“Bartimaeus Healed” Mark 10: 32-52

How do we examine the state of our soul? That’s a really weighty question. John Wesley used to put it this way - how is it with your soul? For many of us that still seems intimidating. Yet, John Wesley had folks answer that in a Sunday school like setting week in and week out. And guess what? People were honest with one another. It wasn’t about trying to impress the people around you with your piety - it was about honestly coming before God in a humble attitude. 

Jesus was trying to teach his disciples once again about what is going to take place to him. He is going to be persecuted, tortured, and killed. He is going to be stripped of his dignity and his life. He is going to be disrespected. That is what lies ahead for Jesus in Jerusalem. And yet, he is leading them right into it. 

Why? Because there is a hope that will come from all of this. In three days he will rise again. His disciples didn’t yet understand what all of this meant - both the killing and the rising. Yet, they still follow him along the way. 

But perhaps only with their feet and not yet their spirits. Because shortly after Jesus tries to explain to his disciples what is to come, we find the brothers James and John coming forward and asking Jesus to sit at his right and left sides in glory. 

Wow. They missed the entirety of the humility and the humiliation of what is to come. They still think this is about ruling and power. They haven’t grasped what Jesus has been trying to convey to them as they march closer and closer to his death. 

What is about to come isn’t just about Jesus. Surely its going to be challenging for him, but he also knows its going to be challenging for his disciples. He knows what awaits him, but he also knows what awaits them. And everything that is going to be resting on their shoulders. He is asking them to go with him on this journey of faith, where every step counts, and James and John  want to rush ahead to what they perceive to be the end, their reward. 

They’ve also missed the point that this hope that we have in Jesus isn’t about individual people rising to power. It’s about the community we have with Christ as the head. Think about this - Mark is writing to believers who are young in their faith. Maybe some of them are so brand new that they still have the mentality of James and John - what am I going to get out of this? How am I going to succeed? But Mark needs to give hope and teaching to this new groups of believers who are in the thick of persecution. He needs to stress that discipleship is costly, but the hope is worth it. 

In the grace that is so emblamatic of Jesus, he doesn’t call James and John out for their misunderstanding or arrogance. Instead, he poses to them a question. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? In other words, are you able to take on yourself all of the sorrow, pain, suffering and death that is to come? 

Because they do not understand this question either, they jump right away into saying of course Lord. We are able. Showing that they did not take time to really dwell in what Jesus is saying or that they had taken time for prayer and reflection. 

It is so easy to criticize James and John. It would seem that is what the other disciples did as they began to grumble and get angry with the brothers. But don’t we do the same thing? Don’t we sometimes not know what discipleship really means. Or how costly it is. We’ve heard of fair weather fans when it comes to sports team, but Church there are also fair weather disciples. They want to follow Jesus, but only on their terms. They want what they want, not realizing that a life in Christ calls for sacrificial discipleship. 

James and John were thinking in terms of the world. They wanted greatness that would come from sitting by Jesus when he would rule in what they believed would be his political kingdom. They wanted the position of power. They wanted the popularity, but their wants blocked their ears from hearing what Jesus was trying to tell them about what being a disciples truly means. 

See, the Kingdom of God isn’t about our individual greatness, its about this beloved community. The Kingdom of God isn’t about putting ourselves first, its about being led by Christ alone. The Kingdom of God isn’t about seeking our own glory, its about challenging the evil forces of this world that are like chains around the souls of folks. The Kingdom of God isn’t about us, its about Christ. 

While the disciples may not have understood this about the Kingdom of God, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus did. Bartimaeus is an interesting character in the Gospel of Mark. He is the last person that we hear a healing story about. He is also the only person we are told the name of. Here is this man who is the lowest of low, he is blind and he is a beggar. Maybe he had heard the rumors about the healings Jesus had performed throughout the region or maybe something just stirred in his spirit that day but he cried out “Son of David, have mercy on me!” 

He makes this Messianic statement - and it made Jesus stand still. 

Jesus who knows all that is to come. Jesus who is on the road traveling with a purpose. He stops and stands still and see this man. 

He asks the man what do you want me to do for you? And maybe the man thinks its an obvious answer but he states clearly - let me see. Heal me. 

And Jesus did. He sent him away saying that his faith had made him well. 

I always loved this story in the Gospel of Mark because Jesus asked the man how he wanted to be healed. He asked him why he was crying out to him. He knew that he was in need of healing and humbly laid it out before this one who he identified and called the Son of Man. 

Friends, we have no idea what lead James and John to make the request they did of Jesus. But we know what lead Bartimaeus - a desire to be changed, a desire to be healed. 

How about us - where are we in need of healing? Where are we blind like James and John? Where do we need Jesus to whisper into our lives and help us to both see and proclaim the obvious - that we are broken and we want to be made whole. 

Notice what happens at the end of Bartimaeus’s story. He follows. He is the also the last person we are told followed Jesus on his journey. Bartimaeus’s life was so drastically changed that he could not help but commit his life to Christ and follow him. 

Friends, we are now in the season of Lent. A season where we are to examine our hearts and ask God to poke around in the corners where we may be blind. Where we may not be aware and ask for healing and forgiveness. Because everything that happened in this section of Mark, Chapter 10 still happens to us today. We still can let our ambitions make us blind to the call of Christ in our lives. We are still in need of healing. We are still able to follow Jesus today.

Let us take time this week to really pray to God to examine us. To heal us. And to send us out anew. Amen.