In preparing for preaching this Sunday on John 9:1-41, I discovered something which I had never seen before – with thanks to the New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary on John, written by Gail. R O’Day, and that is in relation to sin. If I have seen it before and never took it in, or forgot it (somehow) then my apologies to MK.

It seems, at least according to a particular reading of John’s Gospel, that sin it not a moral category – not a result of a lax in morals, but is rather a theological category – and what’s more, sin is generally couched in relationship to Jesus. It appears that sin is defined not by what one does (moral) but almost exclusively by how one relates to Jesus, and more to the point, by whether one believes that God is present in Jesus.

If we take John 9 as a point in case. A man who is born blind (disciples explore theodicy by placing a blame vs result notion on sin – as was tradition) is healed by Jesus, and through his journey of discipleship and awakening Christology; firstly he is a man who healed him, then he is a prophet, the he is his master, and then he is from God and does God’s will; he comes to sight – both physical and spiritual. Then we have the Pharisees who profess to sin, but through exposure to and disbelief in Jesus through this miracle, find themselves in darkness and sin. Sin only occurs in response to Jesus. If the Pharisees had not been given the opportunity to see, then they would not be blind – v41 Jesus said to them, ‘If you were blind, you would not have sin (ie. had not been exposed to Jesus). But now that you say, “We see”, you sin remains. Sin is a conscious decision not to believe in Jesus, rather than a physical decision based on a moral super code, of which the failure to uphold said code is death – excepting for the fact that Jesus died in lieu of our need to pay….

The Johannine understanding of sin opens up to a very different understanding of the salvific function of Jesus’ death. Salvation from sin is primarily a result of Jesus’ life, not his death, because it is the very life of Jesus as God’s Son and incarnate Word that makes it possible for people to move from sin to external life. Sin is fundamentally about one’s relationship with God, and for the Fourth evangelist, the decisive measure of one’s relationship with God is one’s faith in Jesus. From the Johannine perspective, it is not the Christian community’s responsibility, just as it was not the Pharisees’, to judge anyone’s sins, because the determination of sin rests with God and Jesus, and the individual and is determined by faith, not actions. John’s Gospel is therefore the most radical example of salvation by grace, than anywhere else in the New Testament.

How much would the expression of Christian community change is this was the predominant understanding of sin and salvation, rather than the present dominant death and atonement theology?

I’m still wrestling with this idea….what is your impression?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 27, 2008 at 2/27/2008 04:59:00 pm. You can skip to the end and leave a response.