This journey through Mark’s Gospel has been enlightening and filled with great opportunities for me to delve a little deeper into my faith, especially the last few weeks or so. Actually, it’s been the last 6 weeks that I’ve honestly grown closer to an understanding as to what it means to be a disciple of Jesus.
This particular journey started with Jesus and his companions as they traveled through the villages surrounding Caesarea Philippi. If we remember, the scene was painted for us which had the travelers walking down streets lined with idols worshipping other gods as Jesus stopped to ask his followers who they thought he was. Peter’s reply was that Jesus was the Christ, the chosen one, the living Christ. This story is known as the gateway from the Jesus who healed and did signs of wonder to the Jesus who had decided to fulfill his one mission on earth.
Next we traveled through Galilee and into Capernaum, Jesus’ adopted home and safe haven. Capernaum was that place in and around the Galilee area where the Roman Empire had no presence. This was to be Jesus’ rest stop before heading out to Jerusalem, but instead of resting he uses the time to teach his disciples about what it means to be a servant; a theme he’ll repeat again before he gets to the gates of Jerusalem.
To show us about the meaning of being a servant, Jesus takes a little child, someone of no significance to society in his days, and says to the gathered followers that they need to take people like that child – the outcasts, those who live on the fringes, those society has all but ignored – and place them first as those whom we will serve; first as those for whom we will take care of and help provide for.
Then while still in Capernaum, Jesus teaches his followers about what it means to place stumbling blocks in front of those who are trying to do work in his name. They are told in no uncertain terms that to do so, to hinder anyone from traveling their individual paths into the love of God, would be alike to that of being sent to Geena, the place where the fires of punishment never dies.
Here Mark’s Gospel reminds us to continually invite those seeking God through Jesus, regardless of the paths they have traveled to get to where they are.
We took a break from Mark’s Gospel to celebrate the one church in Jesus Christ on World Communion Sunday, but our break didn’t last for long. The very next week, as Jesus began to travel again, we were introduced to the rich man who followed all the laws and did all his prayers and was, for the most part, a good follower of the Jewish faith. But because he was unwilling to give up his prized possessions, he also found himself unwilling to do what was necessary to enter into God’s realm.
Then, just last week we heard yet another story about the two disciples who approached Jesus with a very bold and courageous question. Jesus asks James and John, “What do you want me to do for you?” To which their reply was to hold positions of power in what they were certain was going to be Jesus’ victory over the Roman Empire. However, Jesus once again tells them that whoever wants to be first among them will be the servant of all.
So, if we’ve been following Mark’s Gospel as to what are the expectations of being a disciple of Christ, we have learned that first we must proclaim Jesus as our chosen one, sent by God to lead us into a life reconciled with God, each other, and ourselves. We must also put the needs of others before ours, especially those who have been outcast or pushed to the edges of society. We must also be willing to give up that which we treasure or value the most as we follow the call of Jesus to do God’s work. To add to this we must never hinder someone’s progress into the community of Christ, always inviting and accepting those who come into the community, regardless of any preconceived ideas we might have of what that community is supposed to look like and who we think are the approved members of such a community.
Mother Teresa is quoted as saying, “Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.” What she meant by this is that no matter the living conditions of people around the world, whether they live in mansion-like homes or cardboard shanties, if people don’t belong to a community of others who care for and about them, they live a life that is poor in spirit and devoid of love.
No person should ever have to live in such a world.
It’s unfortunate that even in our day and time, here in the 21st century after the birth of Christ, people who are considered “different” are sometimes still living a life of the poverty Mother Teresa spoke of. But, the good news we are given is that there is still hope.
A few years ago, as I was stuck in horrible traffic on Vineyard Boulevard I was witness to one of these moments of hope. I don’t know what the reason for the back-up on the road was, but it was one of those situations where it took 3 or 4 light changes just to move a few car lengths. I don’t remember being anxious, though, so I must have been in a place where time didn’t much matter.
Being stuck in that traffic gave me the opportunity to look around and take in life as it passed me by. I watched as business people walked along the sidewalk. I watched as college-aged young adults dodged between cars trying to cross the street. It was all amusing to me as I truly enjoy watching people interact with their surroundings.
Then I noticed a blind man, possibly in his late forties or early fifties, as he tried to walk along the sidewalk. The first thing I noticed was where he was walking. He was dangerously close to the road, using his walking stick to tap against the side of the curb as he moved forward. There were more than a few times it looked as though he would stumble right off that sidewalk and onto the road.
A young couple, people possibly in their mid-twenties, approached him from the front, but as they both looked up to see him struggling to walk, they both quickly put their eyes down and moved to the opposite side of the sidewalk, making the choice to ignore the man, rather than help.
A man in an aloha shirt walked by, talking on his cell phone. He had a look of concern on his face as he watched the blind man tapping his way along the edge of the curb. He didn’t move away from the man, but neither did he move towards him, choosing instead to keep talking on his cell phone as he walked right on by.
Everything in me wanted to pull my car over, onto the sidewalk if I had to, so I could help that man reach his destination. I didn’t have to, though, because just as I couldn’t take watching this man possibly fall off the curb and onto the street anymore, a young lady, I would say maybe 20 years old, approached the man and said something to him. He smiled and stopped, reaching out his hand to grab hold of the arm of this young lady, and together they walked towards the center of the sidewalk and along their way.
I thought of this story while reading today’s passage. I thought about how Bartimaeus might have felt as person after person would pass him by all day long, every day of his life. I thought about how at least in today’s society there will be someone willing to reach out and touch someone like Bartimaeus, unlike in the days of Jesus when it was actually against the laws of his people to do so. A blind man living on the streets was unclean, imperfect, and therefore incapable of entering the communities of his day.
Jesus and a large group of people are leaving Jericho, a city which theologian Megan McKenna says would have been known in Jesus’ day as one filled with danger and violence; filled not only with bandits but also with those who were fighting against the Roman Empire. Along their way from that city the group comes across a blind beggar named Bartimaeus.
Bartimaeus shouts, “Jesus, Son of David, show me mercy!” It’s not the cry for mercy Mark’s Gospel is hoping we focus on; it isn’t that a blind man somehow knows that Jesus is walking by. Mark’s Gospel, for the first time, has someone identifying Jesus as who he is – the Son of David, the rightful heir to the throne of Israel. Bartimaeus recognizes Jesus as not only the Christ, the chosen one as did Peter, but as the one to whom all the glory of Israel should be given.
What the followers of Jesus do next is what Jesus had said is the one thing they should never do as a disciple – they hinder Bartimaeus’ approach into the community of Christ. They scold him and tell him to be quiet, but the blind man will have nothing of it as he calls out even louder, “Son of David, show me mercy!”
Jesus, again being the example of what a disciple is supposed to be like, stops what he is doing and calls the man to him. To be honest, this really is what being a disciple of Christ is about. People call out to us for help all the time. Sometimes the cry is subtle and barely noticeable, sometimes it’s so loud we can’t ignore it even if we try. Our call, as followers of Christ, is that when we hear that cry for help we stop what we’re doing and be a presence in the lives of those who need us.
Jesus’ followers call out to the blind man to get up and go to Jesus, which Bartimaeus does.
Now, I’ve worked with a lot of people who live on the streets. I can tell you that the things which they hold close to them, literally on their persons or no more than a few feet away, are their most prized possessions. The clothes they wear, the food they will eat, any monies or other valuables they might use in trade for something else are all kept well within reach.
I can imagine this would hold even truer for a blind person living on the streets. If we stop to think about it, once a blind person loses something on the streets, it is lost. The chances of him or her ever finding it is slim, if that. A blind person who is houseless will do everything they can to keep their possessions on them, if not directly attached to them.
I would say this holds even truer for a blind person in the days of Jesus. Such would be Bartimaeus; a blind beggar living on the streets, with nothing to call his own except maybe the morsels of food someone may have given to him, the clothes he would have been wearing for days or weeks on end, and his coat. A coat which would have been the only way for him to survive the cold nights living on the streets outside Jericho, let alone provide a possible place of sanctuary from the bandits who traveled the roads at night.
His coat, which for all intents and purposes is really the only possession Bartimaeus has, is what he tosses aside as he jumps up to come into the presence of Jesus. Unlike the rich man we heard about a few weeks ago, Bartimaeus is willing to cast aside, and possibly lose forever, the one thing that he depended on for survival so that he could have a chance at a better life with Jesus Christ.
Bartimaeus knew, without a doubt, that his life was about to be transformed. He knew that he no longer would need that coat, or anything else, because Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the one chosen by God to reconcile people under the one love of God, had invited him to be in a community where all are welcome.
Bartimaeus put all of his trust in Jesus Christ. Bartimaeus put all of his faith in Jesus Christ. And when Jesus asks Bartimaeus, “What can I do for you?” unlike the answer James and John gave him, Bartimaeus simply asks for the one thing he had desired for what might have been his entire life: to see. He didn’t want power, he didn’t want fame, he didn’t want riches, he didn’t want friends, he didn’t want anything except for Jesus to make him whole. Bartimaeus, the outcast and unwanted of his society, simply says to Jesus, “I want to see.”
For his faith, for his recognition of Jesus as the Christ and the one sent by God to heal humanity, for his willingness to cast aside all that which he holds of value in his life, for his simple request to just be made complete, Bartimaeus is rewarded with that which he had sought all along: a new life, invited into and to become a part of a community of others who will accept him for who he was in a past life and who he will become in a new life with Christ.
Bartimaeus follows Jesus. Because we know how the story will end, we also know that Bartimaeus won’t be following Jesus for much longer – not here on earth anyway. But something tells me that because of the true examples of Jesus in what discipleship is about, he will follow Jesus for the rest of his life, all the while being as good a disciple to others, just as his savior was to him.Mother Teresa was right. There really is no worse poverty than to go through life without belonging to a community. And just as that young lady invited the stumbling blind man to be a part of her community, even if just for a moment, let us be the disciples Jesus calls us to be and do the same.
God is with us all. Amen.
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