Hello my friends,
This is Mark Gladman,
Also known as Brother Frederick James,
Your friendly neighbourhood monk in docks,
Welcoming you to day 25 of our Lent 2026 journey in the wilderness,
Still held as we walk through John's Gospel towards Easter.
I invite you as always to let your body settle,
As you take a deep breath in,
Gently release it,
As you bring your full self into this moment,
Nowhere to go right now,
Nothing to prove,
Nothing to solve.
Just settle here.
Today we're in the ninth chapter of John's Gospel and the disciples see a man who's been born blind.
They ask the question that I'm sure many of us on occasions have asked when we encounter suffering.
Their question is who sinned?
But at the core of that is the question,
Well who's at fault?
Or what caused this?
What went wrong?
It's such a human reflex,
When something hurts we want to reach for an explanation,
But quite often the explanation becomes blame.
We might blame others,
We might blame ourselves.
Sometimes we quietly assume that pain is proof of failure.
Something's gone wrong,
Who sinned?
But Jesus refuses that premise.
He doesn't enter the blame game when it comes to this,
Or try and moralise the man's condition.
There's no defining of a spiritual cause here.
He simply says this is not about sin.
And right at that moment something liberating enters the story.
Now this is important for us to understand and we need to listen to what's going on here because not everything painful is moral and not everything difficult is punishment and not every loss is failure.
Unfortunately we live in a world that's quick to assign fault.
If something breaks someone must be held responsible.
If someone struggles they must have done something wrong.
If I'm suffering perhaps I didn't pray enough,
Try hard enough,
Believe enough.
Just notice if any of that lives quietly inside of you.
Where have you blamed yourself for circumstances that were never fully within your control?
Where have you carried a subtle shame for something that was simply part of being human?
Now in this story Jesus shifts the lens.
He doesn't deny that there's hardship happening or pretend that the blindness is easy,
But he does reframe it.
He suggests that even here in limitation,
In vulnerability,
In what seems like lack,
Light can still appear.
Sometimes suffering becomes the very space where light is revealed and the reason why is what we forget.
Just because there's suffering doesn't mean that God is absent from it.
Bring to your mind for a moment something in your life that feels unfinished or unresolved or difficult.
Hold that gently in your awareness and ask this question,
What if this is evidence not of divine distance but of light already quietly working within this somewhere?
What if God is close even in this circumstance?
Now the wilderness in scripture is always two things at once.
It's harsh but it also reveals.
It's quick to strip away illusions and reveal what's truly here and the blind man's condition.
It's not a verdict that's being cast down on him or a judgment but it's a doorway.
And maybe some of what you might carry again is not verdict or judgment but a doorway to the reality that God is present there with you.
And friend you need to know that if there's things going on around in your life right now that feel like this,
That you're allowed to stop prosecuting yourself and judging yourself.
You're allowed to release the reflex to assign fault.
You're allowed to lay down any self-blame.
Listen to what happens next.
Jesus approaches the man with presence and imagine that same presence near you now.
Just simply being with you within whatever's going on.
Compassionate,
Steady,
Unhurried.
If shame has been quietly shaping your story,
Let it loosen.
If you've assumed that struggle means you've failed,
Let that assumption soften.
Sometimes in these moments we're being formed.
Sometimes the light comes gradually like sight coming back to us.
Sometimes learning to see begins with learning to stop blaming.
Light doesn't need your perfection to appear.
It simply needs your openness.
And as we rise from this time together,
Remember that you're not alone in your wilderness.
Not everything painful is a verdict.
Some things are still becoming light.
And as you go into your day,
Carry this with you.
Release self-blame.
Make room for compassion and let the light do its quiet and steady work within you.
And may grace,
Peace and love walk with you and warm you as that light slowly brightens today and every day.
Until tomorrow my friends,
May grace and peace go with you.
Bye for now.
