Book of Common Prayer

¹⁹ But you are only a man. Will you tell God what to do? Can the pot say to the man who made it, `Why did you make me like this?'

²⁰ The person who makes pots has power over the mud. He can make two different pots out of one pile of mud. One pot will be fine and another will not be fine. Can the potter not make them so?

²¹ God has a right to be very angry if he wants to be. He has the right to show his power. God was very angry with some people who deserved to die. And yet he waited a long time before he did anything to them.

²² He did it to show how very great he is. He was kind to some people. He planned for them to be made great.

²³ That means he also called us. He called not only those who are Jews, but also those who are not Jews.

²⁴ In the book written long ago by the prophet Hosea, God says `They were not my people. But I will call them "my people". I did not love her, but I will call her "the one I love."

²⁵ And in the very place where it was said to them, "You are not my people," they will be called "sons of the living God." '

²⁶ Isaiah the prophet of God said long ago about Israel, `Even if the people of Israel are as many as the sand by the sea, only some of them will be saved.

²⁷ The Lord will do what he said he will do on the earth. He will do it all and do it soon.'

²⁸ And Isaiah also said, `The Lord who has power, left some of our children. If he had not, we would have been like Sodom. We would have been destroyed like Gomorrah.'

²⁹ So what shall we say? The people who are not Jews have been put right with God. They did nothing to make themselves right with God. But they were put right because they believed God.

³⁰ But the Jews tried to obey the law that could make them good people. But they did not obey it all.

³¹ Why was that? They did not trust in God. They only trusted in doing the things of the law. They therefore hit their feet on the stone on which men hit their feet.

³² That is what the holy writings say, `I put in Zion a stone on which people will hit their feet. It is a rock that will make them fall down. Anyone who believes in him will not be ashamed.'

9 On his way out of the temple Jesus saw a man who had been born blind.

² His disciples asked Jesus, `Master, was this man born blind because of the wrong things he did, or was it the wrong things his parents did?'

³ Jesus answered, `It was not that he or his parents did any wrong thing. But it was so that people would see what God will do in him.

⁴ There is one who has sent me. I must do his work while it is still daylight. Night is coming. Then it will be too dark to work.

⁵ As long as I am in the world, I am the Light of the world.'

⁶ When Jesus had said this, he spat on the ground. Then he put some of the wet dirt on the man's eyes.

⁷ And he said, `Go. wash your eyes in that water hole called Siloam.' (Siloam means Sent.) The man went and washed his eyes. After that, he was able to see.

⁸ His neighbours and other people had seen him when he was blind. They said, `Is not this the same man who used to sit here and beg?'

⁹ Some people said, `Yes, this is the same man.' Others said, `He is like that man.' But the man himself said, `I am that man.'

¹⁰ They asked him, `How is it that you can see now?'

¹¹ He answered them, `That man whose name is Jesus made some mud. He rubbed it on my eyes and told me to go and wash them in the water hole Siloam. And when I had washed my eyes, I could see.'

¹² `Where is the man?' they asked. He said, `I do not know.'

¹³ They brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind.

¹⁴ The day Jesus made the mud and healed the man was the Sabbath day.

¹⁵ Then the Pharisees also asked the man, `How is it that you can see now?' He answered them, `The man put mud on my eyes. I washed my eyes and now I can see.'

¹⁶ Then some of the Pharisees said, `This man is not from God. He does not obey the Sabbath day law.' The others said, `But how can a bad man do such a big work?' So the Pharisees did not agree together in what they thought about Jesus.

¹⁷ Then they asked the man who had been born blind, `What do you say about the man who healed you?' He answered, `I say he is a prophet from God.'