Why does God allow birth defects?

The Saviour had just delivered Himself from the malice of His enemies, who took up stones to cast at Him because He declared Himself the "I am." As He passed by, He noticed a man who had been blind from birth (John 9). The disciples enquired whose sin was responsible for this affliction — the man's, or his parents'? They were as narrow-minded as Job's three friends, who regarded suffering as a special mark of divine displeasure, having no other thought as to it. The Saviour pointed out a higher purpose — "that the works of God should be manifest in him." The man's misery furnished occasion for the display of divine power and goodness.

(1) Passing on out of the hands of His persecutors, the pitiable condition of a man blind from birth arrests the Lord's attention; and the disciples (of whom we now hear for the first time during His present visit to Jerusalem) inquire as to a matter full of perplexity to such as believed with the Rabbis in every physical evil as the result of some specific sin. Was this man so born for sin committed even before birth? or was it for the sin of his parents? Neither explanation of it seems to satisfy them; and indeed, looked at, as they contemplate it, as mere punishment, it must be ever hard to satisfy oneself as to the inequalities of it that seem upon the face of the things. The Lord lets in the light of a higher purpose, as applicable to any other as to the man then before Him, — "that the works of God should be made manifest in him." Of course, the sin which has come into the world has been the cause of all the evil in it; and, of course, there is very commonly specific punishment for specific sin. With this the heart can have no rest, however, until we realize that God is manifesting Himself in all human history; for this cannot be in mere righteousness only, but in love as well. We have a whole book in the Old Testament devoted to the working out of this problem of the mission of evil, which in Job's case was mistaken by his friends in the same fashion as the disciples, question would indicate here. But if the manifestation of God in His works be the great overruling purpose everywhere, then not only must there be in general love as well as righteousness, but in every one of His works there must be love. Where love is not, there God is not: if "God is love." And here the miracle (or as Scripture would speak of it from its having this very character of manifesting God, the "sign") is only a special manifestation of Him who everywhere is the same God.

John 9:2-3. The disciples, with their Jewish prejudices, thought that the blindness might have been inflicted anticipatively for some sin foreseen by God or as the result of the sin of his parents. In His reply the Lord shows that God can use affliction to make manifest the works of God. A life-long sickness is not necessarily the outcome of a specific sin, but may be allowed for the display of the grace of God.

The question which the disciples raised may seem curious to us, but it expressed thoughts which were common among the Jews, finding their basis in Exodus 20:5, which speaks of the iniquity of the fathers being visited upon the children. The Lord's reply shows that affliction may come without there being any element of retribution in it, but simply in order that God's work may be manifested. It was manifested here in working a complete deliverance from the affliction. It may just as strikingly be manifested by complete deliverance from the depression and weight of the affliction, while the affliction itself still persists; and so it is often seen today. It was then the "day," marked by the presence on earth of "the Light of the world." Jesus knew that the "night" of His rejection and death was approaching, but until that time He was here to do the Father's works, and this blind man was a fit subject for the work of God, though he had made no appeal for it, as far as the record goes.

They had nothing better than Jewish thoughts about the case. But all through the gospel of John Christ is setting aside these thoughts on every side, whether in enquirers outside, or more particularly in disciples, who were under this pernicious influence like other people. Here the Lord answered, "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents." The ways of God are not as man's; and their revelation stands in contrast with Jewish notions of retributive justice. The reason lay deeper than what his parents deserved, or the foresight of what he would do amiss. Not that the man and his parents were not sinners; but the eye of Jesus saw beyond nature, or law, or government, in the man's blindness from his birth. To divine goodness, the inner and true and ultimate reason, God's reason — if one may be permitted such a phrase — was to furnish an opportunity for Christ to work the works of God on the earth. How blessedly grace operates in, and judges of, a hopeless case! That it was wholly outside the resources of man made it just the occasion for Jesus, for the works of God. This is the point of the chapter — Jesus working the works of God in free unconditional grace. In John 8 the prominent feature is the word of God; here, the works of God made effectual and manifest in grace. "I must work the works of him that sent me while it is day." Therefore can one say, that it is unqualified grace, because it is not merely God mercifully answering man's appeal, and blessing man's work, but God sending, and Christ working. "I must work the works of him that sent me." What grace (save in Jesus all through) can be compared with this? Jesus, then, was doing this work "while it is day." Day was while He was present with them. Night was coming, which would be, for the Jew, the personal absence of the Messiah; indeed, such for any would be the departure of the Son of God. "The night cometh when no man can work." (Verse 4) Higher things might follow in their season, and brighter light suited to them when the day should dawn, and the day-star arise in hearts established with grace. But here it is the time of the absence of Jesus in contrast with His presence on earth as He then was. "As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world." (Verse 5)

The blindness from birth is too significant to need comment, but the Lord in the Remnant regarded it as no sin to be reckoned, nor as matter of sin reckoned, but as occasion of grace. This is the position in which (sovereign) grace views it. It was not judgment, "that." But as the fact were not so it was "that … should be manifested." This was the resulting point; then the exercise of power: "That the works of God should be made manifest in him." The light shone, yea, to all; but it was in darkness men hated the light; but the work was in him definite and effectual; grace that regarded its condition, and knew no cause but itself, as it were, and the fruits it was to produce, "that … should be manifested." This was the end, the sovereign acting of grace coming in, in the most helpless, when the sight of the world had rejected the Light of the world.

John 9 opens with the case of a man that gives rise to a question from the disciples, in relation to the government of God in Israel. Was it his parents' sin that brought this visitation on their child, according to the principles God had given them in Exodus? Or was it his own sin, known to God though not manifested to men, that had procured him this judgment? The Lord replies, that the man's condition did not depend on the government of God with respect to the sin either of himself or of his parents. His case was but the misery which gave room for the mighty operation of God in grace. It is the contrast that we have continually seen; but here it is in order to set forth the works of God.

The man blind from his birth is no doubt a picture of Israel, and indeed of all mankind by nature. Of course the root of this is sin, but not, as the disciples supposed, some particular sin (v. 2). It is strange that they could think that one might have committed such a sin before birth as to render him blind when born! But sin, the root of sins, has infected the very nature that we all have as children of Adam. This is the reason for all sickness and for spiritual blindness from birth also.

But the supreme wisdom of God is above this, and He has decreed that this particular man should be born blind in order that the work of God in superior power should be manifested in him. Can we not say of every case of trouble or illness, that God has a special reason for allowing it? A submissive spirit will learn the reason, and be blessed, while insubjection will resist God's working and suffer the consequences.

Verse 2: "Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?" This question is so like the mind of man. Christ says, "I do not take it up in that light." He takes up God's side, showing that sorrow and privation are connected in God's mind with some work of power not yet brought out. It was as it were a spot in providence that this man was born blind. Christ says, "I am come into the scene where everything is out of course, to gladden hearts, and display the glory of God."

In chapter 9 it is Christ's work. "And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth; and his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned nor his parents, but that the works of God should be made manifest in him." It is not the word now, but the works. I suppose they thought Exodus 34 was being carried out in the man because his parents had sinned; though that had been abrogated in Jeremiah and Ezekiel really, and it became, "the soul that sinneth it shall die," that is, the death of the person himself who had sinned. It is not spiritual death either; it has done a great deal of mischief, using that as spiritual death, it was temporal only. God's governmental dealings with the Jews.