“When the Light Found Me” (A reflection inspired by John 9)

 

I was born where mornings never came,

Where voices shaped the edges of my world.

I learned the weight of footsteps,

The temperature of silence,

The grammar of pity.

They said I was a question—

Whose sin? What cause? What fault?

But I was only darkness,

Waiting for a dawn I could not imagine.

Then He stood near.

Not as theory. Not as debate.

But as warmth in the air.

He touched dust—

The dust that first felt “Let there be light” in Genesis—

And pressed it upon my unseeing eyes.

Clay upon clay.

Creator’s fingers upon creation.

He told me to wash.

Obedience was the only sight I had.

And when water met word—

Morning happened.

Light did not merely enter my eyes;

It entered my name.

I saw color,

But more than color—

I saw mercy.

I saw faces,

But more than faces—

I saw Truth standing before me.

They questioned the miracle.

They feared the Light.

They claimed to see.

Yet their certainty was darker than my night.

I began with “the man called Jesus.”

I ended with “Lord.”

Sight became worship.

Now I know:

Light does more than brighten the world—

It judges shadows,

It heals birth-deep blindness,

It speaks new creation into broken clay.

He said, “I am the Light of the world”

(Gospel of John 8:12; 9:5),

And I am living proof—

Darkness is strong,

But it is not sovereign.

The Light still finds the blind.

In Gospel of John 9, Jesus heals a man born blind and then declares, “I am the light of the world.” This is not merely a metaphor of comfort—it is a claim of cosmic identity. John intentionally echoes Genesis, where God’s first creative word was, “Let there be light” (Gen 1:3). Before sun and stars existed, divine light pushed back chaos. When Jesus calls Himself the Light, He identifies with that same creative, life-giving power.

The healing of the blind man is a sign. The man is blind from birth—an image of humanity’s spiritual condition. He cannot generate sight from within. Light must come to him. Likewise, spiritual blindness is not mere ignorance but inability. We may have functioning eyes yet remain unable to see truth, grace, or our own need. As John writes earlier, “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:4–5).

Yet light does more than enable vision; it exposes reality. In John 9, the healed man moves toward faith and worship, while the religious leaders, confident in their sight, sink deeper into blindness. Light softens the humble but unsettles the proud.

Christ removes darkness by revealing the Father, exposing sin, and granting new life. To walk in His light is to admit our blindness and receive His grace. The Light of the world still shines—and those who turn toward Him begin to see.

Once Christ removes our own darkness and blindness, he begins to shine his light through our lives. We become the lamps bearing his light. I am reminded of this song composed by a friend, who reminds us that we too, with Christ in us, become carriers of the light. We take his light into the world, dispelling darkness and blindness!