(4) I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day.--The better reading is probably that which has we, instead of "I," and perhaps also that which has us, instead of "me"; but this latter change is not so well supported by MS. authority. The clause would read then, We must work the works of Him that sent Me (or us) while it is day. He identifies the disciples with Himself in the redemptive work of His mission. There is before them a striking instance of the power of evil. He and they are there to manifest the power of good. They must gird themselves to the task. If we are right in placing the whole section from John 7:37 to John 10:21 on the same great day of the Feast (comp. Note on John 9:14), then this work must have come near the close of the day. The sun sinking to the west may have reminded them that the day was passing away, and that the night was approaching. He was reminded of the day of life, and the night of death. He will not be long in the world (John 9:5). That night will be the close of His human work, and the shadows of evening are already falling upon Him.

The night cometh, when no man can work.--He does not except even Himself from the proverbial law. The day of opportunity passes, never to return. His own great work of doing the work of Him that sent Him, could only be done when that day was present. It has, of course, been ever done in the work of His church under the guidance of His Spirit; but the work of His own human activity on earth ceased when the night came. Comp. John 11:9 for this thought of the hours of the day.

Verse 4. - We must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day. The emendation of the text certainly throws much beauty into the statement. Christ identifies himself with his disciples. They are pledged by accepting his call, and he has been himself charged by his own sublime mission to work while it is called day. The sun was going down over the holy city on that sabbath day, and Jesus will not wait, nor lose the opportunity of doing the merciful will of the Father. He did not say, "Him that sent us" (as Tischendorf reads), for "As the Father had sent him, so he sent them." But he adds, The night cometh, when no man can work. The materialistic interpretation of Paulus, "Christ must have daylight for a delicate operation," is too puerile to deserve refutation. The suggestion of the Greek Fathers (Chrysostom, Theophylact, etc.), who here drew a distinction between the work of this world and the work of the future world, between work done before and after his Passion, representing the work of his earthly ministry as done in the day, and that of the Spirit as work done in the night, is singularly unfortunate. Our Lord is merely adopting the phrase as a customary image for life and death. Death puts an end to all human activity on earth, even to Christ's own, as a human Friend and Teacher. Numerous attempts have been made to suppose some emphatic contrast between the lifetime of Christ and the period that should follow his Passion. They all fail, because Christ's own activity resumes another form by his resurrection and the gift of his Spirit. The night of death, accompanied by the cessation of active labor, is the general idea. The day's work must be done in the day. The probation involved in the bare fact of its limitation, and in this case its rapidly approaching consummation, is the main thought, without pressing the imagery too far. By saying, "We must work," etc., he gave a lesson and an example for all time. The 'Pirke Aboth,' "The Sayings of the Fathers," record the words of R. Tryphon, "The day is short, and the task is great, and the workmen are sluggish, and the reward is much, and the Master of the house is urgent."

9:1-7 Christ cured many who were blind by disease or accident; here he cured one born blind. Thus he showed his power to help in the most desperate cases, and the work of his grace upon the souls of sinners, which gives sight to those blind by nature. This poor man could not see Christ, but Christ saw him. And if we know or apprehend anything of Christ, it is because we were first known of him. Christ says of uncommon calamities, that they are not always to be looked on as special punishments of sin; sometimes they are for the glory of God, and to manifest his works. Our life is our day, in which it concerns us to do the work of the day. We must be busy, and not waste day-time; it will be time to rest when our day is done, for it is but a day. The approach of death should quicken us to improve all our opportunities of doing and getting good. What good we have an opportunity to do, we should do quickly. And he that will never do a good work till there is nothing to be objected against, will leave many a good work for ever undone, Ec 11:4. Christ magnified his power, in making a blind man to see, doing that which one would think more likely to make a seeing man blind. Human reason cannot judge of the Lord's methods; he uses means and instruments that men despise. Those that would be healed by Christ must be ruled by him. He came back from the pool wondering and wondered at; he came seeing. This represents the benefits in attending on ordinances of Christ's appointment; souls go weak, and come away strengthened; go doubting, and come away satisfied; go mourning, and come away rejoicing; go blind, and come away seeing.I must work the works of him that sent me,.... This shows, that the works of God, that were to be manifest, were to be done by Christ: many were the works which the Father gave him to do, and which he undertook to perform; and therefore there was a necessity of doing them, as principally the work of redemption, by fulfilling the law, and satisfying justice: and besides this, there were the preaching of the Gospel, and doing of miracles, and among these was this of giving sight to the blind, see Isaiah 35:5, both in a natural and spiritual sense: and with a view to this he speaks of the works he mast do,

while it is day; while the day of life lasts, for in the grave there is no work nor device:

the night cometh when no man can work; meaning the night of death, and of the grave, and suggesting his own death hereby, that he had but a little time to be in this world, and therefore would make the best use of it, to do the will and work of his Father that sent him; and which should be a pattern to us. This life is but short, it is but as the length of a day; a great deal of business is to be done; and death is hastening on, which will put a period to all working.