Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Seeing Isn't Believing | The Gospels | John 9:13-34

Episode Date: July 16, 2026

What keeps people from believing in Jesus? Is it a lack of proof? A lack of certainty? Or something deeper? In today's episode, Patrick shares how John 9:13-34 reveals that unbelief is often less about a lack of evidence and more about the condition of our hearts. Read the Bible with us! This year, we’re exploring the Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—and it's never too late to join! Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passage: John 9:13-34

Welcome to 10-minute Bible talks, where we connect the Bible to your life and the time it takes to get to work. I'm Jensen Holt McNair. I had a friend a few years back whose dad unexpectedly gave up on God for what seemed like a logical reason to him. Now, I don't think this was probably the real reason he gave up on God, but it was the reason he gave when people asked. And so I do believe it was at least part of the equation. My friend's dad had a simple question. If God exists, why hasn't he? seen him? If God exists, why hasn't he seen God do anything? My friend's dad said that he told God

that he would believe him if God did one simple thing, wrote him a message, wrote him a word on a piece of paper. My friend's dad framed a piece of paper and put it on his desk, and every day he showed up to work and checked the frame. And every day the piece of paper was blank. After a year or more of this, he finally gave up. If God loved him, if God was real, then he would have done something. something. But there was nothing there, because there is no God. For him, seeing is believing, and he hadn't seen anything. Well, I don't know many people have gone to those lengths. I do know people who felt the same thing. They say that if they just saw God do something, then they'd believe, one miracle and they'd be on board. Maybe you've thought that too. Fair enough. But here's the thing.

I don't know if it would work. Why? Because it never worked in the past. Seeing is isn't believing. There's always some other explanation to explain away what God has done. If you don't believe me, consider this story from John chapter 9. To set up the context, Jesus healed a man born blind on the Sabbath. After the healing, Jesus disappears, but this man remains. Now, the religious leaders were angry at the idea of someone healing on the Sabbath day, and of course, they're also deeply opposed to Jesus. So they did what they saw to be the only logical thing. They brought the once blind man in for questioning, to verify the veracity of his claims. Let's pick up in John 913. 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. Some of the Pharisees said, this man is not from God. He doesn't keep the Sabbath. But others asked, how can a sinner perform such signs? so they were divided. Then they turned again to the blind man. What have you to say about him? It was your eyes he opened. The man replied, he is a prophet. They still did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they sent for the man's parents. So let's pause for a moment. This is how skepticism works. There's crowds of people who know this blind man, who saw the miracle,

but that's not enough for the Pharisees. They suspect some sort of corruption or collusion. Jesus and the so-called blind man put on some sort of act. And so to prove the point, they call in the man's parents to invalidate his claims. Let's continue in verse 19. Is this your son? They asked. Is this the one you say was born blind? How is it that he can now see?

We know that he is our son, the parents answered, and we know that he was born blind, but how he can now see or who opened his eyes, we don't know. Ask him, he is of age. He will speak for himself. His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders, who had already decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. That was why his parents had said, he is of age, ask him. So what do you think happens next? They have piles of evidence.

People saw the healing. People knew he was blind. Even his parents agreed that he was born blind, even though they were scared. So now do they praise God and believe in Jesus? They've seen a miracle, seeing his believing. after all? Well, of course, seeing isn't believing. Let's continue in verse 24. A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. Give glory to God by telling the truth, they said, we know this man, Jesus, is a sinner. He replied, whether he is a sinner or not, I don't know. One thing I do know,

I was blind, but now I see. Then they asked him, what did he do to you? How did he open your eyes? He answered, I have told you already and you did not listen. Why do you want to be? Why do you want to hear it again. Do you want to become his disciples too? Then they hurled insult at him and said, You are this fellow's disciple. We are the disciples of Moses. We know that God spoke to Moses, but as for this fellow, we don't even know where he comes from. The man answered, now that is remarkable. You don't know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly person who does his will. Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. To this, they replied,

You were steeped in sin at birth. How dare you lecture us? And they threw him out. Now, it's never a good look to bully someone with disabilities who was recently healed, but that's exactly what the Pharisees do. Because despite piles of evidence, their only recourse is to toss the evidence out and attack the man. They can't make a case against the miracle, but they can't ostracize the blind man and discredit him, and once he's discredited, they can invalidate the entire miraculous affair. You see, that's why I don't believe people who say, I'd believe in God if I only saw him do something. You wouldn't. Because the reason we disbelieve in God isn't a lack of evidence.

It's the reality that our hearts don't want to give control to God. We are all surrounded with evidence of the reality of God. You see it in a sunset and on the mountaintop. You see it when prayers for healing and safe travels are answered. You know it when the life of someone who is lost turns around, it is remade. You know it when former convicts and prisoners set aside crime or addiction to love their families and neighbors. And of course you see it in the eyewitness testimony from all around the world and even in the Bible that miracles do happen, that God is working. Just look into it.

The stories are endless. But no amount of ordinary or extraordinary acts of God can convince a skeptic, not because of a lack of evidence, but because of a hard heart. And it's at this point that we must turn the mirror on ourselves, because we all have doubts and questions. But what we need isn't more evidence, but we need is a softened heart. What we need is a heart that can sing when blind men see, that can shout when addicts get clean,

that can celebrate when a sunset steals your breath and sets your senses on edge. The evidence of God is all around us. The question is whether we'll ask that same, Name God to soften our hearts and let us see him, love him, and follow him.