Lent 4 A John 9:1-41

I had a funny experience with a friend this week. She was looking something she had lost. for a piece of software to install on a new computer, a $300 piece of software. She was sure she had seen it just laying out on a counter. So she decided to put it somewhere safe. Famous last words right? So original packaging and all she had scooped it up and moved it and we looked for it, and we looked for it and we looked for it and we finally gave up looking for it. And tried to find another solution for her software troubles when all of sudden, out of a box with a bunch of other computer things, no longer in it's original packaging at all her husband pulled the disc she was looking for! That was predictable, you knew how it was going to end, we do that. We look and look in all the likely places for something we know we've just seen and then when we finally find it, it looks a little different than we expected and it is in a place that we never would have thought to look.

The people in our lessons today have very similar problems. They are looking for something but it is so far in location and appearance from where they would have expected it that finding it is kind of a trick.

First our Old testament lesson is about the prophet Samuel as he journeys to find a new king for the people of Israel. God has charged him to do this and so he goes, reluctantly, to Bethlehem to find a king. Sound familiar? As we have heard before Bethlehem wasn't exactly the New York City of the ancient Middle East. It was up in the Hill country where the shepherds lived and no one really traveled there unless they had to. And yet God's number one prophet was sent there at the risk of being caught by the current king to find a new king for the people of Israel. And so he went to the house a Jesse, a prominent man in the region and asked to see Jesse's sons as the Lord had told him to. Likely he asked only to see the oldest son because in this time he oldest son was the primary heir, the most important in the family, Samuel would have been sure that this son was to be God's new king.

So son number one came in, Eliab was his name and he looked like a king, he was a soldier, tall and strapping, full grown, already even a leader of a few men in the army. Surely this is who God had chosen, but the prophet Samuel heard no, look somewhere else, that isn't him.

So next came Abinadad, Jesse's second son, just a little younger, nearly as promising looking with his armor and confidence but no. Samuel heard look somewhere else, that isn't him.

Next Jesse's third son, Shammah. A younger man, new to the army a little more wild, a little less wise but surely a third son must be it, the Lord wouldn't dip any deeper into the barrel than this...But he heard again, no Samuel, look somewhere else, that isn't him either.

So Samuel looked everywhere, Jesse called sons from the village, from the courtyards, from the low hills, and Samuel looked at each one with lessening hope, we're never going to find him, now we're looking in less and less likely places....Through seven sons they searched for someone worthy to be a king until Jesse was done showing sons and Samuel had to ask: "Is this all do you have any others, maybe one was hidden somewhere or forgotten somehow."

And Yes it turns out there was another...kind of...a lowly shepherd boy out in the field. The eighth son. The one who tended the sheep. He was barely more than a child and being the eighth son had no stature at all he was almost grouped with the servants of the household. But the prophet waited as someone went searching through the hills to find this hidden son.

And so finally Jesse presented his final son, David who played music and wandered the fields with the sheep and God said to Samuel to immediately give this child the kingdom. Anoint him, he is our new king! He didn't look anything like a king and he wasn't where Samuel would have looked and yet here he was the one who would be hailed as the greatest king of Israel, the one who was to be ancestor to the Messiah born in a sheep stall in hill country many years later.

David, it turned out, had a lot to offer. He was wise and fair and just, a strong soldier and a strong leader, just what the people needed. But no one knew. His parents didn't know what he could do, his friends didn't know, his fellow shepherds didn't know, no one knew until God called again and again each time with a little more information until it was clear that David was the chosen king.

Our New Testament lesson tells a very different story about a man who was blind from birth whom Jesus heals. He has no idea who healed him or why. The people around him don't have any idea how he was healed either and so they start asking questions.

People start asking him and he tells his story, someone healed me, with mud.

They ask his parents and they tell what they know, he was blind and now he sees.

They ask the man again and he tells his story, this time with the sense that maybe the man who healed him was a prophet.

People ask him again and he knows a little more, I was blind and now I see, the man who healed me must come from God he says.

People ask him again and again and the story grows each time.

Finally at the end of the story Jesus asks him what he thinks and he says with faith that he was healed by the son of man and he will worship and believe.

From the very beginning of the story the answer to the question, "Where did this healing come from" was right there in front of everyone but no one saw it, it didn't seem likely and was pretty out of the ordinary. Until they heard the story again and again, let it settle and then heard it again.

At the beginning of Lent I mentioned that our Lenten disciplines roughly follows the order of worship. First we talked about baptism, the event that first welcomes us into a worshiping community. Last week we talked about confession and forgiveness, the very beginning of our service. This week we are talking about telling stories, this is the part of the service we are in right now, the word part.

We come here week after week to hear the stories of God's work from the bible because, just like the man born blind, we understand our own story more and more the more we tell it and hear it told to us. We know God better the more we listen to the way God has worked around us.

But for each person in our lessons today something was hidden and when they found it they didn't find it quite how they had expected to. This is the wonderful mystery of God's word. It isn't where you think it would be. At least not only there. For the man born blind the miracle of his healing was in the telling of his story. I tell a lot of stories up here on Sunday mornings but I can tell you I see the most growth and the most faith when people tell their own stories. When children learn to tell the stories of their baptisms, when teenagers tell the story of their confirmation, when adults tell the stories that lead them to come here and to keep coming here.

Martin Luther is quoted as saying about baptism that, "in ordinary water (the same water as the maid's cooking water), when Christ's promise is present, there God is present-hidden as God was hidden in the manger and on the cross." That is good news for Meaghan this morning but I would extend that to say that in ordinary words, when Christ's promise is present, God is present-hidden as he was for Samuel and for the man born blind. This is why we listen to the word or God and tell our stories over and over again so that the hidden God is revealed in our lives. Amen