Listen

Then they led the man who had been born blind to the Pharisees. Now Jesus made the mud and smeared it on the man’s eyes on a Sabbath day. So the Pharisees also asked him how he was able to see.

The man told them, “He put mud on my eyes, I washed, and now I see.”

Some Pharisees said, “This man isn’t from God, because he breaks the Sabbath law.” Others said, “How can a sinner do miraculous signs like these?” So they were divided. Some of the Pharisees questioned the man who had been born blind again: “What do you have to say about him, since he healed your eyes?”

He replied, “He’s a prophet.”

John 9:13-17

Think

Re-hear the Pharisees asking the man healed how it happened, and his response: “I don’t know how it happened. All I know is that it happened.” Notice how the Pharisees go right back to arguing about the how of it (“How can one who breaks God’s rules be of God?” “How can someone not of God heal?”). Finally, they circle back to the man who had been blind, “What do you have to say about this guy? It was, after all, your eyes he opened.” And he said, “Well, he is a prophet.” He didn’t say he was a miracle worker, a healer.

A prophet. “Because my eyes are opened, he is a prophet.” Because that’s what prophets do. They don’t tell us what the future will be. They open our eyes to what is true here and now—that will lead to the future being shaped out of that. They help us see what is true to God that might change the shaping into a different future. Open our eyes, God, we want to see truly.

John Ballenger

Question to Ponder:

If prophetic means telling the truth about our times and our culture, who, in our experience, has been prophetic? Who, in our opinion, is prophetic today?

Pray

We thank you, God, for those who risk speaking truth to us about us and about our lives, about our culture and our context. And may we never presume we have more to say about someone else’s truth than we have to hear about our own. Amen.

Go

Go. God without the “d.”

Movement. Purpose (one hopes)—

direction—intention. Trajectory.

From all that brought us to this here and now,

we go—and maybe everything stays the same.

But maybe, everything changes.