They answered and said unto him, Thou wast altogether born in sins, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out.
John 9:34 belongs to the healing of the man born blind, which displayed tender sympathy for human suffering. The healed man did not know who had healed him until Jesus revealed Himself to him as the Son of God, and then he worshiped Him.
The Pharisees answered the healed man with contempt, treating his congenital blindness as proof that he was altogether born in sins. They challenged his presumption in teaching them and in questioning them. They cast him out, excommunicating and expelling him from the synagogue and driving him as a sheep out of the fold. They did this to silence him rather than face the evidence of his healing, and to smother his testimony that Jesus had done a work never heard of since the world began and therefore must be from God. He had exposed their ignorance about Jesus, and they rejected his testimony with scorn for that reason.
By cutting off one whom the true Shepherd was drawing to Himself, they showed that they did not understand shepherd work and were unworthy shepherds. They were working against God with the adversary instead of in harmony with God. Jesus as the true and compassionate Shepherd sought the outcast and gave him a place in His own fold. All heaven's sympathy was enlisted for him as a wandering sheep.
Their response reveals willful spiritual blindness hardened by prejudice and unbelief. By closing themselves to given light and refusing enlightenment they chose darkness and made themselves even blinder. They became unable to appreciate holiness or discern sin, and though claiming to guide others they reject the way prepared for the redeemed. They acted from envy and jealousy at Christ's popularity and miracles and His hold on attentive hearers spellbound by His plain teaching. They acted from hatred because He would not accept their ideas, and from fear that He would be honored above them, the same unbelief and jealousy that brought Israel's downfall and ruin.
The outcast stands in the conflict between light and darkness as one purchased by Christ's blood whom the Lord is anxious to save, yet whom they despised as worthy only of sneers and hatred. Looking to Calvary and the cross reveals God's love and brings repentance and transformation of character from glory to glory. The charge of being born in sin is also directed at Christ Himself to attack His character and break His hold on the multitudes, adding that He expels demons by the ruler of demons. This fulfills that they hated without cause in persecuting One who is chiefest among ten thousands and altogether lovely. All whose ways please God and separate from worldly customs will likewise be hated, so obedience involving a cross should be expected and not shrunk from, since the servant is not greater than the Lord who endured humiliation, shameful death, and persecution.
John 9:34 belongs to the healing of the man born blind, which displayed tender sympathy for human suffering. The healed man did not know who had healed him until Jesus revealed Himself to him as the Son of God, and then he worshiped Him.
The Pharisees answered the healed man with contempt, treating his congenital blindness as proof that he was altogether born in sins. They challenged his presumption in teaching them and in questioning them. They cast him out, excommunicating and expelling him from the synagogue and driving him as a sheep out of the fold. They did this to silence him rather than face the evidence of his healing, and to smother his testimony that Jesus had done a work never heard of since the world began and therefore must be from God. He had exposed their ignorance about Jesus, and they rejected his testimony with scorn for that reason.
By cutting off one whom the true Shepherd was drawing to Himself, they showed that they did not understand shepherd work and were unworthy shepherds. They were working against God with the adversary instead of in harmony with God. Jesus as the true and compassionate Shepherd sought the outcast and gave him a place in His own fold. All heaven's sympathy was enlisted for him as a wandering sheep.
Their response reveals willful spiritual blindness hardened by prejudice and unbelief. By closing themselves to given light and refusing enlightenment they chose darkness and made themselves even blinder. They became unable to appreciate holiness or discern sin, and though claiming to guide others they reject the way prepared for the redeemed. They acted from envy and jealousy at Christ's popularity and miracles and His hold on attentive hearers spellbound by His plain teaching. They acted from hatred because He would not accept their ideas, and from fear that He would be honored above them, the same unbelief and jealousy that brought Israel's downfall and ruin.
The outcast stands in the conflict between light and darkness as one purchased by Christ's blood whom the Lord is anxious to save, yet whom they despised as worthy only of sneers and hatred. Looking to Calvary and the cross reveals God's love and brings repentance and transformation of character from glory to glory. The charge of being born in sin is also directed at Christ Himself to attack His character and break His hold on the multitudes, adding that He expels demons by the ruler of demons. This fulfills that they hated without cause in persecuting One who is chiefest among ten thousands and altogether lovely. All whose ways please God and separate from worldly customs will likewise be hated, so obedience involving a cross should be expected and not shrunk from, since the servant is not greater than the Lord who endured humiliation, shameful death, and persecution.