Good morning. If the title has you wondering, it has made me wonder a bit too. I think I first heard those words uttered by John Wayne is a western style movie from the 50s. As the Duke said the words, he pounded back a full glass of rot-gut. Even with that visual, I am still unsure of what it means.
Imagine what those words would have meant if Jesus had said them to the man born blind. We read of the blind man’s ordeal in the 9th chapter of John. After explaining to His disciples that the healing of this blind man would provide a testimony to the power of God, we read: After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing. John 9:6-7
Jesus didn’t say, “Here’s mud in your eye”, but He made it happen. The man’s vision was healed, and so was his spirit. Soon, he would be questioned by the Pharisees. We read this: They brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind. Now the day on which Jesus had made the mud and opened the man’s eyes was a Sabbath. Therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. “He put mud on my eyes,” the man replied, “and I washed, and now I see.” John 9:13-15
The Pharisees had no interest in the man’s eyesight, or in the fact that Jesus was again displaying heaven-sent power from God to provide the healing. Their only interest was in denying that Jesus was the Christ, the Anointed One of God. That Jesus would have compassion and heal someone on the Sabbath was, for them, reason to condemn Him.
The disciples were only concerned with the circumstances that caused the blindness, “Whose sin is responsible, his parents’ or his own?” Jesus tells them that they’ve missed the point, the circumstances were not what mattered. What mattered was God in the circumstances. The Pharisees demanded to know what Jesus said and did. It wasn’t the words that mattered, it was that power of God speaking the words that mattered. The Pharisees were very concerned about the mud that was made and placed on his eyes. It wasn’t the mud that provided the healing, the mud only provided the blind man with a sense of what was happening. It wasn’t the mud placed on his eyes that mattered, it was God’s finger stirring the mud that was important.
We may find ourselves entangled in circumstances, confused or angered by words, blinded by hate, or rage, or prejudice, or desire. What matters most is the power of God as He heals us. His heart, His words, His healing touch, His mud in our eye…if that is what it takes. It is all about God and His love for us and His willingness to provide what is needed for our victory. That is what matters.
Vern