[Illustration: Child at prayer.]
CHAPTER IX.
THE MAN BORN BLIND, AND LAZARUS.
One Sabbath day, most likely the next Sabbath day after the Feast of Tabernacles, Jesus saw a blind beggar out of doors. That poor man had always been blind. He had never been able to see at all. Jesus spat on the ground, and put the wet earth on the blind man's eyes, and said, 'Go, wash in the pool of Siloam.' And the man went and washed, and came back able to see. The people who met him began to ask him, 'How were thine eyes opened?' And the man told them. Then they wanted to know where Jesus was. But the man did not know that. Then the people brought him to the Pharisees to see what they would say. And the Pharisees said, 'How is it that you can see now?' And the man told them.
Then the Pharisees turned him out of the synagogue. Jesus heard about that, and He came to the lonely man, and said, 'Dost thou believe on the Son of God?' And the man said, 'Who is He, Lord, that I might believe 'on Him?' And Jesus said to him, 'THOU HAST BOTH SEEN HIM, AND HE IT IS THAT TALKETH WITH THEE.' Then the man fell down at the feet of Jesus, saying, 'Lord, I believe.'
And now Jesus turned to the Pharisees, and told them that they were very blind. They could see things with their eyes, but they could not see that their hearts were full of sin. Then Jesus preached one of the most beautiful of all His sermons. In it He said, 'I am the Door of the sheep; by Me if any man enter in he shall be saved. I am the Good Shepherd; the Good Shepherd giveth His life for the sheep. I am the Good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine; and I lay down My life for the sheep, And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they shall hear My voice, and there shall be one flock under one Shepherd.'
