In the ninth chapter of the book of John we are given a story of a healing, a bestowal of sight to one who has been blind from birth. Unlike many of the healing stories found in the first three books of the New Testament, this story is more than a simple interchange between Jesus, the healer, and the one who is healed, for the individual’s  restoration to health is the catalyst for a dramatic conflict which takes place within the setting of society. The beginning of this story is the transformation of the individual, but as the plot progresses, we see the rippling effect that the individual’s transformation has upon the surrounding social hierarchy and relationships within it. We witness the inevitable confrontation between the way of the newly empowered and the old way of the world, where power and authority are wielded destructively. The man, once blind but now sighted, takes on and overcomes the oppressive force (from John 8 and 9: A Lesson for Prophetic Ministers )