Lent 4
I totally missed Lent 3 — apologies. After a week of navigating bureaucracy and logistics, I was behind on nearly everything. So the weekend was filled with catching up on school, work, and seeing some local artwork. I did complete my weekly Sunday School/devotion materials (which are available for $5/month — roughly $1 a week).
This week’s lectionary gospel is from the Gospel of John 9: 1-41. I work hard not to read too much of today into texts, but I couldn’t avoid it with this one.
We have a man who is born blind. And everyone is talking about him rather than to him. The text starts with the disciples asking Jesus, “who sinned — this man or his parents — that he was born blind?” Presumably the man can hear this question. Maybe this sort of question has been asked over him regularly. Jesus responds — “what? no! This isn’t about sin. This man was born blind to show God’s glory. Blindness isn’t a punishment.” (my own interpretation, of course).
And Jesus heals him. And suddenly, he is apparently unrecognizable. The neighbors are asking each other (again, talking about him, not to him) — “Who is this guy? Is he the man who is always here begging?” And I picture the man running back and forth to all of the folks talking, waving his arms trying to be seen and heard — “Yes! It is me!” And yet they ignore him, “Nah, I think it is just someone who looks similar.”
He is telling them who he is, and they don’t believe him. (Let the reader understand)
He tells his story, and the crowd is just not buying it. They call the man’s parents out and ask “hey, is this your son? The one who was born blind?” They answer, “yes, of course.” The crowd asks, “okay, so what happened? Why isn’t he blind anymore?” And the parents respond, “how would we know? We weren’t here. He is a grown man, talk to him!”
Meanwhile they have been asking him the same things over and over long enough that he asks, “What’s the deal? Are you wanting to be Jesus’ disciple, too?” And they get angry. “You sinner! Who are you to try to teach us?”
I really hope a preacher out there used this text to talk about the current attacks on the transgender community. If you did (or heard someone who did), tell me about it!
Because really — assumed to be a sinner (or that his parents were and forced this on him), talked about as an issue instead of a person, not believed about his own identity and experience, Jesus literally says “the glory of God is revealed in him” but the crowds are unable to see it because they believe they know better, that they know all of the ways God will show up . . . so they run him off. That right there is the story of the church and trans folk. May we pay better attention. God’s glory is righthere.
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