06-20-20 Kevin Goins - The Church's Ministry of Healing, John 9:17

“Anatomy of an Illness: The Church’s Ministry of Healing”
John 9:17

I First, sickness gets our attention and it gets the attention of Jesus (9:1).
II Second, sickness makes us uncomfortable (9:2).
III Third, sickness is caused by alienation (9:2).
IV Fourth, oftentimes our best theological or commonsense explanations for sickness are not good enough (9:3a).
V Fifth, sometimes sickness happens for a good reason, so that God can be glorified in our life (9:3b).
VI Sixth, all believers in Jesus are called to help sick people find health (9:4).
VII Seventh, sickness is a work of the kingdom of darkness; healing is a work of the Kingdom of light (9:5).
VIII Eighth, the how of healing is very important (9:6).
IX Ninth, sickness can be overcome by divine healing, but healing does not happen without some action on our part (9:7).
X Tenth, divine healing will always arouse doubt (9:8-9).
XI Eleventh, the response to the healing of sickness is often questions (9:10-12)
XII Twelfth, healing is not only a debated topic, it is also a very divisive issue.

XIII Thirteenth, people who are healed enter into some kind of _______________________ with the Healer.

A. First, behind every case of sickness there is a real ___________________(9:17a).

1. “Finally” is not just an indicator of ___________, it is also an indicator of ex___________________ on John’s part.

a. Sickness cannot exist by itself; sickness cannot exist without __________________.

b. One of the things I have noticed during this pandemic is how easily we turn sick people into ______________________________.

c. The religious authorities treated this man as if he was just a piece of e___________________ that could be used either to c_______________ Jesus or to glorify him.

2. John next says, “Finally, they t_____________ again….”

a. There is a tendency when someone important to us gets sick, to think more about what their sickness means to ________ than what it means to ____________.

b. To see someone seriously sick means that we are forced to think of what life would be like w__________________ them.
3. Then John says, “Finally they turned again to the _________ ________.”

a. The formerly blind man is not a person with a _____________ to them; he is instead only a sickness, a disease, a thing: “the blind man.”

b. We often tend to treat people with serious illnesses as if they __________ that illness.

c. Sometimes sickness is very hard on relationships because you cannot have a relationship with an i_________________, you can only have a relationship with a p_____________.

B. Second, behind every example of healing, there is a real ________________ (9:17b).

1. Even though much of the crowd and religious leadership are hostile to Jesus, they still expect that this man should ______________ something about the one who healed him and he should be able to _________ them what he knows.

2. This is probably the first time anyone ever asked this man for his o______________ on anything … and it is a very c_________________ question.

3. This man, then, is on the __________________.

4. There was someone behind this unprecedented miracle: there was a ____________________. But some very influential people were very much opposed to recognizing Jesus as _______________.

5. We also find ____________________ in the same situation today: No one is in a better position to talk about the Savior than the ones who claim to have been _____________ by him!

C. Finally, behind every healing there is a person who must decide the ___________ of the one who healed him (9:17c).

1. The Pharisees asked this man for his opinion of who Jesus was…. In response he says, “He is a ___________________.”

2. There are ______________ things to point out about the man’s answer:

a. First, his understanding of Jesus is ________________.

b. Second, his understanding of Jesus is c___________________.

c. Third, his understanding of Jesus is still i____________________.