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Modern readers may doubt this, but the Jews who were listening to the Lord, certainly
did not, for they immediately took up stones to stone Him. They knew that I AM was a
title of Jehovah and that Christ was therefore claiming to be God. If the Lord's deity is
not true, then they were correct, for such language is blasphemous if made by any human
being. There is no middle position. We either worship Him as God or we reject and
stone Him. Hundreds of religious people today do the latter in their blindness and
ignorance of the Word of God. [Those who wish to test this for themselves should
consider the author's book The Lord Jesus Christ, God or only Man?.]
In spite of the threatening attitude of the Pharisees the Lord Jesus went out of the
Temple. "His hour had not yet come." Once again, three months later, the Pharisees
will try to kill Him, but He will pass out of their hands (10: 39).
Chapter 9:
We now come to the sixth of the miraculous sign, the healing of the man born blind.
"As He went along, He saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked 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 work of God might be
displayed in his life. As long as it is day, we must do the work of Him Who sent Me.
Night is coming when no-one can work. While I am in the world, I am the Light of the
world'." (9: 1-5).
From the disciples' question, one can see that they had the idea that physical
congenital troubles were caused either by the sin of the person concerned, or his parents.
It is sometimes true that disease is the result of personal sin as in the case of the man at
the Bethesda pool (5: 14), and parents can hand on the effects of sin to the third and
fourth generation. In this instance it was not so, as the Lord made clear. Rather it was
that the works of God might be manifested in him, and God's glory again revealed. This
was the purpose behind it all, but we must not think that God deliberately caused the man
when a child to be born blind, so that this miracle might be performed. God overruled
the blindness so that by recovering his sight through the power of Christ, he might realize
that this was the work of God and so would turn to the true Light of the world and put his
faith in Him.
Christ said in effect, we must work while it is day, while we have the opportunity.
Darkness was coming, for He Who was the world's Light was soon to leave it and return
to the glory of heaven's holiest of all which He had left.
Then the light would be mediated through His faithful followers. But apart from this
the world would become an exceedingly dark place under the control of the prince of
darkness, Satan. The believer would be exhorted to let his light shine (Phil. 2: 15, 16),
but this would not be equal to the One Who was the Light of the world. Even electric
lights do not turn night into day.