The Pool of Sending
3 April 2011
Fourth Sunday in Lent Year A
1 Samuel 16:1-13; Ephesians 5:8-14; John 9:1-41; Psalm 23
As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. 2His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him. 4We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming when no one can work. 5As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” 6When he had said this, he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva and spread the mud on the man’s eyes, 7saying to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). Then he went and washed and came back able to see.8The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar began to ask, “Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?” 9Some were saying, “It is he.” Others were saying, “No, but it is someone like him.” He kept saying, “I am the man.” 10But they kept asking him, “Then how were your eyes opened?” 11He answered, “The man called Jesus made mud, spread it on my eyes, and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ Then I went and washed and received my sight.” 12They said to him, “Where is he?” He said, “I do not know.”13They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. 14Now it was a sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. 15Then the Pharisees also began to ask him how he had received his sight. He said to them, “He put mud on my eyes. Then I washed, and now I see.” 16Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not observe the sabbath.” But others said, “How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?” And they were divided. 17So they said again to the blind man, “What do you say about him? It was your eyes he opened.” He said, “He is a prophet.” 18The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight 19and asked them, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?” 20His parents answered, “We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; 21but we do not know how it is that now he sees, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself.” 22His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. 23Therefore his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.” 24So for the second time they called the man who had been blind, and they said to him, “Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner.” 25He answered, “I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.” 26They said to him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?” 27He answered them, “I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?” 28Then they reviled him, saying, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. 29We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.” 30The man answered, “Here is an astonishing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. 31We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will. 32Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. 33If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.” 34They answered him, “You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?” And they drove him out.35Jesus heard that they had driven him out, and when he found him, he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” 36He answered, “And who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him.” 37Jesus said to him, “You have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he.” 38He said, “Lord, I believe.” And he worshiped him.39Jesus said, “I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind.” 40Some of the Pharisees near him heard this and said to him, “Surely we are not blind, are we?” 41Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains. (John 9:1-41)
God, take away our hearts of stone, and give us hearts of flesh. Amen
When you go to any of the public churches in China, whether in Shanghai, Beijing, or Guangzhou, and whether Patriotic Catholic or Three Self Protestant, you often will see outside the wall of the Church a similar site—beggars, some visibly and horribly disabled, lining the walkways, shaking small begging bowls or cups, and saying in Chinese (and sometimes English), “Please, help me, please help.” This scene is often also encountered just outside of major Buddhist sites, whether Temples or Monasteries. Presumably the beggars gather at such places because they or their handlers believe that people frequenting them are more likely to be moved to compassion and give alms, or at least be shamed into giving alms because their presence at such a place implies that they place a value on compassion, whether they feel it or not.
The scene in today’s Gospel takes place in just such a setting. Jesus and his disciples are walking in an area where beggars gather, probably just outside the Jerusalem Temple. They see a man who has been blind since birth begging, and the disciples ask why such things happen. Jesus says that it is so the works of God can be made manifest, and then adds that he himself must do the works of God who sent him into the world. He then stops, spits into the dirt and with it makes a bit of mud, and smears the man’s eyes with the mud. He then sends the man to wash the mud off in the pool of Siloam, where he gains his sight and becomes a witness to Jesus.
It is clear that the Gospel writer is using the disability of the man as a symbol for the disabilities we all live with, whether physical or spiritual. Note the irony at the end of the story where the spiritual blindness of Jesus’ opponents is contrasted to their physical sightedness and to the healed man’s clarity of vision on both counts. In some ways, we are all the man born blind.
Note the dynamic of the story. With no explicit request from the blind man (other presumably than his generalized cries to all passersby, “help me”), Jesus takes the initiative and mixes mud to heal the man, in an act reminiscent of the creation story found in Genesis 3, where Yahweh as a potter sculpts the mud into a human being before breathing on it to give it life. He then sends the man to wash the mud off.
The name of the pool is important in the story—Siloam, a Greek form of Shiloah, or “sent.” It is a spring within the city walls that play an important part in the story of Isaiah and Ahaz—Isaiah tells the king not to make any alliance with the Assyrians out of fear of being besieged by local petty kings, and to trust that God would provide adequate water for the city in the spring of Siloah. When the king appeals to the Assyrians, ultimately to his ruin and the ruin of his people, God says to Isaiah in an oracle, “this people has refused the waters of Shiloah that flow gently, and melt in fear before” the local tyrants. (Isa. 8:6). It is to this spring that Jesus sends the blind man.
Though the "Spring of Sending" here echoes “I must do the work of my father who sent me into the world,” the reference to the “Pool of Siloam” plus its explicit gloss into Greek explaining what it means also surely must refer to the fact that Jesus has sent the blind man to the pool. A similar juxtaposition of Jesus being sent and then sending those he interacts with is found later on in John's Gospel, when Jesus appears to the disciples in the evening of the day of his resurrection: "Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit" (John 20:21-22).
This "Jesus sent to send us" is, I think, a model and pattern for all missiology, or theology of mission. That’s what the Latin word mission means, after all, “sending.” God sends Jesus, who in grace begins to heal us. In order to accept God's grace, we ourselves are sent, both to overcome our past (wash off the mud) and to help others (tell the others what God has done for us).
We must never think that we come to God through our own efforts. It is God who stops and smears our eyes with mud, who creates us new, who gives us new life and sight. We mustn’t ever think that it is necessarily our piteous cries “give me alms,” “enough money for dinner, sir?” that move God to help us. He knows what we need better than we do, and wishes ill for none of the creatures he has made. We may be begging for a few crusts of bread, for enough sustenance to get through the day, but he has things in mind for us that are, in the words of the prayer, "more than we can ask or imagine."
Our initial reaction to grace is key. Our view may be so deficient that we do not know what we need to do to amend our lives, or what it is God expects. So we must follow the mission God gives us. Like the man with spit-mud on his eyes, we must go where we are sent. It is only thus that the grace of God can take root and grow in us.
It is this point that Jesus elsewhere describes as a "narrow and skinny door" where at any given time only a few enter. Going on mission, doing what God tells us in our hearts we need to do, requires getting rid of the baggage that encumbers us and makes it hard to squeeze through the door of following that voice that sends us to a place we have not yet known.
(For my Calvinist friends—if saying that "God wishes ill for none of his creatures" and stressing the importance of our reaction to grace is Arminianism, so be it. The doctrine of a universal salvific will has been a hallmark of catholic doctrine—whether Roman or Anglican—since the beginning.)
But when God, for his own purposes and in his own time, reaches to us to heal us, he also makes demands on us. He sends us. He asks us to wash the mud off. To the pool of Siloam, the waters of Siloah, we must go. And if we trust him, we do what he asks even if it doesn’t correspond to what it was that we thought we wanted in the first place.
The result of this initial act of trust on our part in response to God’s reaching our to us? Healing, and a sure knowledge of the good that has occurred. And that sure knowledge of our experience of God’s love and grace is what we must share with others. There is no argument involved, since no one can deny reasonably the experience related to them by another.
But we are also not just like the man born blind in the story. We are also like the religious opponents of Jesus who react to the sign that Jesus has just worked. They believe they know God’s demands and standards, and look at the miracle and note that Jesus made mud on a Sabbath, clearly a violation of the commandment to rest on that day. So they reason that this miracle either could not have come from God or did not occur.
This creates a perfect counterpoint, an exact opposite, of the blind man simply trusting Jesus and following his sending. Where the blind man goes to the Pool of Shiloah, the Pool of Sending, the others refuse, echoing Isaiah’s words, “they have rejected the gently flowing waters of Shiloah."
The opponents of Jesus here are certain of things, and do not want to be confused by facts. The blind man, in reaction to Jesus, is not so sure of many things, not so sure even of what he wants, or what God wants. But once he gains his sight, he is sure of what Jesus did. He responds to the legal arguments of the people so certain of God’s will by saying merely, “All I know is that I was blind but now I see.”
We, like the blind man, need help. We, like the Pharisees, tend to think we already know what it is we need. Jesus sends us in many ways. Sometimes, it is a voice of conscience to be better in our prayers, sometimes, it is an urge to work for social justice. Whatever it is, and however it comes, when we hear God’s voice speaking to us, sending us, let us respond. Let us run to the pool and do what we’re told by God. Then we will be in a position of sharing what we know—not merely what we hope, or what we wish—but what we know, with others, so that they might begin to hear the voice of God sending them as well.
In the name of Christ, Amen.
The scene in today’s Gospel takes place in just such a setting. Jesus and his disciples are walking in an area where beggars gather, probably just outside the Jerusalem Temple. They see a man who has been blind since birth begging, and the disciples ask why such things happen. Jesus says that it is so the works of God can be made manifest, and then adds that he himself must do the works of God who sent him into the world. He then stops, spits into the dirt and with it makes a bit of mud, and smears the man’s eyes with the mud. He then sends the man to wash the mud off in the pool of Siloam, where he gains his sight and becomes a witness to Jesus.
It is clear that the Gospel writer is using the disability of the man as a symbol for the disabilities we all live with, whether physical or spiritual. Note the irony at the end of the story where the spiritual blindness of Jesus’ opponents is contrasted to their physical sightedness and to the healed man’s clarity of vision on both counts. In some ways, we are all the man born blind.
Note the dynamic of the story. With no explicit request from the blind man (other presumably than his generalized cries to all passersby, “help me”), Jesus takes the initiative and mixes mud to heal the man, in an act reminiscent of the creation story found in Genesis 3, where Yahweh as a potter sculpts the mud into a human being before breathing on it to give it life. He then sends the man to wash the mud off.
The name of the pool is important in the story—Siloam, a Greek form of Shiloah, or “sent.” It is a spring within the city walls that play an important part in the story of Isaiah and Ahaz—Isaiah tells the king not to make any alliance with the Assyrians out of fear of being besieged by local petty kings, and to trust that God would provide adequate water for the city in the spring of Siloah. When the king appeals to the Assyrians, ultimately to his ruin and the ruin of his people, God says to Isaiah in an oracle, “this people has refused the waters of Shiloah that flow gently, and melt in fear before” the local tyrants. (Isa. 8:6). It is to this spring that Jesus sends the blind man.
Though the "Spring of Sending" here echoes “I must do the work of my father who sent me into the world,” the reference to the “Pool of Siloam” plus its explicit gloss into Greek explaining what it means also surely must refer to the fact that Jesus has sent the blind man to the pool. A similar juxtaposition of Jesus being sent and then sending those he interacts with is found later on in John's Gospel, when Jesus appears to the disciples in the evening of the day of his resurrection: "Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit" (John 20:21-22).
This "Jesus sent to send us" is, I think, a model and pattern for all missiology, or theology of mission. That’s what the Latin word mission means, after all, “sending.” God sends Jesus, who in grace begins to heal us. In order to accept God's grace, we ourselves are sent, both to overcome our past (wash off the mud) and to help others (tell the others what God has done for us).
We must never think that we come to God through our own efforts. It is God who stops and smears our eyes with mud, who creates us new, who gives us new life and sight. We mustn’t ever think that it is necessarily our piteous cries “give me alms,” “enough money for dinner, sir?” that move God to help us. He knows what we need better than we do, and wishes ill for none of the creatures he has made. We may be begging for a few crusts of bread, for enough sustenance to get through the day, but he has things in mind for us that are, in the words of the prayer, "more than we can ask or imagine."
Our initial reaction to grace is key. Our view may be so deficient that we do not know what we need to do to amend our lives, or what it is God expects. So we must follow the mission God gives us. Like the man with spit-mud on his eyes, we must go where we are sent. It is only thus that the grace of God can take root and grow in us.
It is this point that Jesus elsewhere describes as a "narrow and skinny door" where at any given time only a few enter. Going on mission, doing what God tells us in our hearts we need to do, requires getting rid of the baggage that encumbers us and makes it hard to squeeze through the door of following that voice that sends us to a place we have not yet known.
(For my Calvinist friends—if saying that "God wishes ill for none of his creatures" and stressing the importance of our reaction to grace is Arminianism, so be it. The doctrine of a universal salvific will has been a hallmark of catholic doctrine—whether Roman or Anglican—since the beginning.)
But when God, for his own purposes and in his own time, reaches to us to heal us, he also makes demands on us. He sends us. He asks us to wash the mud off. To the pool of Siloam, the waters of Siloah, we must go. And if we trust him, we do what he asks even if it doesn’t correspond to what it was that we thought we wanted in the first place.
The result of this initial act of trust on our part in response to God’s reaching our to us? Healing, and a sure knowledge of the good that has occurred. And that sure knowledge of our experience of God’s love and grace is what we must share with others. There is no argument involved, since no one can deny reasonably the experience related to them by another.
But we are also not just like the man born blind in the story. We are also like the religious opponents of Jesus who react to the sign that Jesus has just worked. They believe they know God’s demands and standards, and look at the miracle and note that Jesus made mud on a Sabbath, clearly a violation of the commandment to rest on that day. So they reason that this miracle either could not have come from God or did not occur.
This creates a perfect counterpoint, an exact opposite, of the blind man simply trusting Jesus and following his sending. Where the blind man goes to the Pool of Shiloah, the Pool of Sending, the others refuse, echoing Isaiah’s words, “they have rejected the gently flowing waters of Shiloah."
The opponents of Jesus here are certain of things, and do not want to be confused by facts. The blind man, in reaction to Jesus, is not so sure of many things, not so sure even of what he wants, or what God wants. But once he gains his sight, he is sure of what Jesus did. He responds to the legal arguments of the people so certain of God’s will by saying merely, “All I know is that I was blind but now I see.”
We, like the blind man, need help. We, like the Pharisees, tend to think we already know what it is we need. Jesus sends us in many ways. Sometimes, it is a voice of conscience to be better in our prayers, sometimes, it is an urge to work for social justice. Whatever it is, and however it comes, when we hear God’s voice speaking to us, sending us, let us respond. Let us run to the pool and do what we’re told by God. Then we will be in a position of sharing what we know—not merely what we hope, or what we wish—but what we know, with others, so that they might begin to hear the voice of God sending them as well.
