Gospel of John, Chapter 9 (The Man Born Blind)
Chapter 9 of John's Gospel is the story of the Man Born Blind. This is the second chapter in John that centers around a miraculous healing, and it is noteworthy in that it is one of the few chapters in John (if not the only one), where the action does not center around Jesus Christ. All through John's Gospel, we've seen Jesus and the Pharisees, the Jews squaring off. But, once Jesus opens the eyes of the blind man at the beginning of this chapter, Jesus disappears for a while and lets the formerly blind man take over.
And this man is on fire for the Lord. His parents won't speak Jesus' name when asked who healed their son (John 9:18-22), but the man who was blind does. "He is a prophet." (John 9:17) He says this knowing that, "if any one should confess him to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue." To understand why this man is so passionate in his defense of Christ, we need to know what he is seeing for the first time.
In the John chapter 1, we learn that, "The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not understood it." (John 1:5) (Most translations say overcome, but I believe that the ambiguity is intentional.) Jesus tells Nicodemus that, "unless one is born above, he cannot see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3) Jesus is the light, but what good is light to a blind man?
The Pharisees, of course, are more concerned with obeying the Sabbath than sight; about the very practical, but earthly law of Moses (given by God, of course, but not meant to endure eternally, as the Law of the New Covenant is). There are other types of Pharisees, as well. Instead of praising fidelity to some ancient moral code, our secular society heaps praise on those who pursue social justice. The goodness of a Mother Theresa is so pure and true that even an atheist can comprehend it.
But God calls us to transcend materialism, and to see the deeper spiritual realities at work. Giving food to the poor is a good and Christian thing to do, but even more important is to love and pray for our brothers and sisters. This truth cannot even be seen by the atheist, and the Pharisees could not see it when Christ presented it to them. This is a great gift given to us by God, and we should be just as excited to receive it as the Man Born Blind was.