Luke is usually considered the consummate storyteller among the gospel writers. But the lengthy, exquisitely constructed narrative in this week’s John text is a literary masterpiece of storytelling. In John’s telling, the healing of the man blind from birth becomes both the story of new sight that becomes sharper and more acute as faith unfolds and the story of deepening blindness when the chance for faith is rejected.

In keeping with traditional ancient storytelling techniques, the details of these events are presented in a series of two-character scenes. The first scene is played out between Jesus and his disciples (9:1-5). The text seems to assume the continuation of the same time frame and place from 8:59 the temple area during the Feast of Tabernacles. Their encounter with “a man blind…