't dare be exposed to being thrown out of the synagogue by giving a favorable testimony about Jesus.

The parents didn't want to jeopardize themselves, despite having strong reasons for doing so.

The same thing happened to others who were secret followers of Jesus. Joseph of Arimathea "was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jews." (John 19:38). So too was Nicodemus. (John 3:1-2; 7:50-52; 19:39-42) And many others: "Yet at the same time many even among the leaders believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they would not confess their faith for fear that they would be put out of the Synagogue; for they loved praise from men more than praise from God." (John 12:42-43).

The man's parents hardly had great honor, because they were the parents of a beggar, but even so, they didn't want to lose what little that they had. Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus and the rulers on the other hand did possess a great deal of honor. Is it not therefore strange that the parents didn't want to lose their honor? They didn't admit openly that Jesus was the Christ -although they believed it in their hearts - in order to avoid being thrown out of the synagogue.

For them, being in the synagogue meant having both God and men on their side. For that reason, it didn't suit them to be thrown out for any reason.

Yet to continue in the synagogue after believing in Jesus caused problems of the conscience. They surely didn't have peace, because they could not defend Jesus when others spoke badly of him.

They don't appear in the book of Acts (although perhaps they were with the Christians). They perhaps didn't have the wonderful privilege of following him, because they loved the praise of men more than the glory of God.

The problem of the synagogues

A great similarity exists between the Jewish synagogues of Jesus' times and the Christian synagogues in our days.

There are, at least, two clear similarities:

The Jewish synagogues were institutions that were not described in the Scriptures. They had arisen during the inter-testament period for political and social reasons. Therefore when Jesus came, this non-scriptural system came in contact with the one that superceded it. He was raised, as all Jewish boys were, around the synagogue, and, when he had grown up, he went to the synagogues to share the Scriptures, as all Rabbi did. However, in his speeches directed to the Pharisees and Scribes, he told them: –You nullify the word of God by your tradition.

And: – Isaiah was right when he prophesized about you hypocrites; as it is written…They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men. (Mark 7:13,7) (See also Matthew cap.23)

This is happening with the Christian synagogues of our days: they are not a biblical teaching, but an institution born out of man's good will to please God, with many non-scriptural additions.

The second similarity is even more serious.

Like all human constructions, its nature loses its value with each passing year, becoming more systematized and paralyzed. What arose in the beginning as a passionate vision, as a wineskin that would contain (or that would help to contain) the wine of God, became a rigid structure, with an autonomous existence, that in the end contained no wine.

When Jesus came, the synagogues were a deformed system, unable to recognize the Messiah. There were Scriptures there, but the spiritual testimony that they gave was not heard. There the Scriptures were welcomed, but not the One that had inspired them, nor the One for whom they existed. Could there be a greater absurdity?

Today, when we find ourselves at the doors of the second coming of the Lord, the situation is not much different. The Scriptures are present in today's Christian synagogues, but the spiritual testimony that they give is not, so that if he would come to them, he would be ignored and rejected again.

The synagogues work perfectly without his presence, without hearing him or attending to him. The synagogues have acquired their own existence, they have established their routine and they will exist even though they heard God assuring them that he is not there.

The synagogues don't receive testimony

In Jesus' times, and later, in Paul's days, the synagogues didn't receive the testimony concerning Christ.

In Nazareth, Jesus' countrymen wanted to throw him down a cliff after hearing him in the synagogue (Luke 4:16-30), and they would surely have done it had it not been for the authority that the Lord exercised in the critical moment.

In many cities of Israel and those outside, Paul was threatened with being lynched by the inflamed Jewish crowds because of the testimony that gave of Jesus Christ's resurrection.

For the Jews in Paul's days, Jesus was only a blasphemous Galilean that claimed to be the Son of God. In today's synagogues, Christ is a historical entity, an absent liturgy. Remembered, but absent. His figure shines brightly as an object of adoration, provided he doesn't hinder the routine or break the protocol.

Christ is known from the outside

In yesterday's synagogues and those of today, Christ is not truly accepted nor well-known.

The formerly blind man didn't have a real knowledge of his Healer while he was inside the synagogue. He came to know him after they threw him out.

Let us revise the scene.

"Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, and when he found him, he said: –Do you believe in the Son of Man?

–Who is he, Sir? The man asked. Tell me so that I may believe in him.

Jesus said: –You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you.

Then the man said: –Lord, I believe, and he worshipped him." (9:35-38).

Let us examine some important facts here.

When the Lord knew that the man had been expelled from the synagogue (that which must have affected the man a great deal), he looked for him and found him. The man had been willing to join Jesus, knowing the price that he would have to pay, so the Lord looks for him to confirm his faith and to reveal himself to the man.

He had declared that Jesus was from God, so Jesus revealed himself as such: as the Son of God.
Jesus granted the formerly blind man a privilege given to very few. A privilege that he granted only to those rejected by the hand of men, like the Samaritan woman (John 4:25-26). He revealed himself to her, as the Christ; and to the formerly blind man, as the Son of God. These two revelations that Jesus made about himself contain the entire truth regarding his person (Matthew 16:16; John 20:31).

Therefore, when the man that had been blind received this second miracle, this revelation (that is a greater miracle that the first one) he fell down and he worshipped him. He could have remained standing before "That man they call Jesus", or before the " prophet " Jesus, but not before Jesus, the Son of God.

This scene finishes with the formerly blind man, kneeling down and worshipping Jesus. His final posture is symbolic of a life consecrated to Christ because of the greatness of the glory that had been shown him.

To know Jesus is not matter of taking up the Scriptures and studying them. Nor does it consist in being a faithful and committed participant of a synagogue. To know Jesus as the Son of God is to receive a revelation from him that passes through the soul, that breaks molds, and that produces an outpouring of our spirit before him, forever.