When reading the Bible, a really edifying exercise to do is to underline key words and phrases, or any repeated themes.

If you tried to do this for this chapter (like I once did), your Bible will be filled with markings, because words like "blind", "see", "eyes", etc. repeat so much throughout this chapter.

The key event in John Chapter 9 is a man born blind being healed by Jesus. Jesus passed by the blind man, anointed his eyes with the clay, and asked the man to wash his eyes in the pool of Siloam. The blind man obeyed, and came back seeing.

Yet, this only takes up a few verses in this chapter. The rest of the chapter focuses on the spiritual eyes of the man slowly being opened.

When asked by others how his eyes were opened, the blind man first referred to Jesus as "a Man called Jesus" (John 9:8-12).

Then, when questioned by the unbelieving Jews who accused Jesus of being a sinner, he first responds with "Whether He is a sinner or not I do not know. One thing I know: that though I was blind, now I see." (John 9:24-25).

Yet, when furthered questioned, he gave a very powerful answer, proclaiming his faith:

"The man answered and said to them, “Why, this is a marvellous thing, that you do not know where He is from; yet He has opened my eyes! Now we know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does His will, He hears him. Since the world began it has been unheard of that anyone opened the eyes of one who was born blind. If this Man were not from God, He could do nothing.”"
(John 9:30-33)

This resulted in him being cast out by the Pharisees. This "casting out" is not just being asked to leave the synagogue, but rather being excommunicated and no longer having anything to do with the Jews.

We then see the love and compassion of Jesus: Upon hearing that he was cast out, Jesus went to find him.

"Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when He had found him, He said to him, “Do you believe in the Son of God?” He answered and said, “Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?” And Jesus said to him, “You have both seen Him and it is He who is talking with you.” Then he said, “Lord, I believe!” And he worshipped Him."
(John 9:35-38)

Here, the spiritual eyes of the initially blind man are fully opened. He sought to believe in the Son of God, and when Jesus revealed Himself to him, he again proclaimed his belief and worshipped.

The opening of the man's physical eyes only spanned a few verses, today's chapter details the gradual opening of his spiritual eyes.

We may not be physically blind today, but are our spiritual eyes open? Do we truly recognise Jesus as our Lord and bow the knee to worship Him?