“Everything Everywhere All at Once” - Lent 4A

 

Saint John 9:1–41

Disclaimer

When the reading of the Gospel has to begin with a disclaimer you know you are in for a wild ride. 

Those of you who are here in person might as well sit down and strap in. Those watching at home might want to sit down too or, at least, scout out a safe place to fall down because you are not going to get this anywhere else on your television or computer screens this morning.

Last Saturday morning I was driving down Touhy Avenue in Rogers Park and as I was passing the synagogue of the Congregation Adas Yeshurun I noticed that they had guards – burly guys in heavy vests with security clearly marked on them – in their parking lot and on the street in front of their building.  They were checking cars and people driving and walking in.  I was saddened because these measures were obviously a reaction to the rise in anti-Semitic violence and when “a small antisemitic group based in eastern Iowa designated Feb. 25 as a ‘day of hate.’”1

Unfortunately, this hate has not been limited to one day or a single weekend but has been going on for centuries and has led to some of history's biggest horrors.  So, when we read a Gospel like today’s we must always do so keeping in mind the words of Dr. Michael Lindvall. 

First, all the characters in the story are Jews.  Jesus was a Jew; Jesus followers were Jews; and John himself was most surely a Jew. Secondly, John used the term as a signal word to identify Jesus' opponents in a historical context that did not yet know what would later become anti-Semitism.2

But we do, which is why I am going to suggest something to you.  As we go through the reading, and you hear the word Pharisee heed the suggestion of another biblical scholar and think of the words: “the learned ones.”3 This might help us to remember that this reading is not so much about them as it is about us.

The Sermon

The big winner at last Sunday’s Academy Awards was a crazy film called “Everything Everywhere All At Once” that won not only the Oscar for Best Picture but also “film editing, best actress and best supporting actor and actress.”4

I have not seen it but friends who did didn’t understand it.  One walked out mid-way while another said he “stuck with it to the end” which is not particularly high praise.

Michael Wilmington of The Chicago Tribune said it has “become more divisive than the political divide in this country, even.” And described it as being “about a Chinese American family living above their laundromat, confronting debt, internal fractures and alternate universes ruled by an everything bagel.”5 Meaning a bagel with everything on it. 

I’m not sure that I’m going to have to see the movie after reading today’s gospel which is essentially about a man for whom everything, everywhere, seems to happen, all at once.I

It all begins innocently enough with a man blind from birth. He is minding his own business, not bothering anybody, when all of a sudden the disciples notice him and make him into an object of speculation.  As Dr. James D. Howell observed. “Jesus’ answer to the question about sin exhibits his heart more than anything he ever said: ‘Who sinned, this guy or his parents?’ Right answer: Neither. Boom, blame game squashed.”6

Then, as if to prove that this man is not outside of God’s power and love, Jesus is willing to get his hands dirty with spit and mud and orders the man to go and wash.

When he does, wonder of wonders, he can see again.  He can see his town, his house, his family – mom and dad, aunts and uncles, relatives and friends.  He can see flowers and colours, horses and camels, dogs and cats.  He can see!

What should have been a cause for community celebration with everybody going wild in jubilation instead turns into a call for speculation.  

There should have been a corned-beef-and-cabbage dinner.  There should have been green beer and a wild party that would have put any St. Patrick’s Day shindig to shame.  But, instead of great times everything, everywhere, seems to happen to this man all at once. 

In John's Gospel the story of his cure takes exactly two verses; the controversy surrounding the cure, takes 39 verses. 

All the man’s neighbours and friends knew is that before whatever happened, happened they could count on the same unnamed guy, being in the same spot, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, sitting on his mat and asking for alms.  He was a living landmark.  When they gave directions, they could tell visitors: “You walk down this street until you get to the blind guy. Turn left and what you are looking for will be right there.  You absolutely can’t miss it.”

Now he is up and he’s the one acting like a tourist himself seeing sights he only heard of but has never seen before. Something has happened that cannot be explained but that doesn’t stop the learned ones from trying to explain it or perhaps explain it away.

As one of the characters in the great book, The Lincoln Highway, observed:  “Living in the big city, rushing around amid all that hammering and clamoring, the events of life can begin to seem random. But in a town this size, when a piano falls out of a window and lands on a fellow’s head, there’s a good chance you’ll know why he deserved it.”7

The rest of the story is made up of whether this man deserved, or didn’t deserve, what he received.

There are questions and none of the questions are kind.  Instead of asking him what its like to see again or whether the light hurt his eyes they speculate as to what happened. Noone asked the man what he was feeling or what he would do now. 

Instead, they begin by asking the most puzzling question of all: “Who are you?” and to each other “Who is this guy?”  Maybe it’s not the same man, they theorize.  Looks like him but maybe its not. Foolishly the man pipes us and says, ““I’m the man all right!”8 

In light of everything that happens to him, all at once, I’ll bet if he had it to do all over again, he would have kept his mouth shut. 

Who did this?  they want to know, and the man replied “a man whose name, I was told, was Jesus.  But, I didn’t actually see him because, I was blind!  Remember?”

When they ask him the “how” question, he tells the same story over and over again. “‘He put mud on my eyes, and I washed, and now I see.’”9

Then they ask him the most dangerous question of all: the “when” question.  Almost as an aside we are told that this miracle occurred on the Sabbath. Now everything has gotten worse. 

To the learned ones it appears that this miracle “has come on the wrong day, to an unworthy recipient, from a maverick agent who the Pharisees can’t see for dust.”10

If anybody can start doing anything they want whenever they want all at the same time.  Everything is going to fall apart.  Everywhere there will be lawlessness.  

Even the newly sighted man’s parents put distance between themselves and him.  Outside of Jesus and the man whose world is now in a royal upheaval they are my favourites in the story.  

When they are asked, they are smart enough to stay out of the fray. ““We know he is our son, and we know he was born blind. But we don’t know how he came to see—haven’t a clue about who opened his eyes. Why don’t you ask him? He’s a grown man and can speak for himself.”11

They didn’t exactly throw their son under the bus but they sure wanted to make certain that they stayed out of oncoming traffic. 

It was well that they did because what happens next turns everything, all at once into a disaster.

They called the man back a second time—the man who had been blind—and told him, “Give credit to od. We know this man is an impostor.”

He replied, “I know nothing about that one way or the other. But I know one thing for sure: I was blind . . . I now see.”  They said, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?” “I’ve told you over and over and you haven’t listened. Why do you want to hear it again? Are you so eager to become his disciples?”

With that they jumped all over him. “You might be a disciple of that man, but we’re disciples of Moses. We know for sure that God spoke to Moses, but we have no idea where this man even comes from.”

The man replied, “This is amazing! You claim to know nothing about him, but the fact is, he opened my eyes! It’s well known that God isn’t at the beck and call of sinners but listens carefully to anyone who lives in reverence and does his will. That someone opened the eyes of a man born blind has never been heard of—ever. If this man didn’t come from God, he wouldn’t be able to do anything.”

They said, “You’re nothing but dirt! How dare you take that tone with us!” Then they threw him out in the street.12

 So, there you have it.  On a day where everything, everywhere, seemed to happen to the man all at once he is right back where he started – on the street.

At this point Jesus, who has be absent from most of this story, reappears.  

In a perfectly lovely scene Jesus goes looking for the man.  

I can see the two of them sitting outside on the curb together with the man wondering what just happened to him and also wondering if his day, if not he whole life, would have been much better if Jesus had just left him alone.  

At least back there, in the good old days, which were no more than twelve hours but seemed like an eternity ago, he knew what to expect.  He had his spot on the street, his mat, his cup, and made enough to get by.  It wasn’t much but, at least, it was stable.

Now everything, everywhere, seems to have fallen apart all at once.  It was like he had been in a very confusing movie.  

It is then that Jesus comes and helps this man to see everything clearly not just on a physical level, but in every way.

What Jesus says to the man, in essence is this:

Remember all those people who doubted you, and defamed you, and made fun of you, all day long?

Remember all those people who thought that they and they alone had a handle on the truth?

Remember all those learned ones who thought they were so smart?

Well, all those people were blind as bats to what was and what was not the power of God working in their midst.  They wouldn’t be able to see it if it came up hit them right in the eye.

But you know.  You’ve experienced it and now you know that no darkness, not even ”the darkness of confusion or anger… NO DARKNESS is stronger than Jesus’ light. 

And Jesus helps him to see – that even when everyone else is casting him aside and telling him that he is not worthy or welcome, God’s response is staring him in the face: “you are deeply loved, and you are child of God, created in God’s image.”13

This – and so much more - is what Jesus helps this man to see. 

Jesus helps us to see it too.  Maybe not in everything, everywhere, all at once but at least in him, the one who made miracles from spit and mud. 

________________

1. Kade Heather, “Police Urge Jewish, Other Religious Communities to Be Vigilant This Weekend as Neo-Nazi Group Declares 'Day of Hate',” Chicago Sun-Times, February 23, 2023), https://chicago.suntimes.com/2023/2/22/23611081/chicago-police-jewish-communities-vigilant-when-neo-nazi-group-has-declared-national-day-of-hate.

2. Michael J. Lindvall, “St. John 9:1-41. Connecting the Reading with the World,” in Connections: A Lectionary Commentary for Preaching and Worship, ed. Thomas G. Long, et. al, vol. 2 (Louisville, KY: Westminister|John Knox Press, 1999), pp. 90-92.

3. Andrew Nagy Benson, “St. John 9:1-41. Connecting the Reading with Scripture,” in Connections: A Lectionary Commentary for Preaching and Worship, ed. Thomas G. Long, vol. 2 (Nashville, TN: Westmonister/John Knox Press, 1999), p. 90.

4. Brooks Barnes, “'Eerything Everywhere All at Once' Is Big Winner at the Oscars,” The New York Times (The New York Times, March 13, 2023), https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/13/movies/oscars-everything-everywhere-all-at-once.html.

5. Michael Phillips, “Column: For Oscars 2023, 'Everything Everywhere' Wins, and a Great Divider Goes All the Way,” Chicago Tribune, March 13, 2023, https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/movies/ct-ent-oscars-2023-reaction-everything-everywhere-20230313-7epeslcvt5eolbsnzigdqs4xe4-story.html.

6. James C. Howell, “What Can We Say?  March 19,” James Howell's Weekly Preaching Notions (Myers Park United Methodist Church, January 1, 2023), https://jameshowellsweeklypreachingnotions.blogspot.com/. 

7. Amor Towles, in Lincoln Highway (New York, NY: Penguin Books, 2023).

8. St John 9:9. (PHILLIPS) [PHILLIPS=J. B. Phillips,  in The New Testament in Modern English (London: HarperCollins, 2000).

9. St. John 9:15. (NIV) [NIV=The New International Version]

10. Richard Lischer, “March 22, 2020: Fourth Sunday in Lent,” The Christian Century, March 3, 1999, https://www.christiancentury.org/article/2012-01/acknowledgment?code=0YirY63ycMCxxNyCOmEt&utm_source=Christian%2BCentury%2BNewsletter&utm_campaign=179489864c-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_SCP_2023-03-13&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b00cd618da-179489864c-86361464.

11. St. John 9:20-23.  (MESSAGE) [MESSAGE=Eugene H. Peterson, The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language, with Topical Concordance (NavPress, 2005).]

12. St. John 9:24-34. (MESSAGE)

13. Michael Remmenger, “I'm So Pretty,” A Sermon for Every Sunday (asermonforeverysunday.com, March 13, 2023), https://asermonforeverysunday.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Michael-Renninger-Man-Born-Blind-1.pdf.

Sermon preached at The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Saint Luke

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d0FFTTuJ2g