When Expectations Blur Our Vision

Sight, Light, "Water", and Dirt

Jesus’ disciples ask a question that is as old as suffering itself: Why did this happen? Who is to blame? When faced with hardship, we naturally look for causes—sometimes to understand, sometimes to prevent it from happening again.

Jesus' answer has long troubled people. Did this man really have to suffer blindness all these years just so God’s power could be revealed in this moment? Was there no other way?

Perhaps Jesus isn’t saying that suffering exists just for the sake of a later miracle. Rather, he is proposing that whatever the situation is, it has the capacity to become a place where God’s justice restores, brings newness, and instills life. (We’ll see tomorrow that not everyone finds this acceptable.)

In the meantime, Jesus calls his disciples—including us—to acknowledge both darkness and light. Suffering exists, but so does the One who redeems it.

And he is the light of the world.

John’s gospel has been pointing us back to Genesis from the very first verse. I am the light of the world echoes God’s first spoken words demonstrating power over light—Let there be light. And here, Jesus returns to the dust of the earth, just as God did when forming the first human, adding water to create something new—sight where there had only been darkness.

John 9:1-7

As Jesus walked along, he saw a man who was blind from birth. Jesus’ disciples asked, “Rabbi, who sinned so that he was born blind, this man or his parents?”

Jesus answered, “Neither he nor his parents. This happened so that God’s mighty works might be displayed in him. While it’s daytime, we must do the works 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.” After he said this, he spit on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and smeared the mud on the man’s eyes. Jesus said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (this word means sent). So the man went away and washed. When he returned, he could see.

Psalm 146:7-9

God: who is faithful forever, who gives justice to people who are oppressed, who gives bread to people who are starving!
The Lord: who frees prisoners.
The Lord: who makes the blind see.
The Lord: who straightens up those who are bent low.
The Lord: who loves the righteous.
The Lord: who protects immigrants, who helps orphans and widows, but who makes the way of the wicked twist and turn!

Prayer

God,

How is it that we come to have so many expectations? I’m convinced that most of life’s disappointments stem from unmet ones.

Do you give me expectations, or do I create them myself? Had I known the peanut was rotten, I might have prepared myself differently before eating it. Not that it would have made it pleasant—just that I might have handled it better.

Does this even make sense, God?

Lord, help me live with a posture of steady hope—not naïve optimism, nor constant skepticism, but a heart that is ready to respond. I don’t want to sit around like Eeyore, expecting the worst. But I do want to be even-keeled, steady in faith, and open to what you bring.

By your Spirit & in Christ,
Amen.