37  The Power of  Unbelief (13:53-58)

And it came about that when Jesus had finished these parables, He departed from there. And coming to His home town He began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they became astonished, and said, “Where did this man get this wisdom, and these miraculous powers? Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his home town, and in his own household.” And He did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief. (13:53-58)

Although Jesus continued to teach many additional truths and to reinforce and illustrate those already taught, the eight parables of Matthew 13 mark the end of the disciples’ basic instruction. As noted earlier, Jesus’ use of parables was primarily in response to His rejection by the Jews. The same stories that clarified truth for His true followers obscured truth for those who refused to trust in Him. “All these things Jesus spoke to the multitudes in parables, and He did not speak to them without a parable” (Matt. 13:34), because, as He had earlier explained to the disciples, “To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted. . . . Therefore I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand” (vv. 11, 13).

As far as preparation of the disciples was concerned, the two most important parables of Matthew 13 were those of the sower and of the wheat and tares. The story of the sower made clear that some people would believe the gospel but many would not; and it prepared them to anticipate the four basic responses men would make to the gospel. The vivid story of the wheat and tares made clear that, for the present period of Christ’s kingdom, the saved and the unsaved would coexist side by side. The twelve—and all succeeding witnesses of Christ—would carry on their ministry in a time of both belief and unbelief and of both good and evil.

Beginning with 13:53 and continuing through the first part of chapter 16, Matthew records eight incidents in the life of the Lord that correspond to and demonstrate the truths presented in the two parables just mentioned.

The first incident involved the offense taken against Jesus by His hometown of Nazareth (13:54-58). To them Jesus was a stumbling block, and the soil of their hearts was obviously hard.

The second incident involved Herod (14:1-12), whose heart was also hard but who rejected the Lord more out of indifference than hatred.

The third incident had two parts and centered first on the large multitude whom Jesus miraculously fed and then around the people of Gennesaret (14:13-21, 34-36). In both instances, the initial fascination with Jesus was positive but superficial. The first group followed Him because they were fed and the second because they were healed. Their interest eventually withered, just like plants in shallow soil do when the sun comes out.

The fourth incident occurred between the two parts of the third and involved the twelve disciples, whose “good soil” was evidenced by their worshiping Jesus after He walked on the water and calmed the storm (14:22-33).

The fifth incident involved the scribes and Pharisees who tried to find an excuse to condemn Jesus (15:1-20), and it illustrates again the hard and stony ground of unbelieving rejection.

The sixth incident centered on the Canaanite woman who immediately confessed Jesus as Lord and begged Him to deliver her demon-possessed daughter (15:21-28). The soil of her heart was soft and fertile, and the seed of the Word took firm root.

The seventh incident involved the Galileans who brought their sick and afflicted to Jesus for healing but made no genuine commitment (Luke 15:29-39). Here was a mixture of shallow and thorny soils, in which the gospel was partially but not permanently received.

The eighth and last incident involved the Pharisees and Sadducees who sought to test and entrap Jesus by asking for a special sign (16:1-4). The soil of their hearts was obviously hard.

In these eight accounts there is exactly the ratio of belief to unbelief (one out of four) found in the parable of the sower. By the marvelous wisdom and provision of the Lord, the twelve, through these incidents, witnessed living demonstrations of the principles He had just taught them about men’s response to the gospel in the present age. In these situations both the power of belief and the power of unbelief are revealed.

The power of belief is attested throughout Scripture. Abraham believed God and became the father of a great nation and of God’s chosen people. Israel believed God and walked through the Red Sea on dry land. David believed God and was enabled to slay Goliath. Naaman believed God and was healed of his leprosy. Daniel believed God, and the lions could not harm him. A Roman centurion believed God, and his servant was healed. Two blind men believed God and received their sight and their salvation. Jairus believed God, and his daughter was brought back to life. The Philippian jailer and his household believed God and received eternal life. The list could go on and on.

But the list of accounts showing the power of unbelief is also long. Adam and Eve failed to believe God, and the whole world was cursed. The world itself refused to believe God’s warning preached through Noah, and it was destroyed in the Flood, except for eight people. Pharaoh refused to believe God, and he lost his firstborn son, his entire army, and his own life. Israel refused to believe God and wandered forty years in the wilderness; and as a kingdom the people again refused to believe and were scattered for centuries among foreign nations. Aaron refused to believe God’s command about worship and led the people into idolatry, resulting in the loss of 3,000 lives. Moses refused to believe God, and it cost him the privilege of entering the Promised Land. Nebuchadnezzar refused to believe God and became a senseless beast. Many would-be disciples refused to believe God because they were offended by Christ’s teaching, and they entered into eternity without hope. The rich young ruler refused to believe God and forfeited eternal life. Most of the scribes, Pharisees, and Sadducees refused to believe God and were condemned to the eternal torment of hell. Although he lived for three years with Jesus, in the presence of the living Truth and Light, Judas refused to believe God and was condemned to hell, which Jesus said was Judas’s own place. Felix, Festus, and Agrippa refused to believe God through the witness of Paul, and they were lost forever.

Just as faith has the power to bring forgiveness of sins and eternal life, unbelief has the power to hold a person in his sins and under the condemnation of eternal hell. Just as belief has the power to bring eternal happiness, joy, peace, and glory in God’s presence, unbelief has the power to bring eternal sorrow, pain, and anguish in God’s absence.

As the parable of the sower illustrates, most of the response Jesus faced and the disciples would face was that of unbelief. Whether unbelief comes from the heart beaten hard by sin, from the rocky heart covered by a shallow layer of superficial belief, or from the thorny heart whose worldliness chokes out the truth of the gospel—all unbelief is a matter of will. Unbelief is a choice; it is saying no to God in spite of the evidence.

Matthew’s account of the first incident illustrating the parable of the sower is preceded by the brief mention of Jesus’ departure from Capernaum.

LEAVING CAPERNAUM

And it came about that when Jesus had finished these parables, He departed from there. (13:53)

Jesus had been ministering in and around Capernaum for about a year, using it as His home base (see 4:13; 8:5). But the majority of the people who saw and heard Him in that region eventually fell away, manifesting their rejection either by blasé indifference or direct opposition. Because of that rejection, His last teaching there was done entirely in parables, in order that, “while seeing they [would] not see, and while hearing they [would] not hear, nor . . . understand” (13:13). After Jesus finished the parables on the kingdom, He departed from there.

Because the Lord had spent more time there than anywhere else thus far in His ministry, Capernaum was especially guilty for rejecting Him. Earlier, Jesus had scorchingly rebuked them, saying, “And you, Capernaum, will not be exalted to heaven, will you? You shall descend to Hades; for if the miracles had occurred in Sodom which occurred in you, it would have remained to this day” (11:23).

Jesus had, in effect, pronounced a curse on Capernaum, and when He departed from there, that city’s doom was imminent. Jesus never went there again except as He passed through to minister elsewhere. He had come into the city and demonstrated power that could only have been from God. Yet the people would not have Him as Lord. Many marveled and some criticized, but few believed. Now Capernaum’s opportunity was passed, and she entered a decline into oblivion from which she never recovered. Today the city is in virtually the same state of ruin—without houses or people—that it was a few centuries after Jesus was there. Apparently the town and the synagogue enjoyed a period of worldly prosperity for a while, but archaeological excavations show increasing pagan influence on the Jews there. The last synagogue built in Capernaum, erected over the floor of the one where Jesus taught, was decorated with various animals and mythological figures. Having rejected the true God, the people were at the mercy of false ones.

RETURNING TO NAZARETH

And coming to His home town He began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they became astonished, and said, “Where did this man get this wisdom, and these miraculous powers? Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his home town, and in his own household.” And He did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief. (13:54-58)

Jesus’ home town was Nazareth, where Joseph and Mary went to live after returning from Egypt with their infant Son (2:23). It was to Nazareth that Jesus returned after His baptism and temptations (4:12-13); and we learn from Luke that the response to Him then was the same as it was on this occasion.

Luke reports that, after the wilderness temptations, “Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit;... And He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up; and as was His custom, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath, and stood up to read” (Luke 4:14a, 16).

Jesus had been away only a short while and was still a familiar figure in the synagogue, where it was “His custom” to be every Sabbath. The crowd assembled on this particular Sabbath was essentially the same as it had been for many years; but Jesus was not the same. During the intervening time He had begun His ministry and suddenly become famous, because from the onset of His work the “news about Him spread through all the surrounding district,... and [He] was praised by all” (vv. 14b, 15b).

After Jesus stood and read the familiar messianic text of Isaiah 61:1-2, He handed the scroll to the synagogue attendant and sat down to comment on the reading. (The reader always stood to read the Scripture and then sat down as he gave an interpretation, lest he give the impression that his comments were equal in authority to God’s Word.) As He began to interpret, Jesus said, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing”; and He probably made other comments as well. At first the people did not understand that Jesus was referring to Himself, because their initial response was quite favorable: “All were speaking well of Him, and wondering at the gracious words which were falling from His lips; and they were saying, ‘Is this not Joseph’s son?’” (Luke 4:17-22).

Knowing that the people’s praise was based merely on faithless recognition of His popularity and power, Jesus began to expose their real motives. He knew they wanted Him to duplicate in Nazareth the miracles He had performed in Capernaum. And He knew that if He complied with their demand they still would not accept Him as the Messiah, because “no prophet is welcome in his home town.” In further rebuke of their hypocrisy and faithlessness, He reminded them that in the days of Elijah God had shut up the rain in Israel for three-and-a-half years and caused a great famine. During that time the Lord showed mercy on none of the many suffering widows in Israel but showed great mercy on a Gentile widow of Zarephath. He also reminded them that during the time of Elisha, God cleansed no lepers in Israel but did cleanse the leprosy of the Gentile Naaman of Syria (vv. 23-27). They could not have missed Jesus’ powerful, rebuking point that a believing Gentile is dearer to God than an unbelieving Jew.

When Jesus made clear that He understood their wicked motives and would not bend to their hardhearted provincial desire to have their own display of miracles, “all in the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things”; and they rose up and cast Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff” (vv. 28-29). In their attempt to kill Jesus, their evil character and unbelief became apparent. They wanted entertainment by Jesus and benefit for themselves from the miracle worker, not conviction of sin and a message of salvation by Jesus the Messiah.

From Jesus’ second, and similar, encounter with His former neighbors in Nazareth we can learn four important truths about unbelief: it blurs the obvious, builds up the irrelevant, blinds to the truth, and blocks the supernatural.

UNBELIEF BLURS THE OBVIOUS

And coming to His home town He began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they became astonished, and said, “Where did this man get this wisdom, and these miraculous powers?” (13:54)

The people at the synagogue in Jesus’ home town of Nazareth immediately recognized Him as the person they had known as a boy and young man. They also remembered that less than a year earlier He had worked miracles in other parts of Galilee, had impressed them with His great wisdom, and had so angered them by exposing their hypocrisy and unbelief that they tried to throw Him over the cliff to His death. It soon became evident on this trip to Nazareth that their basic attitude about Him had not changed. They were still astonished at His wisdom and His miraculous powers, and they still refused to recognize the obvious, asking again, Where then did this man get all these things?

How could the people for the second time reject Jesus as the Messiah, when it was so obvious that these things, at which they marveled, could only have come by God’s power? In less than a year He had demonstrated profound wisdom and authority beyond anything the people had ever witnessed, or even heard of. He taught profoundly on virtually every subject related to life and death, time and eternity, truth and falsehood, righteousness and sin, God and man, heaven and hell. He taught about regeneration, worship, evangelism, sin, salvation, morality, divorce, murder, service, servanthood, pride, hate, love, anger, jealousy, hypocrisy, prayer, fasting, true and false doctrine, true and false teachers, the Sabbath, the law, discipleship, grace, blasphemy, signs and wonders, repentance, humility, dying to self, obedience to God, and countless other subjects. He taught the truth about everything that pertained to spiritual life and godliness (cf. 2 Pet. 1:3).

Jesus had not studied in any of the famous rabbinical schools and had no more formal training in the Scriptures than the average Jewish man. Consequently, when He taught in the Temple during the feast of booths, the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem marveled at Him, “saying, ‘How has this man become learned, having never been educated?’” (John 7:15). Despite the absence of traditional credentials, His spiritual and moral wisdom was so true and profound that it could not be refuted even by His severest critics.

In addition to teaching with great wisdom, Jesus had displayed supernatural power that all but banished sickness and disease from Palestine and had performed miracles of nature that astonished the most hardened skeptics. At the very least, it should have been clear that Jesus was a prophet of God unequalled by any of the Old Testament era. How could the people not believe Jesus was from God, when only divine power and wisdom could explain the greatness of what He said and did?

When Nicodemus came to Jesus at night, he immediately acknowledged that Jesus had “come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him” (John 3:2). Even the antagonistic Jewish leaders recognized His power was real, although they illogically and blasphemously attributed it to Satan. One of the greatest apologetics for Jesus’ divinity is the clear testimony even of His enemies that He had miraculous powers that no other man had ever had. As Jesus reminded the unbelieving Jews in Jerusalem, “The works which the Father has given Me to accomplish, the very works that I do, bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me” (John 5:36). Later in Jerusalem He told another group of Jews who wanted to stone Him, “If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father” (John 10:37-38). At the end of his gospel John declares, “And there are also many other things which Jesus did, which if they were written in detail, I suppose even the world itself would not contain the books which were written” (21:25).

Like the scribes and Pharisees, the people of Jesus’ hometown synagogue refused to make the logical and obvious connection between His power and His divinity because they were willfully unbelieving. The seed of the gospel fell on the hard-packed soil of sin-loving hearts into which God’s truth could not make the slightest penetration. As Jesus explained to Nicodemus, “He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should exposed” (John 3:18-20).

Those who heard and saw Jesus did not reject Him for lack of evidence but in spite of overwhelming evidence. They did not reject Him because they lacked the truth but because they rejected the truth. They refused forgiveness because they wanted to keep their sins. They denied the light because they preferred darkness. The reason for rejecting the Lord has always been that men prefer their own way to His.

The Jewish leaders in Jerusalem marveled at the obvious wisdom and power of Peter and John, knowing “that they were uneducated and untrained men” (Acts 4:13). But just as they had done with Peter’s and John’s Master, they did not judge the message on its scriptural merits but on its relation to their human traditions—which derived from and appealed to their works-oriented self-righteousness.

When a person willfully rejects the Lord, even the most compelling evidence will not convince Him of divine truth. Cultists and liberal theologians who refuse to acknowledge Jesus as the divine Son of God can find countless ways to discount or explain away the most obvious truths of Scripture. They then congratulate themselves for their intellectualism in explaining Scripture without accepting its truths, for seeming to honor Christ without believing in Him or in what He taught, and for calling themselves by His name while denying His divine nature and power. To such false disciples Jesus continues to say, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 7:21; Luke 6:46).

The person who has heard many clear presentations of the gospel but continually asks for more evidence of its truth simply reveals the obstinacy of his unbelief. As Jesus explained in the story of the rich man and Lazarus, “If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone rises from the dead” (Luke 16:31). The person who does not accept the light from God he already has will not believe no matter how much more light he is given.

UNBELIEF BUILDS UP THE IRRELEVANT

“Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” (13:55-56)

Instead of accepting the obvious and overwhelming evidence that Jesus was the Messiah, the people of Nazareth focused their attention on the irrelevant. It was indeed surprising to see someone they had watched grow up and with whom they had gone to synagogue all His life suddenly come on the scene as a great leader—with no formal training and no recognition by the accepted religious hierarchy.

The facts that Jesus was the carpenter’s son and the Son of Mary, that He had brothers named James and Joseph and Simon and Judas who everyone in Nazareth knew, and that He had sisters who still lived there were irrelevant to the issues of His being the Messiah or not. Although the Jews had many incomplete and false notions about the Messiah, they knew He was to come to earth as a man and that He would have to be born into some family and live in some community. But instead of feeling highly honored that God chose to place His Son in Nazareth to grow up into manhood—as Mary felt highly honored to be His mother (Luke 1:48)—the people were skeptical, jealous, and resentful.

From this text and numerous others (see, e. g., Matt. 12:46-47; Luke 2:7; John 7:10; Acts 1:14), it is clear that Mary did not live in perpetual virginity, as Roman Catholic heresy claims. After Jesus’ birth, Joseph began normal marital relations with his wife, and she bore at least four sons and two daughters by him. Mary was a woman of extraordinary godliness, but she was no more divine than any other woman ever born, and certainly was not the mother of God, as Catholic dogma maintains. She even referred to the Lord as “God my Savior” (Luke 1:47), affirming her own sinfulness and need of salvation.

Joseph had been a tektn (carpenter), which was the general term for a craftsman who worked with hard material, including wood. He may also have worked with bricks and stones. In any case, he had surely built many houses, windows, doors, yokes, and other things for his neighbors in Nazareth; and many products of his workmanship were probably still being used in the village. Joseph was an ordinary laborer like most other men of the village, and Jesus learned carpentry under him and no doubt took over the business after Joseph died (see Mark 6:3).

The fact that the citizens of Nazareth did not regard Jesus and His family as being out of the ordinary completely undercuts myths that attribute bizarre miracles to Him when He was a child. One story maintains that whenever He found a bird with a broken wing, He would stroke it gently and send it flying on its way healed and healthy. This text completely mitigates against such fabrications.

When He came to earth, Jesus emptied Himself of certain divine prerogatives, “taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men” (Phil. 2:7). And although He was sinless and morally perfect during every minute of His life, His perfection was clearly not of the sort that called attention to itself or set Him apart as strange or peculiar. To those who knew Him as a child and young man, Jesus was simply a carpenter and a carpenter’s son. It was partly over the commonness of Jesus and His family that the people of Nazareth stumbled. They found it impossible to accept Him even as a great human teacher, much less as the divine Messiah.

It is tragic that small issues can be used as great excuses for not believing. The people of Nazareth were like people throughout the history of the church who can find every foolish reason to justify their rejection of the gospel. They don’t like the attitude of the one who witnesses to them; they think most church people are hypocrites; they think the preacher is too loud or too soft, too stuffy or too overbearing; and the services are too formal or too informal. They are offended at the slightest things Christians do and construe the insignificant as being all important. They put up one smoke screen after another to excuse their unwillingness to believe the clear and demanding claims and promises of Christ.

As a means of escape or self-justification, unbelief diverts attention away from the truth. The genuine seeker may have many questions about the gospel before he is ready to commit himself to Christ. But his sincerity is proven by his willingness to accept the truth once it is explained. Each new ray of light leads him closer to belief. For the confirmed unbeliever, on the other hand, each new truth prompts him to raise another objection, and his argument against that truth pushes him still further from salvation.

It is characteristic of unbelief to disguise itself, and in order to hide their self-satisfaction and refusal to accept the clear evidence about Jesus, the people of Nazareth dismissed Him on the basis of having known Him since He was a child and of knowing His family as ordinary citizens of the community. They allowed pride, jealousy, resentment, embarrassment, and a host of other wicked and petty feelings to fill their hearts and become barriers to salvation.

UNBELIEF BLINDS TO THE TRUTH

And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his home town, and in his own household.” (13:57)

Took offense is from skandaliz, which has the basic idea of causing to stumble or trip up and is the term from which our English scandalize is derived. Jesus’ friends and former neighbors were offended by His claims. They were offended by His ordinary background, by the commonness of His family, the limits of His formal training, His lack of official religious status, and many other irrelevant or secondary issues.

We have no full account of what Jesus taught on either occasion in that Nazareth synagogue; but both times He offended the people by what He said. He unmasked their hypocrisy by exposing their wicked desire to see Him perform miracles for miracles’ sake (Luke 4:23); and He probably talked to them about their sinfulness and need to repent. In any case, they became antagonistic and took offense at Him, because their unbelief blinded them to the truth He taught. “While seeing they [did] not see, and while hearing they [did] not hear, nor [did] they understand” (Matt. 13:13). As Paul declared to the Corinthian believers, Christ is “to Jews a stumbling block, and to Gentiles foolishness” (1 Cor. 1:23).

Until a person is willing to have the hard ground of his heart plowed up by God’s truth and to confess and forsake his sin, he will be offended by the gospel. Until a person faces his sin in penitence, the truth of the gospel is hidden from him, and the blessing of the gospel is lost to him.

Again (see Luke 4:24) Jesus reminded the people of Nazareth of the well-known proverb that a prophet is not without honor except in his home town, and in his own household. It is often difficult for those who have watched a child grow up as a neighborhood kid to later accept him as a community leader, government official, pastor, or such—to say nothing of accepting him as the divine Son of God! Even when the man is personally liked, it is not easy for him to gain the respect that an outsider of the same capabilities would enjoy. Jesus’ brothers eventually came to believe in Him as their Savior (Acts 1:14), but for several years after He began His ministry they did not (John 7:5).

UNBELIEF BLOCKS THE SUPERNATURAL

And He did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief. (13:58)

Some of Jesus’ miracles were done in direct response to personal faith; but many others, perhaps most of them, were done regardless of any specific expression of an individual’s faith. All of the miracles were done to strengthen the faith of those who believed in Him; but although God can perform miracles where there is no belief, He chose not to perform them where there was hard and willful unbelief. Unbelief, then, became a barrier to divine blessing, and because of the unbelief of the people of Nazareth, Jesus did not do many miracles there. Mark reports that “He could do no miracles there except that He laid His hands upon a few sick people and healed them” (Mark 6:5). It was not that Jesus lacked supernatural power while He was in Nazareth but that He chose to operate only in response to faith, with the result that the people’s unbelief prevented Him from fully exercising that power.

Just as believing saves the soul and enables the power of God to work in its fullness, so unbelief blocked the release of His power and dammed up the flood of His blessing.

Jesus warned, “Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces” (Matt. 7:6). The hardened unbeliever despises the precious truths and blessings of God and will even use them against the Lord and His people if he can. Jesus refused to bend to the request of the hypocritical scribes and Pharisees who wanted to see a sign from Him (Matt. 12:38). “He answered and said to them, ‘An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign shall be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet’” (v. 39). Jesus’ miracles were of spiritual benefit only as they led to faith in Him or strengthened those who already believed. For those who refused to believe, His miracles had no spiritual value at all, and He would not perform them in order to entertain or to satisfy ungodly curiosity.

When Jesus and His disciples came upon the man in Jerusalem who had been blind from birth, the “disciples asked Him, saying, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he should be born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was in order that the works of God might be displayed in him’” (John 9:2-3). The man was born blind, Jesus explained, so that his healing could glorify God.

After the man’s sight was restored while he was washing in the pool of Siloam as Jesus had commanded, his neighbors could hardly believe he was the same person whom they had known from infancy as totally blind and helpless. He was brought before the Pharisees, who took the occasion to express various opinions about the godliness of Jesus. Because He dared to “work” on the Sabbath by performing a miracle, some of them were certain Jesus could not be from God. Others argued that a person who was not from God could never do such things.

Some of the leaders did not even believe the man had ever been blind, and they called in his parents to testify. When asked to explain what happened to their son, the parents said, “We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but how he now sees, we do not know.” When the man was called back the second time, the leaders said to him, “Give glory to God; we know that this man is a sinner,” referring to Jesus. The man responded that, although he could not be certain about Jesus’ sin, he was certain that it was Jesus who had healed him. And he did not believe a sinful man could do such marvelous things as Jesus had undeniably done for him. “If this man were not from God,” he insisted, “He could do nothing.”

But as the man’s testimony became more and more favorable to Jesus, the Pharisees’ unbelief only became more and more hardened. They finally said to the man, “‘You were born entirely in sins, and are you teaching us?’ And they put him out.”

After they dismissed the man, Jesus came to him and asked, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” When he discovered that Jesus was Himself the Son of Man, the former blind man confessed, ‘“Lord, I believe.’ And he worshiped Him.” Then Jesus said, “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see; and that those who see may become blind.” In reply to some of the Pharisees who asked Him, “‘We are not blind too, are we?’ Jesus said to them, ‘If you were blind, you would have no sin; but since you say, “We see,” your sin remains’” (see John 9:6-41).

As those Pharisees perfectly illustrate, when unbelief investigates the supernatural work of God, it comes up empty. It meets a dead end when it tries to probe divine things. It cannot recognize the works of God because it will not recognize the truth of God.