The Man Who Shouted So Loudly The Kingdom Came To Him
Preaching
There Are Demons In The Sea
Preaching The Message Of The Miracles
Bartimaeus, Blind Beggar Of Jericho
This is the story of a man who shouted so loudly the Kingdom of God came to him. He was blind to the world about him, but not to himself. He saw his own need and faced the helpless desperation of his condition. He knew that, if he were to be cured, help must come from a Messiah sent from God. Isaiah had promised that a savior would come, born of the house of David. And his coming would be marked by the miracle of blind eyes being opened. This promise was Bartimaeus' only hope. He saw that vision of the one who would come more clearly than all the people about him who had two good eyes.
The Messiah came to the city where Bartimaeus sat and begged by the gate. Jesus, on his way to the Holy City, led a parade of his followers to the place of his passion. Ahead of him was a coronation of death. His crown would be made of thorns and his throne would be a criminal's cross. The decisive hour had struck. The Messianic secret was out. No longer would he be reluctant to show all people what it really meant to be the true king of Israel. Then irony of ironies, the first man to recognize and hail him king was a blind man.
Here we see the great storyteller Mark at his best. He paints the character of Bartimaeus in such vivid and striking details that Jesus almost fades into the background so far as the drama of the event is concerned. The spotlight is directed and focused on the blind beggar of Jericho. He is thrust forth in a barrage of strong actions descriptive of quickness, boldness, stubbornness, impetuosity, confidence. Bartimaeus is pictured as quick to grasp the opportunity to be healed -- bold in his use of the title "Son of David" -- stubborn in his refusal to be silenced -- impetuous in his readiness to throw aside his garment and come to Jesus -- confident in his loyalty to follow Jesus to Jerusalem. The whole account bristles with excitement and expectation.
Discipleship As A Divine Miracle
At first this miracle might appear as just another healing of a blind man, but it is so much more. Edward Schweizer in The Good News According to Mark titles his treatment of this miracle "Discipleship as a Divine Miracle." He states, "This story has been placed here by Mark, who transformed it into a picture of discipleship by the addition of the last few words."1 For Schweizer it is a miracle of enlightenment; it is not just a story about how one man's eyes were opened but about how all persons' eyes might be opened to the meaning of true discipleship. He continues, "Once more, immediately before the Passion narrative, Mark demonstrates to his readers what faith is and what it means to be a disciple of Jesus."2 Nineham agrees with Schweizer and sees Mark using this miracle story "as a vehicle for instruction on certain aspects of Christian discipleship."3
Here in this simple street drama we see the ten decisive steps to discipleship. The miracle actually reads like a theatre program setting forth each separate act in the process of becoming a follower of Christ. The plot of the story is directed to the disciples and to us. To the disciples this miracle is a parable pointing up the whole meaning and purpose of our Lord's ministry. He so desperately desired that the eyes of his disciples, like those of the blind beggar, would be opened to who he was and why he had come into the world.
To us its plot is a parable presenting the true way to discipleship. The points of the parable are obvious by analogy. We sit helpless in our blindness and poverty by the side of the road, while life passes us by. Then Jesus comes. In our wretched desolation and darkness we cry out, "Oh, God, have mercy upon us!" The clamor of the world attempts to drown out our litany for help. But nevertheless Christ hears. He stops. He calls us to him, and as we come his compassion comforts us and cheers us -- for his word to us is a word of salvation. Our eyes are opened and we follow him.
In all of Scripture there is no more dramatic and compact picture of what it means to become a disciple of Christ. Therefore a thorough study of this miracle, and the ten steps to discipleship which it contains, is well worth our attention. But before we begin that study, a few exegetical items need to be recalled.
Three Accounts
The Gospels contain three accounts of this miracle. Matthew differs considerably from Mark and Luke in his mention of two blind men. Some scholars hold the opinion that Matthew is talking about a different healing event altogether. Others suggest there were two blind men and Mark and Luke mention only the principal one. Luke places the healing at the entry into Jericho, while Matthew locates the miracle as Jesus is leaving the city. This suggests the possibility of two healings. Van der Loos concludes from his study of these three accounts that "all attempts to bring the stories into line with one another are open to dispute, so that no satisfactory solution can be found."4
Jericho
The miracle takes place at Jericho, one of the most ancient cities in the world. It lies about seventeen miles from Jerusalem and some six miles from the river Jordan, controlling some of the most important fords of the river. That may be the reason the invading Hebrews in the time of Joshua felt it was the key fortress which must be overcome before they entered the hill country of Canaan.
The dramatic capture of Jericho is one of the most familiar and favorite stories of the Old Testament. Joshua's army did not mount an attack against the city but marched around it. For six days the priests led Joshua's warriors once each day around the city; on the seventh day, after marching around the city, the priests blew the trumpets, all the multitude of Israelites shouted, and the walls of Jericho came tumbling down.
The parallels of this ancient story to the miracle of Bartimaeus are interesting. In both there is persistence, shouting, and the falling of walls. Bartimaeus, like Joshua, persisted in his attempts to capture something important in his life. For Joshua it was a city; for Bartimaeus it was his sight. And like the trumpets of the priests and the cry of the multitude, Bartimaeus shouted and the scales of his blindness fell from his eyes like the tumbling walls of Jericho. And, we might add, like Joshua, Bartimaeus was able to enter into a new land of promise. When his sight was restored, the blind beggar rose up and followed Jesus.
It is also interesting that Jericho was known as the "city of palms," and the setting of this miracle in the life of our Lord is a prelude to Palm Sunday with our Lord's triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Jesus, like Joshua, was about to attack a key fortress in the form of a cross which had to be overcome before he could enter into the new age of the resurrection. The shadow of the cross, the blare of trumpets, the distant rumble of tumbling walls permeate the miracle with a sense of destiny and place it firmly into the total story of God's mighty acts.
Son Of David
When Bartimaeus calls out to Jesus, he uses the term "Son of David." Josef Schmid points this out as "the first and only time in Mark's Gospel that Jesus is addressed by the title Son of David."5
Some scholars, such as Lane, do not believe that Bartimaeus was recognizing Jesus as Messiah. His interpretation is that "all that is required by the ensuing narrative is that the blind man recognize Jesus as the one from whom he could expect the gracious mercy of God."6
Hendriksen expresses the opinion of most interpreters when he writes, "Though there are those who deny that Bartimaeus is using the term in the Messianic sense, the probability is that he did so intend it for ... it is clear that during Christ's ministry on earth 'Son of David' and 'Messiah' had become synonyms."7
Nineham sees this as "the first public and unrebuked recognition of Jesus as Messiah."8 Up to this point only the demons and the disciples had recognized him as such, and they had been forbidden to speak of it. Now the messianic secret is out and amazingly it is a blind beggar who sees who he really is.
Van der Loos finds the striking point of this miracle in the fact that "Jesus does not reject the title 'Son of David'; his command that the blind man be called rather implies that he pays it particular attention." He continues, "The healing of the blind man who then follows Jesus, on the one hand manifests without any concealment the Messianic glory of Jesus and his pity on those who believe in him, and on the other it characterizes the blindness of the people Israel, whose eyes remain closed to his glory."9
Perhaps it should be noted that Jesus in this account makes no claim to be the Son of David; he simply accepts the title from another.
Ten Decisive Steps To Discipleship
We have pointed out that we have here not simply the account of how a blind beggar from Jericho was given his sight, but a profound insight into how to become a disciple. Therefore let us examine each of the decisive steps to discipleship which this miracle story presents.
Step One: "When he heard."
The first step to discipleship begins with a word. Mark says, "When he heard that it was Jesus." This is the beginning not only of faith and discipleship but of all revelation. John introduces his Gospel, "In the beginning was the Word." This is where it all starts -- with a word. How many people sit by the side of the road in quiet desperation while life passes them by because no one takes the time, or puts forth the effort, to tell them about Jesus passing by.
An elderly gentleman came into the church office after attending the morning service and announced he wanted to join the church. When he was asked if he had ever been a member of any other church, the man said, "No."
"How long have you been saved?" the pastor asked.
"All my life," the man quickly answered.
"Then why have you waited so long to join a church?" the startled pastor inquired.
"Well," the elderly man replied, "no one ever told me about it till this morning."
We do not know who the person was who first told the blind beggar about Jesus. It might have been a friend, or a camel driver taking his caravan into the city, or a pilgrim on his way to Jerusalem. But we do know that there would have been no miracle that day in Jericho without a word spoken by some unnamed witness, or as Spurgeon, referring to this act of witnessing, called it, "A very short sermon that was preached to him."10
We may never be chosen by God to play a starring role in his plan of redemption, but we are all called to bear witness to the word -- to gossip about the good news of the gospel. And that is vital; for without such testimony no miracle can happen.
Step Two: "He yelled."
The second step in the drama of discipleship is the cry of Bartimaeus, "Jesus! Son of David! Have mercy upon me!" The King James version says, "He begins to cry out." The Good News version says, "He began to shout." Perhaps it would be better stated, "He yelled!" or "screamed!" for the Greek word used here implies a loud, piercing tone like that of an enthusiastic fan at a football game. It was as if his whole life's breath were exploding in a last desperate effort to be heard.
We have said that the blind beggar's cry was initiated by the power of a word someone had shared with him concerning Jesus. And it was more than likely true that behind his yell there was also the remembered instruction of his rabbis in the synagogue who taught him about the coming of the Messiah -- the Son of David. He would be the light of the nations and open the eyes of the blind. Bartimaeus' expectations therefore were intense. How he wished he could seek Jesus out, but it was impossible for one imprisoned to a beggar's mat. All he could do was sit and wait -- hoping that someday Jesus would pass his way.
Every time he heard a crowd of people approaching, his heart throbbed in his breast. Maybe this was it. And he would cry out into the darkness that surrounded him, "Jesus, Son of David!" But it was only a caravan of merchants coming down from Jerusalem, or a group of pilgrims on their way to a feast at the Temple. How many times had he cried out in vain? How many times had he been disappointed? We can only speculate. But one day his persistence paid off and his cry was heard. Spurgeon puts it, "The blind beggar with but one sermon, and that exceedingly brief, never leaves off praying till Christ grants him his desire."11
Is this not true of all our faith encounters and all vital religious experiences? There are no formulas that can be given. No quick and easy solutions. No setting or circumstance that can be artificially created to make the Holy Spirit work. Rather, it is a delicate balance of timing that makes the moment right. No one knows the day or the hour when Christ shall come in Glory, nor do we know the day or the hour when Christ will encounter us personally, and make of what is now only a hope in our hearts a glorious experience for our whole being.
It is not enough to say that we do not find God, it is God who finds us. We need to add that the moment of his finding us cannot be planned, or pre-arranged, or manipulated either by our faith or pious performances. It is something that happens when it happens. It is pure mystery.
Some people think that the church is the place, and prayer the activity, in which God encounters us. Others say it is in the Word that God seeks us. Still others, on sound biblical evidence, state it is in the needs of our fellow humans that God comes to us. But the truth is, none of these is an automatic and absolute key that, like an ignition switch, will instantly turn on the motor and produce an immediate encounter with the living God. The Spirit blows where and when he wills. Most important is not where and how we encounter God, but our sensitivity, alertness, and readiness to be encountered by him at any time.
The church, prayer, the Word, and Christian service all enable us to maintain our spiritual sensitivity. However, they are not guarantees. Like the blind beggar Bartimaeus, we will cry out into the darkness again and again, and we will be disappointed again and again. Like Bartimaeus, also, we must not give up, but keep on shouting, "Jesus, Son of David." For as certain as Christ came to Bartimaeus, so he will come to us. When the time is right he will touch us. Then all we long for, and hope for, and search for will be given us.
Step Three: "Many scolded him."
The third step to discipleship is accepting the negative and often hostile reaction we may experience from the world about us. Mark says, "Many scolded him and told him to be quiet." Many reasons are suggested by preachers and scholars to explain the reaction of the crowd.
Spurgeon believed the crowd was motivated by the Devil himself. In his sermon he refers to Diabolus in Pilgrim's Progress who has a castle by the gate of mercy, and from this castle shoots at all who seek entrance. He also keeps a big dog that barks and howls and seeks to devour every person who knocks at the gate of mercy. Then Spurgeon proclaims, "Whenever a sinner gets to mercy's gate and begins knocking, that noise is heard in hell, and straightway the devil endeavors to drive the poor wretch away from the gate of hope."12
Some scholars suggest that the reason for the crowd's reaction was fear. Nineham points out that Jericho was later the seat of a great Roman garrison, and the city was frequently teeming with soldiers.13 Knowing that Rome had a ruthless reputation of retaliation against rebels, the people were afraid that political overtones would be heard in the blind beggar's yells hailing Jesus as the Messianic King of the Jews. As Barclay points out, "This was a time of strain and tension."14 The roads were crowded with pilgrims, and rumors were flying everywhere that "the hour" so frequently spoken of by Jesus was about to strike. In the air was a sense of decisive destiny which was both thrilling and frightening.
This political implication seems to be confirmed by the contrast between the name quoted by the crowd and that used by Bartimaeus in his cry. The crowd used the harmless description "Jesus of Nazareth," but Bartimaeus cried out the politically dangerous title, "Son of David."
We have many "afraid" people in our churches today. They are afraid of too much emotion and shouting too loudly the name of the Lord. There are no Roman soldiers waiting to arrest us, but our friends and neighbors might think that having found salvation we have lost our sanity. Or they might associate our enthusiasm with the radical actions of that strange group of "oddball faith-freaks" in the storefront church down the street. Then, too, we might step on someone's toes or offend a generous supporter of the church. It is much safer never to mention religion or politics in public -- particularly in a mixed crowd where strong convictions could create a nasty conflict. Faith is best kept a strictly private affair. It is safer that way.
A young man from a devout family went off to study at the state university. In church circles, the university had the reputation of being a hot-bed of radicals, atheists, and "pinkos." His parents were naturally concerned that their son's Christian faith might be destroyed by the vicious attacks of atheistic professors and student "fellow-travelers."
When he returned home for his first vacation, his parents asked him if his Christian faith had gotten him into trouble with his professors and friends.
"No," the young man casually replied, "nobody knows about it yet."
A light securely hidden under a basket is in little danger of being blown out by the winds of adversity. But it provides very little light for the one who possesses it, and none for those about who blindly stumble in the darkness. Faith is meant to be shared.
Dr. Robert Roth tells of getting a baseball glove handed down many times from older brothers. He complained to his father that so many of his brothers had used it that it had worn thin and did nothing to protect his hand from the sting of a hard-flung baseball.
His father wisely answered him, "A baseball glove is not intended to eliminate the sting, but to increase the size of your catching hand."
So with faith. It is not intended to protect us from the dangers and stings of life but to extend the witness of our lives that more and more might share our faith in Jesus as Lord. How often fear prohibits our faith from moving beyond the limits of our own self-concern. Instead of encouraging others to have faith, like the crowd in the miracle story, we scold them to keep their faith expressions quiet.
Another suggestion from scholars is that the reaction of the crowd came from a sense of propriety. For example, Henry Barclay Swete suggests the crowd reaction was: "Why should this beggar force his misery on the attention of the great Prophet?"15 The eyes of the whole Jewish nation were on this young man from Nazareth. He was their hero who carried with him all their hopes. Ahead lay the Holy City, and he had set his face toward it with determination. It was rumored that already his disciples were vying and maneuvering to secure strategic positions of power in the Kingdom when Jesus assumed the throne. This was no time for a begging blind man to interrupt a man about to proclaim himself King of all Israel. And what's more, his yelling was out of harmony with the dignity of the person addressed.
Certainly this element of the crowd exists in our contemporary congregations. People who think that a thing is right only when it is done right. People who make a piety of propriety. They are concerned only with appearances, to the end that the church might look good. They are so concerned with form, method, and the impression the actions of the church will make upon the community, that they discourage all social action and involvement in the nitty-gritty problems of our time. It is beneath the dignity of the church, in their estimation, to meddle in the dirty affairs of this world. The church should maintain a pure example of "spiritual concerns." We are in the business of saving "souls," not fighting poverty, crime, and corruption. Avoid the risk of radical causes. Play it safe! Don't rock the boat! Don't climb out on a limb for any reason. But they forget it was "out on a limb" reaching for sinners and outcasts that our Lord was crucified.
The most common interpretation of the reaction of the crowd is best expressed by Josef Schmid when he says, "They regarded his shouting as an annoyance."16 Sometimes this scene is pictured as one of mass confusion, people engaged in many different activities were all converging at the city gate. However, the true picture would be that of an orderly procession of a rabbi with his students. Some were going before him to prepare the way. More followed behind Jesus, listening. The disciples were immediately around him and Jesus was in the midst of them all teaching as he walked leisurely along. Everyone was extremely attentive. The crowd hung on each word he uttered. For, after all, the Kingdom was about to dawn and this young man had a direct line of communication to the Holy God. He spoke with authority, and the closer Jerusalem loomed up before them, the more authority his words seemed to assume. They wanted to hear every word, and this shouting, blind beggar was drowning out the voice of the Master.
Undoubtedly there are many people like that in our churches today. They are concerned only with their own salvation. The cares and concerns of others are only an annoyance to them. This attitude is generally the result of a false view of faith. They believe each person has to work out his own salvation and is individually responsible for his own faith.
When such an attitude prevails, personal belief becomes a competitive activity, and we push everything and everyone aside in order to secure our own salvation from hell. The truth is, as we have pointed out so often in this discussion of the miracle stories, faith is a cooperative experience.
We can only speculate about what actually motivated the crowd's reactions to Bartimaeus. It may have been fear, or propriety, or annoyance -- one or a combination of some or all of these. But of one thing we can be certain, such speculation is necessary because it establishes an identification between us and that crowd reacting in the miracle of healing blind Bartimaeus. We then are brought to examine ourselves and see how far short we constantly fall from measuring up to the type of discipleship our Lord desires of us. So often we are more of a hindrance than a help in bringing blind beggars in need to our Lord. Thus we can appreciate all the more the graciousness of our Lord to the beggars of this world and to us, his so-often-blind followers.
It needs to be added that Bartimaeus was not "put down" or held back by the scolding of the crowd. In fact the discouragement he experienced served like water thrown on a grease fire -- it only made the fire of Bartimaeus' zeal to be heard flame up all the more. He simply would not be stopped. However, hearing the cries of the blind beggar, Jesus stopped. That is the next step we will consider.
Step Four: God stops!
This step in the process of discipleship is the most surprising and amazing. It is really unbelievable. In his enactment of events which are to change the course of human history and turn the created cosmos on its axis, God stops to heal a blind beggar.
This action shouts as loudly as the blind beggar did and tells us of God's concern for a particular person in need. We hear so often that "God so loved the world." Yet the word "world" is so general and universal in scope that it is easy to miss the fact that these words include us -- you and me.
With the mail that arrives each day we frequently receive letters addressed, "Occupant." We know that they were sent by the thousands to everybody in general and to no one in particular. Or sometimes there appears in the newspaper an announcement, "The Public Is Invited." Now in one sense we know this includes us, but in another, more decisive sense we have no real feeling of being personally invited. "Everybody" is nobody in particular.
The glory of the gospel is that, even though it is universal in scope, God uses persons to carry his message personally to others. He intends each person who hears the gospel to tell another, so that we are each directly confronted with the invitation to come to him. And this leads us to the fifth step of discipleship.
Step Five: God calls the blind man to him.
When Jesus hears the cry of Bartimaeus, he stops and turns to those who are with him. "Call him," he tells them. And they go and personally speak to Bartimaeus. "Cheer up!" they say. "Get up; he is calling you." Jesus does not respond in general; he sends representatives to call the blind beggar personally to him.
By this compassionate act, Christ is showing that his concern for an individual need is not something different from what he will do on the cross in Jerusalem. Therefore, we dare not separate the compassion of Christ's life from the passion of his death. Both his life and his dramatic death are essential parts of his total act of dying for each one of us.
Sometimes this incident on the road to Jericho is viewed as an interlude, an interruption in Christ's essential task which is to die on the cross awaiting him just ahead in Jerusalem. The miracle of Bartimaeus is a beautiful picture revealing that God's love is big enough to deal with little things. The whole New Testament testifies to this truth. There is no concern, no person too insignificant for God in his compassionate love to bend down to and touch. The glory of it all is that such bending is not bothersome to God, nor is it an interruption in his redemptive work.
The story is told of a shipwrecked sailor adrift on an angry sea who, in his desperation, cried out this awkward prayer, "Oh, Lord, I've never bothered you before, and if you deliver me from this threatening sea, I solemnly promise you I'll never bother you again."
Such an attitude fails to understand the truth of Holy Scripture that our personal needs are not a bother to God. They are not interruptions to his work. They are an essential part of it. When Jesus stops to heal this blind beggar on the road to Jericho, it is not an interruption in his march to his death. It is an essential event of that march.
The events of Good Friday are often so dramatic and sensational that they blind us to the truth of the cruciform nature of the entire life of Christ. His whole life was an act of dying for others. Like the sun which daily burns itself out for everything in our universe except itself, so the Son of God gives light and life to all the world, and in so doing dies a little with each compassionate act. In Christ, compassion and passion are one. His whole life is cross-shaped. The cross simply brings to a focal point his total life of sacrifice and suffering for all of us -- each and every one of us personally. So he sends his disciples to us as he sent them to Bartimaeus with the simple message, "Cheer up! Jesus is calling you!"
Step Six: He threw off his cloak.
The sixth step of discipleship is one of the most decisive and certainly the most dramatic. The quick response of Bartimaeus in jumping up and coming to Jesus was a sensational sight to behold. But the spotlight of our attention needs to fall on the cloak that went flying through the air, cast recklessly aside in Bartimaeus' eagerness to get to Jesus. That cloak is symbolic of his total response. This man literally gave the shirt off his back to come to Jesus.
That cloak was the sum total of all Bartimaeus' wealth. In the days of Jesus, among the poor, a man's cloak was his most valued possession. It meant everything to him. Not only was it his only means of warmth against the cold of winter, but for a blind beggar it was an essential means of livelihood. Beggars used their cloaks to catch the coins thrown to them. People avoided close contact with beggars, for there was always the danger of ritual contamination. Most beggars were regarded as sinners and ceremonially unclean. So people stood a safe distance away and tossed their alms. The beggar needed a cloak to catch the coins thrown by these stand-offish givers.
Therefore, when Bartimaeus flung off his cloak and ran to Jesus, he was throwing away everything most dear to him. And certainly this is an important step of discipleship. So often we want to come to Jesus with our arms loaded down with the precious things we are certain we just can't do without. But Jesus cannot fully share his gifts with us until we are willing to come to him as the hymn states, "Nothing in my hands I bring."
A fire raged through an apartment house. From an eighth floor window a woman stood, screaming frantically for help. The firemen raised the narrow ladder to her window. When one climbed up to where she was, there she stood with her arms loaded with valuables. The fireman took one look and cried out, "Lady, if you expect me to save you and me, you're going to have to leave all that stuff behind."
It is obvious that we are not stranded in a burning building -- at least not yet. It is equally obvious that we are not blind beggars, which means we have more than an old cloak to cast aside if we are to forsake all to follow Jesus. Nevertheless, this step of discipleship will someday be demanded of us all.
Christ does not ask us immediately to denounce the world with all its comforts and advantages when we respond to his call of discipleship. He does not expect us to sell or give away all that we possess and apply for membership in the closest monastery. But he does call us to reevaluate all the things of our lives, and be willing to give up anything that prohibits us from living a life of loving obedience to God our Father.
God created this world and called it "good." He made us stewards of the "stuff" of this world. He expects us to use all we have been given to his glory. He wants us to enjoy the fruits of the earth, to prosper and celebrate with the things of this world. But when the time comes for us to leave behind this world and answer God's call into a new experience of discipleship in another and better world, then we must fling aside our prized possessions with the same joyous abandonment as Bartimaeus when he threw aside his cloak and ran to Jesus.
Step Seven: Jesus asked, "What do you want?"
This is perhaps the strangest step to discipleship. God asks, "What do you want me to do for you?" There is no doubt Jesus knew that Bartimaeus wanted his sight. Still, he asked. Why? Why does God want us to ask him for things he already knows we want and need?
One answer is that this is the means by which he draws us closer to himself, in order that we can become a part of his continual process of making us into the persons we were intended to be. When you bring a little boat up to the dock and throw out the line, so that it encircles a piling and thereby enables you to draw your boat tightly against the dock, you are not creating your own security. You are simply connecting to the security and stability of the dock.
When we ask God for something and so verbalize our needs, we are throwing out a line whereby he might draw us closer to himself. This is true of all prayer. Prayer is the connecting link formed between God and ourselves whereby his strength and stability can become ours. We may think we are doing something important when we pull that rope. It is the dock, however, that is important. For if it were not secure, all our efforts would be in vain and we would be fastening our lives to floating straws.
God, in his kindness, lets us do something, even though he has done everything. He lets us pull on that rope, and pray our prayers, even though the full truth is that the strength we need to pull and to pray comes from him.
Step Eight: Bartimaeus asks for the most!
The eighth step of discipleship calls for reckless courage. Bartimaeus was not timid; he was presumptuous. He asked for the most! When Jesus says, "What do you want me to do for you?" Bartimaeus shouts out, "Teacher, I want to see again!" He pitched his demands high. As Hallmark reminds us that the sender "cared enough to send the very best," Bartimaeus trusted his Lord enough to ask the very best.
Bartimaeus may have been blind, but he was no fool. He could have played the role of the humble seeker and started out with a simple request. He could have asked alms of Jesus, in an attempt to gain his sympathy. But he didn't. He came right to the point, "I want to see again."
How many of us have the trust in God to pitch our requests as high as did Bartimaeus? We have strong inner longings for something in our lives, but we are afraid to risk offending God with such sizable demands.
A friend who once served Alexander the Great asked him for some money as a dowry for his daughter. Alexander told him to go to the treasurer and demand what he pleased. The man went straight and demanded an enormous sum. The treasurer was startled and said that he could not pay that amount of money without a written order. So the treasurer went to Alexander and told him that he thought a small part of the amount the man was asking would be more than enough. "No," replied Alexander, "let him have it all. I like that man; he does me honor; he treats me like a king, and proves by what he asks that he believes me to be both rich and generous."
So when we pitch our demands high and ask God for the very best, we honor him and prove to him by what we ask that we believe him to be a God both great and generous.
Step Nine: Your faith has made you well.
This is one of the most misunderstood of all the steps to discipleship. Jesus says, "Your faith has made you well." Instantly we settle in on the word "your." Jesus says, "Your faith," and this means it was Bartimaeus' faith that was instrumental in the miracle that opened his eyes. Therefore, people do play a vital role in their own redemption. We must have faith. God acts and then we respond with our faith. So we separate the process of salvation into two opposing categories. There is the realm in which God acts; then there is the realm in which we act. Both must be operative if salvation is to be successful.
Now this sounds good. It sounds like what we have heard all our lives. "You have to work to eat." "Nobody gets anything for nothing." "Everything has its price." However, when we turn to the Kingdom of God, such sound advice from the practical world is dead wrong. In the Kingdom, God is the creator and sustainer of all that is. Nothing exists except that which is of God. R. C. Lenski once said, "If God is not Lord of all, He is not Lord at all." Thus even the faith we possess and manifest is a gift from God. We have faith, we respond in faith to God, but we have this faith from God and respond with faith in God. God gives what he demands in return. What he asks from us he provides for us.
This exchange should not be too difficult to understand. For nothing we have and possess did we create; it was given to us. We come into this world given a life we did not make. We are naked, defenseless, the most helpless of all God's creatures. We even take our first breath because someone slaps us into a response. We have to be fed, clothed, and protected. We are completely, totally dependent upon others. Everything we gradually acquire comes from others.
The mark of our sinful nature is that the older we become, the more we lose sight of our dependence on others and the more we demand independence from others. Perhaps that is what Jesus means when he says, "Except you become as little children you cannot enter into the Kingdom of God." We need to admit once again our total dependence.
Nowhere is this more important than in the area of salvation. God acts upon us, and then within us. He speaks to us, and then he opens our ears that we might hear the word he speaks. Certainly it is true that we have the freedom to fight and resist the work of God within us; but we can do nothing positive toward our own salvation, for everything has been done for us.
When we are baptized, we are placed in the flowing stream of God's grace. The water of the Spirit surrounds and supports us, and the current of this living water moves us. We can decide to fight God and swim up stream against his will, or we can relax, trust in him, and be carried along in an obedient, buoyant life of joyful discipleship.
One day a little fish heard that fish cannot exist without water. His first reaction was sheer panic. Then he decided he must find water as quickly as possible. So he swam off frantically in all directions asking every fish he met, "Where is there some water?" But the fish only turned over on their bellies, laughing at him. Finally he encountered a kindly, fatherly fish who informed him, "Son, you're swimming in it."
So with God's grace. We are swimming in it. Everything that supports and sustains us is but a gift from God. Hendriksen puts it very well when he writes, "In view of the fact that faith is itself God's gift, it is nothing less than astounding that Jesus in several instances praises the recipient of the gift for exercising it! This proves the generous character of his love."17
Jesus says to Bartimaeus, "Go, your faith has made you well." Bartimaeus did not flex the muscles of his faith, and reach around and pat himself on the back, or dash off to brag to his friends about his great faith that gained for him his sight. No! He knew who alone had done this miraculous deed that day, and he left all behind and followed him.
Step Ten: He was able to see and followed Jesus.
The final step of discipleship is the most familiar -- following Jesus. When Victoria was Queen of England she was probably the most powerful person in the world. One day she said to Gordon of Havelock, "When can you start for India?" Immediately he answered, "Tomorrow." Writers have used this story to illustrate the key to successful and influential lives. When the call comes, great persons are ready -- ready to make use of opportunity, or to answer the call of duty.
However, in the New Testament when Christ calls his disciples, they do not answer, "Tomorrow." They say nothing; they drop everything and follow him immediately. Not tomorrow, but today! Like steel drawn to a magnet, men leave all and immediately follow Jesus.
Why this is so cannot be explained; it can only be experienced. The call of Christ carries with it the imperative of immediate reaction. In the Hebraic mind, to hear was to obey. One did not hear the voice of God and then contemplate the pros and cons of following him. If and when you heard the voice of God you obeyed.
It was much like when my mother called to me when I was outside playing. If I did not come immediately, she would come after me. And when she caught hold of me she did not say, "Why didn't you obey me?" Rather she asked, "Didn't you hear me?" In her mind, if I heard her I would obey her, because she was my mother. So with God in the Jewish understanding. When God spoke, his word did not assume consideration of a response; it created the response, because he was God the Father.
So as soon as Bartimaeus was able to see, he followed Jesus as a spontaneous reaction of sheer joy and grateful enthusiasm.
Thus we have the ten steps of discipleship dramatized in this miracle story. It is an impressive list: hearing about Jesus; hoping persistently; overcoming resistance; discovering God's willingness to stop; receiving a personal call; sacrificing of "stuff"; believing in God's knowledge of our need; asking for the most and the best; responding with a given faith; and following spontaneously after Jesus. A most impressive list, but in the light of God's generous grace, this kind of discipleship is an adventure we can undertake with confidence.
Feel The Weight Of The Cross
When we view the miracle story as a whole, there is one more message that comes through to us loudly and clearly. That message is: Christ opens blind eyes so that faith might fully see.
First, eyes are opened that we might see who Jesus Christ is, the Son of God and the Savior of People. He is the long-waited Messiah, the one sent from God to bring lost children back to the Father-Creator and restore all creation to its intended destiny.
The second aspect of the message is equally important: how this divine redemption is to be accomplished. As we have pointed out above, it is not insignificant that the healing of Bartimaeus occurred while Jesus was moving to Calvary and to the Cross. Compassion and passion must not be separated. We need to have our eyes opened not only to who Jesus is but to how he is to be our Savior.
Being a disciple involves not only knowing Christ but surrendering to him and participating with him in his redemptive action. The miracle of healing blind Bartimaeus points out to us that we should not follow after Christ with our eyes closed. We need to have our eyes opened -- completely opened to what true discipleship involves.
Paul writes, "For if we become one with him in dying as he did, in the same way we shall be one with him by being raised to life as he was" (Romans 6:5). Discipleship means we will feel the weight of the cross on our lives.
Some tourists were visiting the famous Passion Play in Germany. After one of the performances, they tried to lift the cross carried by Anton Lang who, at that time, was interpreting the role of Jesus. "Why must it be so heavy?" they asked Lang. He answered, "If I did not feel the weight of it, I could not act my part."
Discipleship involves cross-bearing and dying. This does not mean that crosses will be erected in our communities and we will be crucified like our Lord on the local garbage dump. No! It means that we are to die with Christ by daily giving of ourselves to others. Every time we stop as Jesus stopped on the road to Jericho to heal a person in need, we are dying with Christ. Every time we take the precious moments of our lives -- moments we would much rather spend doing something to please ourselves -- and give those moments to help others, we are dying with Christ.
Christ followed the road to Calvary by way of Jericho. He stopped to heal a poor blind beggar. With his cross of passion ahead of him, he still had time for compassion for others. Therefore, in this miracle story, our Lord's message to us is: He is going up to Jerusalem to die for us, and he invites us to go with him. Not all the way to Jerusalem, but simply to Jericho where needy people cry out for help. As we answer these calls for help and meet these needs, we share in our Lord's death by dying for others. And we can look forward with certainty to that day when we will be resurrected with him into a new and more glorious life. Halleluia!
Let us pick up our palm branches and head for Jerusalem. Our Lord is about to mount his throne!
____________
1. Edward Schweizer, The Good News According to Mark (Richmond, Virginia: John Knox Press, 1970), p. 223.
2. Ibid., p. 225.
3. D. E. Nineham, The Gospel of St. Mark, The Pelican Gospel Commentaries (New York: The Seabury Press, 1963), p. 282.
4. H. Van der Loos, The Miracles of Jesus (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968), p. 423.
5. Josef Schmid, The Gospel According to St. Mark, The Regensburg New Testament (New York: Alba House, 1968), p. 202.
6. William Lane, The Gospel According to Mark (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1974), p. 387.
7. William Hendriksen, Exposition of the Gospel According to Mark, New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1975), p. 419.
8. Nineham, op. cit., p. 282.
9. Van der Loos, op. cit., p. 425.
10. Charles Hadden Spurgeon, Spurgeon to Meyer 1834-1929, Twenty Centuries of Great Preaching (Waco, Texas: Word Book Publishers, 1971), p. 50.
11. Spurgeon, op. cit., p. 52.
12. Ibid., p. 54.
13. Nineham, op. cit., p. 283.
14. William Barclay, And He Had Compassion (Valley Forge: Judson Press, 1976), p. 73.
15. Henry Barclay Swete, The Gospel According to St. Mark (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1956), p. 244.
16. Schmid, op. cit., p. 202.
17. Hendriksen, op. cit., p. 422.
This is the story of a man who shouted so loudly the Kingdom of God came to him. He was blind to the world about him, but not to himself. He saw his own need and faced the helpless desperation of his condition. He knew that, if he were to be cured, help must come from a Messiah sent from God. Isaiah had promised that a savior would come, born of the house of David. And his coming would be marked by the miracle of blind eyes being opened. This promise was Bartimaeus' only hope. He saw that vision of the one who would come more clearly than all the people about him who had two good eyes.
The Messiah came to the city where Bartimaeus sat and begged by the gate. Jesus, on his way to the Holy City, led a parade of his followers to the place of his passion. Ahead of him was a coronation of death. His crown would be made of thorns and his throne would be a criminal's cross. The decisive hour had struck. The Messianic secret was out. No longer would he be reluctant to show all people what it really meant to be the true king of Israel. Then irony of ironies, the first man to recognize and hail him king was a blind man.
Here we see the great storyteller Mark at his best. He paints the character of Bartimaeus in such vivid and striking details that Jesus almost fades into the background so far as the drama of the event is concerned. The spotlight is directed and focused on the blind beggar of Jericho. He is thrust forth in a barrage of strong actions descriptive of quickness, boldness, stubbornness, impetuosity, confidence. Bartimaeus is pictured as quick to grasp the opportunity to be healed -- bold in his use of the title "Son of David" -- stubborn in his refusal to be silenced -- impetuous in his readiness to throw aside his garment and come to Jesus -- confident in his loyalty to follow Jesus to Jerusalem. The whole account bristles with excitement and expectation.
Discipleship As A Divine Miracle
At first this miracle might appear as just another healing of a blind man, but it is so much more. Edward Schweizer in The Good News According to Mark titles his treatment of this miracle "Discipleship as a Divine Miracle." He states, "This story has been placed here by Mark, who transformed it into a picture of discipleship by the addition of the last few words."1 For Schweizer it is a miracle of enlightenment; it is not just a story about how one man's eyes were opened but about how all persons' eyes might be opened to the meaning of true discipleship. He continues, "Once more, immediately before the Passion narrative, Mark demonstrates to his readers what faith is and what it means to be a disciple of Jesus."2 Nineham agrees with Schweizer and sees Mark using this miracle story "as a vehicle for instruction on certain aspects of Christian discipleship."3
Here in this simple street drama we see the ten decisive steps to discipleship. The miracle actually reads like a theatre program setting forth each separate act in the process of becoming a follower of Christ. The plot of the story is directed to the disciples and to us. To the disciples this miracle is a parable pointing up the whole meaning and purpose of our Lord's ministry. He so desperately desired that the eyes of his disciples, like those of the blind beggar, would be opened to who he was and why he had come into the world.
To us its plot is a parable presenting the true way to discipleship. The points of the parable are obvious by analogy. We sit helpless in our blindness and poverty by the side of the road, while life passes us by. Then Jesus comes. In our wretched desolation and darkness we cry out, "Oh, God, have mercy upon us!" The clamor of the world attempts to drown out our litany for help. But nevertheless Christ hears. He stops. He calls us to him, and as we come his compassion comforts us and cheers us -- for his word to us is a word of salvation. Our eyes are opened and we follow him.
In all of Scripture there is no more dramatic and compact picture of what it means to become a disciple of Christ. Therefore a thorough study of this miracle, and the ten steps to discipleship which it contains, is well worth our attention. But before we begin that study, a few exegetical items need to be recalled.
Three Accounts
The Gospels contain three accounts of this miracle. Matthew differs considerably from Mark and Luke in his mention of two blind men. Some scholars hold the opinion that Matthew is talking about a different healing event altogether. Others suggest there were two blind men and Mark and Luke mention only the principal one. Luke places the healing at the entry into Jericho, while Matthew locates the miracle as Jesus is leaving the city. This suggests the possibility of two healings. Van der Loos concludes from his study of these three accounts that "all attempts to bring the stories into line with one another are open to dispute, so that no satisfactory solution can be found."4
Jericho
The miracle takes place at Jericho, one of the most ancient cities in the world. It lies about seventeen miles from Jerusalem and some six miles from the river Jordan, controlling some of the most important fords of the river. That may be the reason the invading Hebrews in the time of Joshua felt it was the key fortress which must be overcome before they entered the hill country of Canaan.
The dramatic capture of Jericho is one of the most familiar and favorite stories of the Old Testament. Joshua's army did not mount an attack against the city but marched around it. For six days the priests led Joshua's warriors once each day around the city; on the seventh day, after marching around the city, the priests blew the trumpets, all the multitude of Israelites shouted, and the walls of Jericho came tumbling down.
The parallels of this ancient story to the miracle of Bartimaeus are interesting. In both there is persistence, shouting, and the falling of walls. Bartimaeus, like Joshua, persisted in his attempts to capture something important in his life. For Joshua it was a city; for Bartimaeus it was his sight. And like the trumpets of the priests and the cry of the multitude, Bartimaeus shouted and the scales of his blindness fell from his eyes like the tumbling walls of Jericho. And, we might add, like Joshua, Bartimaeus was able to enter into a new land of promise. When his sight was restored, the blind beggar rose up and followed Jesus.
It is also interesting that Jericho was known as the "city of palms," and the setting of this miracle in the life of our Lord is a prelude to Palm Sunday with our Lord's triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Jesus, like Joshua, was about to attack a key fortress in the form of a cross which had to be overcome before he could enter into the new age of the resurrection. The shadow of the cross, the blare of trumpets, the distant rumble of tumbling walls permeate the miracle with a sense of destiny and place it firmly into the total story of God's mighty acts.
Son Of David
When Bartimaeus calls out to Jesus, he uses the term "Son of David." Josef Schmid points this out as "the first and only time in Mark's Gospel that Jesus is addressed by the title Son of David."5
Some scholars, such as Lane, do not believe that Bartimaeus was recognizing Jesus as Messiah. His interpretation is that "all that is required by the ensuing narrative is that the blind man recognize Jesus as the one from whom he could expect the gracious mercy of God."6
Hendriksen expresses the opinion of most interpreters when he writes, "Though there are those who deny that Bartimaeus is using the term in the Messianic sense, the probability is that he did so intend it for ... it is clear that during Christ's ministry on earth 'Son of David' and 'Messiah' had become synonyms."7
Nineham sees this as "the first public and unrebuked recognition of Jesus as Messiah."8 Up to this point only the demons and the disciples had recognized him as such, and they had been forbidden to speak of it. Now the messianic secret is out and amazingly it is a blind beggar who sees who he really is.
Van der Loos finds the striking point of this miracle in the fact that "Jesus does not reject the title 'Son of David'; his command that the blind man be called rather implies that he pays it particular attention." He continues, "The healing of the blind man who then follows Jesus, on the one hand manifests without any concealment the Messianic glory of Jesus and his pity on those who believe in him, and on the other it characterizes the blindness of the people Israel, whose eyes remain closed to his glory."9
Perhaps it should be noted that Jesus in this account makes no claim to be the Son of David; he simply accepts the title from another.
Ten Decisive Steps To Discipleship
We have pointed out that we have here not simply the account of how a blind beggar from Jericho was given his sight, but a profound insight into how to become a disciple. Therefore let us examine each of the decisive steps to discipleship which this miracle story presents.
Step One: "When he heard."
The first step to discipleship begins with a word. Mark says, "When he heard that it was Jesus." This is the beginning not only of faith and discipleship but of all revelation. John introduces his Gospel, "In the beginning was the Word." This is where it all starts -- with a word. How many people sit by the side of the road in quiet desperation while life passes them by because no one takes the time, or puts forth the effort, to tell them about Jesus passing by.
An elderly gentleman came into the church office after attending the morning service and announced he wanted to join the church. When he was asked if he had ever been a member of any other church, the man said, "No."
"How long have you been saved?" the pastor asked.
"All my life," the man quickly answered.
"Then why have you waited so long to join a church?" the startled pastor inquired.
"Well," the elderly man replied, "no one ever told me about it till this morning."
We do not know who the person was who first told the blind beggar about Jesus. It might have been a friend, or a camel driver taking his caravan into the city, or a pilgrim on his way to Jerusalem. But we do know that there would have been no miracle that day in Jericho without a word spoken by some unnamed witness, or as Spurgeon, referring to this act of witnessing, called it, "A very short sermon that was preached to him."10
We may never be chosen by God to play a starring role in his plan of redemption, but we are all called to bear witness to the word -- to gossip about the good news of the gospel. And that is vital; for without such testimony no miracle can happen.
Step Two: "He yelled."
The second step in the drama of discipleship is the cry of Bartimaeus, "Jesus! Son of David! Have mercy upon me!" The King James version says, "He begins to cry out." The Good News version says, "He began to shout." Perhaps it would be better stated, "He yelled!" or "screamed!" for the Greek word used here implies a loud, piercing tone like that of an enthusiastic fan at a football game. It was as if his whole life's breath were exploding in a last desperate effort to be heard.
We have said that the blind beggar's cry was initiated by the power of a word someone had shared with him concerning Jesus. And it was more than likely true that behind his yell there was also the remembered instruction of his rabbis in the synagogue who taught him about the coming of the Messiah -- the Son of David. He would be the light of the nations and open the eyes of the blind. Bartimaeus' expectations therefore were intense. How he wished he could seek Jesus out, but it was impossible for one imprisoned to a beggar's mat. All he could do was sit and wait -- hoping that someday Jesus would pass his way.
Every time he heard a crowd of people approaching, his heart throbbed in his breast. Maybe this was it. And he would cry out into the darkness that surrounded him, "Jesus, Son of David!" But it was only a caravan of merchants coming down from Jerusalem, or a group of pilgrims on their way to a feast at the Temple. How many times had he cried out in vain? How many times had he been disappointed? We can only speculate. But one day his persistence paid off and his cry was heard. Spurgeon puts it, "The blind beggar with but one sermon, and that exceedingly brief, never leaves off praying till Christ grants him his desire."11
Is this not true of all our faith encounters and all vital religious experiences? There are no formulas that can be given. No quick and easy solutions. No setting or circumstance that can be artificially created to make the Holy Spirit work. Rather, it is a delicate balance of timing that makes the moment right. No one knows the day or the hour when Christ shall come in Glory, nor do we know the day or the hour when Christ will encounter us personally, and make of what is now only a hope in our hearts a glorious experience for our whole being.
It is not enough to say that we do not find God, it is God who finds us. We need to add that the moment of his finding us cannot be planned, or pre-arranged, or manipulated either by our faith or pious performances. It is something that happens when it happens. It is pure mystery.
Some people think that the church is the place, and prayer the activity, in which God encounters us. Others say it is in the Word that God seeks us. Still others, on sound biblical evidence, state it is in the needs of our fellow humans that God comes to us. But the truth is, none of these is an automatic and absolute key that, like an ignition switch, will instantly turn on the motor and produce an immediate encounter with the living God. The Spirit blows where and when he wills. Most important is not where and how we encounter God, but our sensitivity, alertness, and readiness to be encountered by him at any time.
The church, prayer, the Word, and Christian service all enable us to maintain our spiritual sensitivity. However, they are not guarantees. Like the blind beggar Bartimaeus, we will cry out into the darkness again and again, and we will be disappointed again and again. Like Bartimaeus, also, we must not give up, but keep on shouting, "Jesus, Son of David." For as certain as Christ came to Bartimaeus, so he will come to us. When the time is right he will touch us. Then all we long for, and hope for, and search for will be given us.
Step Three: "Many scolded him."
The third step to discipleship is accepting the negative and often hostile reaction we may experience from the world about us. Mark says, "Many scolded him and told him to be quiet." Many reasons are suggested by preachers and scholars to explain the reaction of the crowd.
Spurgeon believed the crowd was motivated by the Devil himself. In his sermon he refers to Diabolus in Pilgrim's Progress who has a castle by the gate of mercy, and from this castle shoots at all who seek entrance. He also keeps a big dog that barks and howls and seeks to devour every person who knocks at the gate of mercy. Then Spurgeon proclaims, "Whenever a sinner gets to mercy's gate and begins knocking, that noise is heard in hell, and straightway the devil endeavors to drive the poor wretch away from the gate of hope."12
Some scholars suggest that the reason for the crowd's reaction was fear. Nineham points out that Jericho was later the seat of a great Roman garrison, and the city was frequently teeming with soldiers.13 Knowing that Rome had a ruthless reputation of retaliation against rebels, the people were afraid that political overtones would be heard in the blind beggar's yells hailing Jesus as the Messianic King of the Jews. As Barclay points out, "This was a time of strain and tension."14 The roads were crowded with pilgrims, and rumors were flying everywhere that "the hour" so frequently spoken of by Jesus was about to strike. In the air was a sense of decisive destiny which was both thrilling and frightening.
This political implication seems to be confirmed by the contrast between the name quoted by the crowd and that used by Bartimaeus in his cry. The crowd used the harmless description "Jesus of Nazareth," but Bartimaeus cried out the politically dangerous title, "Son of David."
We have many "afraid" people in our churches today. They are afraid of too much emotion and shouting too loudly the name of the Lord. There are no Roman soldiers waiting to arrest us, but our friends and neighbors might think that having found salvation we have lost our sanity. Or they might associate our enthusiasm with the radical actions of that strange group of "oddball faith-freaks" in the storefront church down the street. Then, too, we might step on someone's toes or offend a generous supporter of the church. It is much safer never to mention religion or politics in public -- particularly in a mixed crowd where strong convictions could create a nasty conflict. Faith is best kept a strictly private affair. It is safer that way.
A young man from a devout family went off to study at the state university. In church circles, the university had the reputation of being a hot-bed of radicals, atheists, and "pinkos." His parents were naturally concerned that their son's Christian faith might be destroyed by the vicious attacks of atheistic professors and student "fellow-travelers."
When he returned home for his first vacation, his parents asked him if his Christian faith had gotten him into trouble with his professors and friends.
"No," the young man casually replied, "nobody knows about it yet."
A light securely hidden under a basket is in little danger of being blown out by the winds of adversity. But it provides very little light for the one who possesses it, and none for those about who blindly stumble in the darkness. Faith is meant to be shared.
Dr. Robert Roth tells of getting a baseball glove handed down many times from older brothers. He complained to his father that so many of his brothers had used it that it had worn thin and did nothing to protect his hand from the sting of a hard-flung baseball.
His father wisely answered him, "A baseball glove is not intended to eliminate the sting, but to increase the size of your catching hand."
So with faith. It is not intended to protect us from the dangers and stings of life but to extend the witness of our lives that more and more might share our faith in Jesus as Lord. How often fear prohibits our faith from moving beyond the limits of our own self-concern. Instead of encouraging others to have faith, like the crowd in the miracle story, we scold them to keep their faith expressions quiet.
Another suggestion from scholars is that the reaction of the crowd came from a sense of propriety. For example, Henry Barclay Swete suggests the crowd reaction was: "Why should this beggar force his misery on the attention of the great Prophet?"15 The eyes of the whole Jewish nation were on this young man from Nazareth. He was their hero who carried with him all their hopes. Ahead lay the Holy City, and he had set his face toward it with determination. It was rumored that already his disciples were vying and maneuvering to secure strategic positions of power in the Kingdom when Jesus assumed the throne. This was no time for a begging blind man to interrupt a man about to proclaim himself King of all Israel. And what's more, his yelling was out of harmony with the dignity of the person addressed.
Certainly this element of the crowd exists in our contemporary congregations. People who think that a thing is right only when it is done right. People who make a piety of propriety. They are concerned only with appearances, to the end that the church might look good. They are so concerned with form, method, and the impression the actions of the church will make upon the community, that they discourage all social action and involvement in the nitty-gritty problems of our time. It is beneath the dignity of the church, in their estimation, to meddle in the dirty affairs of this world. The church should maintain a pure example of "spiritual concerns." We are in the business of saving "souls," not fighting poverty, crime, and corruption. Avoid the risk of radical causes. Play it safe! Don't rock the boat! Don't climb out on a limb for any reason. But they forget it was "out on a limb" reaching for sinners and outcasts that our Lord was crucified.
The most common interpretation of the reaction of the crowd is best expressed by Josef Schmid when he says, "They regarded his shouting as an annoyance."16 Sometimes this scene is pictured as one of mass confusion, people engaged in many different activities were all converging at the city gate. However, the true picture would be that of an orderly procession of a rabbi with his students. Some were going before him to prepare the way. More followed behind Jesus, listening. The disciples were immediately around him and Jesus was in the midst of them all teaching as he walked leisurely along. Everyone was extremely attentive. The crowd hung on each word he uttered. For, after all, the Kingdom was about to dawn and this young man had a direct line of communication to the Holy God. He spoke with authority, and the closer Jerusalem loomed up before them, the more authority his words seemed to assume. They wanted to hear every word, and this shouting, blind beggar was drowning out the voice of the Master.
Undoubtedly there are many people like that in our churches today. They are concerned only with their own salvation. The cares and concerns of others are only an annoyance to them. This attitude is generally the result of a false view of faith. They believe each person has to work out his own salvation and is individually responsible for his own faith.
When such an attitude prevails, personal belief becomes a competitive activity, and we push everything and everyone aside in order to secure our own salvation from hell. The truth is, as we have pointed out so often in this discussion of the miracle stories, faith is a cooperative experience.
We can only speculate about what actually motivated the crowd's reactions to Bartimaeus. It may have been fear, or propriety, or annoyance -- one or a combination of some or all of these. But of one thing we can be certain, such speculation is necessary because it establishes an identification between us and that crowd reacting in the miracle of healing blind Bartimaeus. We then are brought to examine ourselves and see how far short we constantly fall from measuring up to the type of discipleship our Lord desires of us. So often we are more of a hindrance than a help in bringing blind beggars in need to our Lord. Thus we can appreciate all the more the graciousness of our Lord to the beggars of this world and to us, his so-often-blind followers.
It needs to be added that Bartimaeus was not "put down" or held back by the scolding of the crowd. In fact the discouragement he experienced served like water thrown on a grease fire -- it only made the fire of Bartimaeus' zeal to be heard flame up all the more. He simply would not be stopped. However, hearing the cries of the blind beggar, Jesus stopped. That is the next step we will consider.
Step Four: God stops!
This step in the process of discipleship is the most surprising and amazing. It is really unbelievable. In his enactment of events which are to change the course of human history and turn the created cosmos on its axis, God stops to heal a blind beggar.
This action shouts as loudly as the blind beggar did and tells us of God's concern for a particular person in need. We hear so often that "God so loved the world." Yet the word "world" is so general and universal in scope that it is easy to miss the fact that these words include us -- you and me.
With the mail that arrives each day we frequently receive letters addressed, "Occupant." We know that they were sent by the thousands to everybody in general and to no one in particular. Or sometimes there appears in the newspaper an announcement, "The Public Is Invited." Now in one sense we know this includes us, but in another, more decisive sense we have no real feeling of being personally invited. "Everybody" is nobody in particular.
The glory of the gospel is that, even though it is universal in scope, God uses persons to carry his message personally to others. He intends each person who hears the gospel to tell another, so that we are each directly confronted with the invitation to come to him. And this leads us to the fifth step of discipleship.
Step Five: God calls the blind man to him.
When Jesus hears the cry of Bartimaeus, he stops and turns to those who are with him. "Call him," he tells them. And they go and personally speak to Bartimaeus. "Cheer up!" they say. "Get up; he is calling you." Jesus does not respond in general; he sends representatives to call the blind beggar personally to him.
By this compassionate act, Christ is showing that his concern for an individual need is not something different from what he will do on the cross in Jerusalem. Therefore, we dare not separate the compassion of Christ's life from the passion of his death. Both his life and his dramatic death are essential parts of his total act of dying for each one of us.
Sometimes this incident on the road to Jericho is viewed as an interlude, an interruption in Christ's essential task which is to die on the cross awaiting him just ahead in Jerusalem. The miracle of Bartimaeus is a beautiful picture revealing that God's love is big enough to deal with little things. The whole New Testament testifies to this truth. There is no concern, no person too insignificant for God in his compassionate love to bend down to and touch. The glory of it all is that such bending is not bothersome to God, nor is it an interruption in his redemptive work.
The story is told of a shipwrecked sailor adrift on an angry sea who, in his desperation, cried out this awkward prayer, "Oh, Lord, I've never bothered you before, and if you deliver me from this threatening sea, I solemnly promise you I'll never bother you again."
Such an attitude fails to understand the truth of Holy Scripture that our personal needs are not a bother to God. They are not interruptions to his work. They are an essential part of it. When Jesus stops to heal this blind beggar on the road to Jericho, it is not an interruption in his march to his death. It is an essential event of that march.
The events of Good Friday are often so dramatic and sensational that they blind us to the truth of the cruciform nature of the entire life of Christ. His whole life was an act of dying for others. Like the sun which daily burns itself out for everything in our universe except itself, so the Son of God gives light and life to all the world, and in so doing dies a little with each compassionate act. In Christ, compassion and passion are one. His whole life is cross-shaped. The cross simply brings to a focal point his total life of sacrifice and suffering for all of us -- each and every one of us personally. So he sends his disciples to us as he sent them to Bartimaeus with the simple message, "Cheer up! Jesus is calling you!"
Step Six: He threw off his cloak.
The sixth step of discipleship is one of the most decisive and certainly the most dramatic. The quick response of Bartimaeus in jumping up and coming to Jesus was a sensational sight to behold. But the spotlight of our attention needs to fall on the cloak that went flying through the air, cast recklessly aside in Bartimaeus' eagerness to get to Jesus. That cloak is symbolic of his total response. This man literally gave the shirt off his back to come to Jesus.
That cloak was the sum total of all Bartimaeus' wealth. In the days of Jesus, among the poor, a man's cloak was his most valued possession. It meant everything to him. Not only was it his only means of warmth against the cold of winter, but for a blind beggar it was an essential means of livelihood. Beggars used their cloaks to catch the coins thrown to them. People avoided close contact with beggars, for there was always the danger of ritual contamination. Most beggars were regarded as sinners and ceremonially unclean. So people stood a safe distance away and tossed their alms. The beggar needed a cloak to catch the coins thrown by these stand-offish givers.
Therefore, when Bartimaeus flung off his cloak and ran to Jesus, he was throwing away everything most dear to him. And certainly this is an important step of discipleship. So often we want to come to Jesus with our arms loaded down with the precious things we are certain we just can't do without. But Jesus cannot fully share his gifts with us until we are willing to come to him as the hymn states, "Nothing in my hands I bring."
A fire raged through an apartment house. From an eighth floor window a woman stood, screaming frantically for help. The firemen raised the narrow ladder to her window. When one climbed up to where she was, there she stood with her arms loaded with valuables. The fireman took one look and cried out, "Lady, if you expect me to save you and me, you're going to have to leave all that stuff behind."
It is obvious that we are not stranded in a burning building -- at least not yet. It is equally obvious that we are not blind beggars, which means we have more than an old cloak to cast aside if we are to forsake all to follow Jesus. Nevertheless, this step of discipleship will someday be demanded of us all.
Christ does not ask us immediately to denounce the world with all its comforts and advantages when we respond to his call of discipleship. He does not expect us to sell or give away all that we possess and apply for membership in the closest monastery. But he does call us to reevaluate all the things of our lives, and be willing to give up anything that prohibits us from living a life of loving obedience to God our Father.
God created this world and called it "good." He made us stewards of the "stuff" of this world. He expects us to use all we have been given to his glory. He wants us to enjoy the fruits of the earth, to prosper and celebrate with the things of this world. But when the time comes for us to leave behind this world and answer God's call into a new experience of discipleship in another and better world, then we must fling aside our prized possessions with the same joyous abandonment as Bartimaeus when he threw aside his cloak and ran to Jesus.
Step Seven: Jesus asked, "What do you want?"
This is perhaps the strangest step to discipleship. God asks, "What do you want me to do for you?" There is no doubt Jesus knew that Bartimaeus wanted his sight. Still, he asked. Why? Why does God want us to ask him for things he already knows we want and need?
One answer is that this is the means by which he draws us closer to himself, in order that we can become a part of his continual process of making us into the persons we were intended to be. When you bring a little boat up to the dock and throw out the line, so that it encircles a piling and thereby enables you to draw your boat tightly against the dock, you are not creating your own security. You are simply connecting to the security and stability of the dock.
When we ask God for something and so verbalize our needs, we are throwing out a line whereby he might draw us closer to himself. This is true of all prayer. Prayer is the connecting link formed between God and ourselves whereby his strength and stability can become ours. We may think we are doing something important when we pull that rope. It is the dock, however, that is important. For if it were not secure, all our efforts would be in vain and we would be fastening our lives to floating straws.
God, in his kindness, lets us do something, even though he has done everything. He lets us pull on that rope, and pray our prayers, even though the full truth is that the strength we need to pull and to pray comes from him.
Step Eight: Bartimaeus asks for the most!
The eighth step of discipleship calls for reckless courage. Bartimaeus was not timid; he was presumptuous. He asked for the most! When Jesus says, "What do you want me to do for you?" Bartimaeus shouts out, "Teacher, I want to see again!" He pitched his demands high. As Hallmark reminds us that the sender "cared enough to send the very best," Bartimaeus trusted his Lord enough to ask the very best.
Bartimaeus may have been blind, but he was no fool. He could have played the role of the humble seeker and started out with a simple request. He could have asked alms of Jesus, in an attempt to gain his sympathy. But he didn't. He came right to the point, "I want to see again."
How many of us have the trust in God to pitch our requests as high as did Bartimaeus? We have strong inner longings for something in our lives, but we are afraid to risk offending God with such sizable demands.
A friend who once served Alexander the Great asked him for some money as a dowry for his daughter. Alexander told him to go to the treasurer and demand what he pleased. The man went straight and demanded an enormous sum. The treasurer was startled and said that he could not pay that amount of money without a written order. So the treasurer went to Alexander and told him that he thought a small part of the amount the man was asking would be more than enough. "No," replied Alexander, "let him have it all. I like that man; he does me honor; he treats me like a king, and proves by what he asks that he believes me to be both rich and generous."
So when we pitch our demands high and ask God for the very best, we honor him and prove to him by what we ask that we believe him to be a God both great and generous.
Step Nine: Your faith has made you well.
This is one of the most misunderstood of all the steps to discipleship. Jesus says, "Your faith has made you well." Instantly we settle in on the word "your." Jesus says, "Your faith," and this means it was Bartimaeus' faith that was instrumental in the miracle that opened his eyes. Therefore, people do play a vital role in their own redemption. We must have faith. God acts and then we respond with our faith. So we separate the process of salvation into two opposing categories. There is the realm in which God acts; then there is the realm in which we act. Both must be operative if salvation is to be successful.
Now this sounds good. It sounds like what we have heard all our lives. "You have to work to eat." "Nobody gets anything for nothing." "Everything has its price." However, when we turn to the Kingdom of God, such sound advice from the practical world is dead wrong. In the Kingdom, God is the creator and sustainer of all that is. Nothing exists except that which is of God. R. C. Lenski once said, "If God is not Lord of all, He is not Lord at all." Thus even the faith we possess and manifest is a gift from God. We have faith, we respond in faith to God, but we have this faith from God and respond with faith in God. God gives what he demands in return. What he asks from us he provides for us.
This exchange should not be too difficult to understand. For nothing we have and possess did we create; it was given to us. We come into this world given a life we did not make. We are naked, defenseless, the most helpless of all God's creatures. We even take our first breath because someone slaps us into a response. We have to be fed, clothed, and protected. We are completely, totally dependent upon others. Everything we gradually acquire comes from others.
The mark of our sinful nature is that the older we become, the more we lose sight of our dependence on others and the more we demand independence from others. Perhaps that is what Jesus means when he says, "Except you become as little children you cannot enter into the Kingdom of God." We need to admit once again our total dependence.
Nowhere is this more important than in the area of salvation. God acts upon us, and then within us. He speaks to us, and then he opens our ears that we might hear the word he speaks. Certainly it is true that we have the freedom to fight and resist the work of God within us; but we can do nothing positive toward our own salvation, for everything has been done for us.
When we are baptized, we are placed in the flowing stream of God's grace. The water of the Spirit surrounds and supports us, and the current of this living water moves us. We can decide to fight God and swim up stream against his will, or we can relax, trust in him, and be carried along in an obedient, buoyant life of joyful discipleship.
One day a little fish heard that fish cannot exist without water. His first reaction was sheer panic. Then he decided he must find water as quickly as possible. So he swam off frantically in all directions asking every fish he met, "Where is there some water?" But the fish only turned over on their bellies, laughing at him. Finally he encountered a kindly, fatherly fish who informed him, "Son, you're swimming in it."
So with God's grace. We are swimming in it. Everything that supports and sustains us is but a gift from God. Hendriksen puts it very well when he writes, "In view of the fact that faith is itself God's gift, it is nothing less than astounding that Jesus in several instances praises the recipient of the gift for exercising it! This proves the generous character of his love."17
Jesus says to Bartimaeus, "Go, your faith has made you well." Bartimaeus did not flex the muscles of his faith, and reach around and pat himself on the back, or dash off to brag to his friends about his great faith that gained for him his sight. No! He knew who alone had done this miraculous deed that day, and he left all behind and followed him.
Step Ten: He was able to see and followed Jesus.
The final step of discipleship is the most familiar -- following Jesus. When Victoria was Queen of England she was probably the most powerful person in the world. One day she said to Gordon of Havelock, "When can you start for India?" Immediately he answered, "Tomorrow." Writers have used this story to illustrate the key to successful and influential lives. When the call comes, great persons are ready -- ready to make use of opportunity, or to answer the call of duty.
However, in the New Testament when Christ calls his disciples, they do not answer, "Tomorrow." They say nothing; they drop everything and follow him immediately. Not tomorrow, but today! Like steel drawn to a magnet, men leave all and immediately follow Jesus.
Why this is so cannot be explained; it can only be experienced. The call of Christ carries with it the imperative of immediate reaction. In the Hebraic mind, to hear was to obey. One did not hear the voice of God and then contemplate the pros and cons of following him. If and when you heard the voice of God you obeyed.
It was much like when my mother called to me when I was outside playing. If I did not come immediately, she would come after me. And when she caught hold of me she did not say, "Why didn't you obey me?" Rather she asked, "Didn't you hear me?" In her mind, if I heard her I would obey her, because she was my mother. So with God in the Jewish understanding. When God spoke, his word did not assume consideration of a response; it created the response, because he was God the Father.
So as soon as Bartimaeus was able to see, he followed Jesus as a spontaneous reaction of sheer joy and grateful enthusiasm.
Thus we have the ten steps of discipleship dramatized in this miracle story. It is an impressive list: hearing about Jesus; hoping persistently; overcoming resistance; discovering God's willingness to stop; receiving a personal call; sacrificing of "stuff"; believing in God's knowledge of our need; asking for the most and the best; responding with a given faith; and following spontaneously after Jesus. A most impressive list, but in the light of God's generous grace, this kind of discipleship is an adventure we can undertake with confidence.
Feel The Weight Of The Cross
When we view the miracle story as a whole, there is one more message that comes through to us loudly and clearly. That message is: Christ opens blind eyes so that faith might fully see.
First, eyes are opened that we might see who Jesus Christ is, the Son of God and the Savior of People. He is the long-waited Messiah, the one sent from God to bring lost children back to the Father-Creator and restore all creation to its intended destiny.
The second aspect of the message is equally important: how this divine redemption is to be accomplished. As we have pointed out above, it is not insignificant that the healing of Bartimaeus occurred while Jesus was moving to Calvary and to the Cross. Compassion and passion must not be separated. We need to have our eyes opened not only to who Jesus is but to how he is to be our Savior.
Being a disciple involves not only knowing Christ but surrendering to him and participating with him in his redemptive action. The miracle of healing blind Bartimaeus points out to us that we should not follow after Christ with our eyes closed. We need to have our eyes opened -- completely opened to what true discipleship involves.
Paul writes, "For if we become one with him in dying as he did, in the same way we shall be one with him by being raised to life as he was" (Romans 6:5). Discipleship means we will feel the weight of the cross on our lives.
Some tourists were visiting the famous Passion Play in Germany. After one of the performances, they tried to lift the cross carried by Anton Lang who, at that time, was interpreting the role of Jesus. "Why must it be so heavy?" they asked Lang. He answered, "If I did not feel the weight of it, I could not act my part."
Discipleship involves cross-bearing and dying. This does not mean that crosses will be erected in our communities and we will be crucified like our Lord on the local garbage dump. No! It means that we are to die with Christ by daily giving of ourselves to others. Every time we stop as Jesus stopped on the road to Jericho to heal a person in need, we are dying with Christ. Every time we take the precious moments of our lives -- moments we would much rather spend doing something to please ourselves -- and give those moments to help others, we are dying with Christ.
Christ followed the road to Calvary by way of Jericho. He stopped to heal a poor blind beggar. With his cross of passion ahead of him, he still had time for compassion for others. Therefore, in this miracle story, our Lord's message to us is: He is going up to Jerusalem to die for us, and he invites us to go with him. Not all the way to Jerusalem, but simply to Jericho where needy people cry out for help. As we answer these calls for help and meet these needs, we share in our Lord's death by dying for others. And we can look forward with certainty to that day when we will be resurrected with him into a new and more glorious life. Halleluia!
Let us pick up our palm branches and head for Jerusalem. Our Lord is about to mount his throne!
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1. Edward Schweizer, The Good News According to Mark (Richmond, Virginia: John Knox Press, 1970), p. 223.
2. Ibid., p. 225.
3. D. E. Nineham, The Gospel of St. Mark, The Pelican Gospel Commentaries (New York: The Seabury Press, 1963), p. 282.
4. H. Van der Loos, The Miracles of Jesus (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968), p. 423.
5. Josef Schmid, The Gospel According to St. Mark, The Regensburg New Testament (New York: Alba House, 1968), p. 202.
6. William Lane, The Gospel According to Mark (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1974), p. 387.
7. William Hendriksen, Exposition of the Gospel According to Mark, New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1975), p. 419.
8. Nineham, op. cit., p. 282.
9. Van der Loos, op. cit., p. 425.
10. Charles Hadden Spurgeon, Spurgeon to Meyer 1834-1929, Twenty Centuries of Great Preaching (Waco, Texas: Word Book Publishers, 1971), p. 50.
11. Spurgeon, op. cit., p. 52.
12. Ibid., p. 54.
13. Nineham, op. cit., p. 283.
14. William Barclay, And He Had Compassion (Valley Forge: Judson Press, 1976), p. 73.
15. Henry Barclay Swete, The Gospel According to St. Mark (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1956), p. 244.
16. Schmid, op. cit., p. 202.
17. Hendriksen, op. cit., p. 422.
