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Summit Church
See The Signs Pt 8 | Open Eyes Are Just The Beginning | Chuck Stecker
Locations & Times
Summit Church
7200 S Clinton St, Centennial, CO 80112, USA
Sunday 9:00 AM
Sunday 10:45 AM
The Big Idea: Jesus will open your eyes, but you must decide what to do next.
HOW TO STUDY THIS
Skill for this week: Observe the actions, motives, and choices of each character and find yourself in the story. It is about everyone in the story seeing the same sign and making radically different choices.
Skill for this week: Observe the actions, motives, and choices of each character and find yourself in the story. It is about everyone in the story seeing the same sign and making radically different choices.
The Process of Faith Development:
I. See The Sign (vv. 1–7)
I. See The Sign (vv. 1–7)
II. Evaluate The Claims (vv. 8–34)
Word study note: the Greek behind "I know" in v. 25 (οἶδα) is a settled-knowledge verb, not a hunch. He's not offering an opinion he can be argued out of — he's reporting a fact of his own experience. That's a useful distinction: testimony doesn't require you to win every argument, only to tell the truth about what happened to you.
III. Choose Your Response (vv. 35–41)
Response:
Where are you in the road to full faith in Jesus?
What is keeping you from an all-in walk with God?
Who in your Oikos needs some encouragement?
Where are you in the road to full faith in Jesus?
What is keeping you from an all-in walk with God?
Who in your Oikos needs some encouragement?
Discussion Notes
Week 8: "Open Eyes Are Just the Beginning"
John 9:1–41 | See the Signs, Hear the Claims, Choose Your Response
Icebreakers
1. What's something you use or rely on every day now that you didn't even know you needed a few years ago? What changed?
2. Tell about a time someone believed in you, or trusted you, before you'd really proven anything to them yet. How did that affect you?
Before You Discuss
Review together John 9:1–41 - it's basically a courtroom drama with one healed man at the center of it.
Discussion Questions
1. Jesus' disciples ask whose fault the man's blindness is — his or his parents'. Jesus rejects the question entirely and reframes it in terms of purpose rather than blame. Have you ever caught yourself asking "whose fault is this?" about a hard situation, when a better question might have been "what could God do with this?"
2. The actual miracle takes up just seven verses out of forty-one. Why do you think John spends so much more space on how people react to the miracle than on the miracle itself?
3. The man's neighbors can't even agree on whether it's really him (vv. 8–12). Have you ever seen someone change so much that people had a hard time accepting it was really them? Tell us about it.
4. The religious leaders — the Pharisees, the recognized experts on God at the time — have access to the exact same evidence as everyone else, and still can't agree, eventually hardening into flat denial (vv. 13–17, 24–29). What do you think actually determines whether someone accepts good evidence, or explains it away?
5. The man's parents know the truth but won't say it out loud, because it would cost them their place in the community (vv. 18–23). Has fear of what other people would think ever kept you from saying what you actually believed?
6. Of everyone in the story, only the healed man gets more confident the more he's pressured, not less (vv. 25–33). What do you think gave him that kind of courage, considering he still doesn't have most of the answers?
7. In v. 25 he says, "One thing I do know: I was blind, but now I see." He doesn't win an argument — he just tells his own story. Why might a simple, honest story be harder to argue with than a clever one?
8. After the religious leaders throw the man out, Jesus goes and finds him (v. 35). What does it tell you about Jesus that he goes looking for the one person everyone else had just rejected?
9. Jesus closes by saying there are two kinds of blindness in this story: the kind you know you have, and the kind you're sure you don't (vv. 39–41). Which one do you think is actually more dangerous — and why?
10. Of everyone in this chapter — the curious but uninvolved neighbors, the hardening religious leaders, the fearful parents, or the man who kept trusting even without all the answers — which one feels closest to where you are right now with Jesus? What would one honest step further look like for you this week?
Before you close in prayer, take a minute individually to think of one person in your Oikos — the ordinary, everyday people in your life: family, coworkers, neighbors, friends — who could use some encouragement this week. Consider reaching out to them before your group meets again.
John 9:1–41 | See the Signs, Hear the Claims, Choose Your Response
Icebreakers
1. What's something you use or rely on every day now that you didn't even know you needed a few years ago? What changed?
2. Tell about a time someone believed in you, or trusted you, before you'd really proven anything to them yet. How did that affect you?
Before You Discuss
Review together John 9:1–41 - it's basically a courtroom drama with one healed man at the center of it.
Discussion Questions
1. Jesus' disciples ask whose fault the man's blindness is — his or his parents'. Jesus rejects the question entirely and reframes it in terms of purpose rather than blame. Have you ever caught yourself asking "whose fault is this?" about a hard situation, when a better question might have been "what could God do with this?"
2. The actual miracle takes up just seven verses out of forty-one. Why do you think John spends so much more space on how people react to the miracle than on the miracle itself?
3. The man's neighbors can't even agree on whether it's really him (vv. 8–12). Have you ever seen someone change so much that people had a hard time accepting it was really them? Tell us about it.
4. The religious leaders — the Pharisees, the recognized experts on God at the time — have access to the exact same evidence as everyone else, and still can't agree, eventually hardening into flat denial (vv. 13–17, 24–29). What do you think actually determines whether someone accepts good evidence, or explains it away?
5. The man's parents know the truth but won't say it out loud, because it would cost them their place in the community (vv. 18–23). Has fear of what other people would think ever kept you from saying what you actually believed?
6. Of everyone in the story, only the healed man gets more confident the more he's pressured, not less (vv. 25–33). What do you think gave him that kind of courage, considering he still doesn't have most of the answers?
7. In v. 25 he says, "One thing I do know: I was blind, but now I see." He doesn't win an argument — he just tells his own story. Why might a simple, honest story be harder to argue with than a clever one?
8. After the religious leaders throw the man out, Jesus goes and finds him (v. 35). What does it tell you about Jesus that he goes looking for the one person everyone else had just rejected?
9. Jesus closes by saying there are two kinds of blindness in this story: the kind you know you have, and the kind you're sure you don't (vv. 39–41). Which one do you think is actually more dangerous — and why?
10. Of everyone in this chapter — the curious but uninvolved neighbors, the hardening religious leaders, the fearful parents, or the man who kept trusting even without all the answers — which one feels closest to where you are right now with Jesus? What would one honest step further look like for you this week?
Before you close in prayer, take a minute individually to think of one person in your Oikos — the ordinary, everyday people in your life: family, coworkers, neighbors, friends — who could use some encouragement this week. Consider reaching out to them before your group meets again.