Make the Turn
Preacher: Tim Jenkins
Scripture: John 9:1-41
Reflection Questions
The disciples assumed someone had to be at fault for the blind man's suffering — a very human instinct. When something goes wrong in your life or in the lives of people you love, do you find yourself asking "whose fault is this?" or "what did I do to deserve this?" How does Jesus' answer — that suffering can be an instrument of God's work — challenge or comfort you?
The Pharisees were passionate, serious, and deeply committed people — and yet their certainty about how the world worked made them increasingly blind to what was right in front of them. Are there places in your life where your confidence in how things should work might be preventing you from seeing what God is actually doing?
The sermon describes how we are trained to compartmentalize — keeping faith in one box while health worries, family tensions, financial fears, and grief go in separate ones, so that Jesus never really gets into the things that matter most. Which area of your life right now feels most closed off from God's presence? What would it look like to let the light in there?
The blind man's testimony was simple and unpolished: "I don't really know — I just know what happened to me." He had no theology, no tidy explanation — just a real encounter with Jesus that changed everything. Looking back over your life, can you point to a moment like that? How has that encounter — or encounters — shaped the person you are today?
The blind man lost his community, his place, everything familiar — and it was precisely there, alone and stripped down, that he said "Lord, I believe" and worshiped. Many of us have lived through seasons of real loss — a spouse, a career, a sense of purpose, our health. Looking back, was there something that got stripped away that turned out to be the moment you encountered Jesus most clearly?
