+ 4th Sunday in Lent – March 15th, 2026 +
Series A: Isaiah 42:14-21; Ephesians 5:8-14; John 9
Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church
Milton, WA
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.
As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.
The Book of Genesis and the Gospel of John may be separated by hundreds of pages in your Bible. But in truth, they are neighbors. More than that. Twin storytellers giving us good news of the same gracious God at work in both places. Moses and John are both musicians in God’s orchestra playing the same piece of music.
So which is it? The story of creation or redemption? Sometimes it seems hard to tell. And that’s the point. Call it divinely inspired, sanctified plagiarism. Holy Scripture is full of it.
Genesis and John are singing in harmony. Painting in unison. They’re stories are not two separate acts of God, but one. God creates, by his grace in Christ. God redeems and saves, by his grace in Christ. God the Creator is also God the crucified one.
God’s work of creation and redemption are two sides of the same coin. The God who creates out of nothing by his eternal Word is also the God who is the Word made flesh and gives life out of nothingness. The God who graciously creates the world out of love, also graciously recreates and rescues us in the love of His Son Jesus crucified and risen. The God who said “let there be light” says with the same authority: “Arise. Be of good cheer. Your sins are forgiven.”
The Word of God who created the world in six days and rested on the 7th, is the same Word of God incarnate who saves the world in three days, takes his Sabbath day rest in the grave, and rises again to a new day, an 8thday. An endless day. A dawning day of a new creation.
That’s why in beginning of John’s Gospel he takes us all the way back…in the beginning. So we see Jesus’ saving work and his creating work – not as separate works – but one continuous story of his good and gracious work of new creation. God who gives you bodily life, lays down his life to give you eternal life in body and soul.
This is what’s happening when Jesus sees the man born blind. Jesus approaches him. Just as in the first word (and every word) of creation is his initiative. So it is here.
Jesus, the Light of the World. The Word through whom light and life first came into existence, brings a dawning new day to a blind beggar. An eternal Sabbath is at hand. God’s new creation arrives.
And in the strangest of ways, at least by our reckoning. Jesus clears his throat. Fills it with saliva. And spits on the ground. Jesus takes his drool-drenched dust of the earth and forms it. The Potter goes to work with clay once again. Jesus is re-Genesising this blind man. Giving sight where there was blindness. Light where there was only darkness. Life where there was death and nothingness.
Jesus takes an old page out his divine playbook. Word. And water and earth. Dust. Mud. Clay. The stuff of his creation. And he mixes them all together. A merciful mashup. The Word who in the beginning formed Adam from the dust of the earth. Who breathed life into his lungs. Who formed man from the clay. Now brings sight to a blind man all by his word, water, and the dust of the earth. He uses mud and clay to restore this man’s sight. And fill him with the life of his new creation.
Creation and Redemption. Two sides of the same coin. Two chapters in the same story. Two wondrous works of our good and gracious God. And not only in Genesis. Not only in John’s Gospel. Not only for the blind beggar.
But for all of us, you and me, fellow beggars. This blind man leads us who are blind to the one who restores. Redeems. Rescues. Reconciles. And re-creates.
And our Lord Jesus does this for all of us beggars the same way he did for the blind beggar. Jesus speaks. The Word made flesh gives his word. Takes water - the stuff of his creation – and washes us over our dry, dusty, earth-bound flesh and bones. And he re-Genesises you. The Spirit who hovered over creation splashes down into the water and word of you Baptism. Awake, o sleeper and rise from the dead, and Christ will shine upon you.
We were blind. Now, by God’s grace we see. We were in darkness. No…deeper than that. We were darkness. Now, by God’s grace you are light and life in the Lord. We were dead. Not just a little dead. Stinking, rotting, hanging with the worms kind of dead. But now, now you are alive. For Christ has brought you out of death into life, by his dying and rising for you.
God who created every tree for you, is the God who is nailed to a tree and crucified for you.
God who brought forth life out of darkness, also hangs in the darkness of Good Friday on the cross to bring forth your life out of his death for you.
God who said, “Let there be light” in the beginning, fills you with light and life and new creation by his resurrection.
God who worked his spit into the mud of his creation, takes his body and blood places it into the bread and wine for your forgiveness. For your redemption.
God who created the world in 6 days. Who dies and rises to save you and the world in 3 days. Saves and forgives and redeems and makes you his new creation in three words. I baptize you.
Creation and Redemption. They both rest in the hands of Christ crucified and risen for you.
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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