It's
important to recognize the context of this story—well, when is it not?—but here
it's especially critical, because it's the last healing in Mark, the last
mighty deed, if you except the cursing of the fig-tree, that is . . . The very
next section has him arriving in Jerusalem for the last time, and so this is
the end of the road both to Jerusalem—he’s been traveling there with his
followers for some time—and the beginning of the end of the road for his life,
because we know what happens in Jerusalem.
So does Mark’s community, his congregation, the people for whom this
gospel was written. So they would have
been well aware of the echoes between this final story, the ending of his journey
to Jerusalem, and the ending of his journey in life.
But
wait . . . there’s more! This is the
second story of healing a guy of blindness, of enabling someone who can't see
to regain his sight, and in fact, these two stories bracket a portion of Mark’s
gospel that deals with the spiritual
blindness of Jesus’ followers, especially to the true nature of his
identity and of his ministry on earth.
It is between these two healings that Jesus tells them—three times!—that
he’s going to be crucified, and each time, they fail—or is it refuse?—to get
it, to understand, to see.
Of
course, today we realize that it isn't the men’s physical blindness that is the
wrong, nor does it imply that they are bad because they’re blind, as it did to
the religious authorities of the day. It
was neither of their faults that they were blind, which is part of the point of
both stories: the men were shunned, unclean because of their blindness. By healing them he demonstrated that they were welcome in God’s kingdom, and that
the last—in this case, penniless outcasts—were indeed first in that kingdom.
So,
although we are to be sensitive and not make the mistakes the religious
authorities did, confusing people with their diseases, it's important to
understand how the idea of not being able to see plays out, both actually and
metaphorically. But let's back up a
little: Just who is this Bartimaeus, anyway?
Well, the very fact that he's named
is of significance: in fact, he's the only one of the people Jesus heals—man or
woman—that is named. And we know him by his father’s name, because
that’s what it means: Bar-timaeus, son of Timaeus. And son of Timaeus has fallen on hard
times. In fact, he was outcast, unclean,
a beggar sitting by the dusty road. His
condition ensured that he would be that way, and can you picture how it was for
him? His face, not at eye level, but of
the level of the legs of the passers-by . . . Not that he would look them in
the eye anyway, he’d learned long ago that if he did that, he'd get nothing,
because people would think him uppity, trying to act above his station . . . The
people along that Jericho road considered him beneath them . . . They had to, because he was unclean, unfit to
worship with, and that meant he'd done something that God didn't like, and for
which he was being punished. It was
unthinkable that it was a random thing, that his blindness was just a trick of
fate, he must've done something wrong . . .
And
so there son of Timaeus is, dependent upon the kindness of strangers, the dust
clogging his nostrils and stinging his eyes, mixing with his sweat into a kind
of paste, flies dividing their time between his face and the pile of donkey
dung three feet away, and here comes Bar-Gary, son of Gary, with his wife Bat-Louise
a respectful step behind, and she’s saying “oh, look at that poor man . . .
Give him a coin, my husband” but Bar-Gary is having none of it, saying “he’ll
just spend it on alcohol . . . Wouldn't want to enable him, my dear,” and so it
goes, Bartimaeus is used to it, people thinking they know who he is just by his
condition, thinking they know how he got there, and the afternoon is getting
hotter, and the flies more persistent, and he swears that dung-pile is bigger, when he hears a commotion, almost
a whispering at first, a susurration coming towards him along the road . . . A
stirring on the breeze, as if the spirits of the air have pricked up their
ears, and it seems a little more cool, a little more tolerable all of a sudden
. . .
And
now he hears a name on the wind, whispered by the spirits at first, then echoed
by the crowds on that boiling day: “Jesus, JESUS . . .” and his heart leaps, not only because he has heard the
name, but because something within him just falls into place with a sigh, as if
a part of him—missing for all this time has finally come home. And inside him there is an openness, a spaciousness
that had always been there, but has been awakened anew . . . Perhaps it is his
suffering that has awakened it, made him more open, more receptive to the new .
. . that's how philosopher and theologian Raimon Panikkar described faith . . .
as a receptiveness, an openness to revelation . . .
And
in a way that is not apparent in the crowd, son-of-Timaeus is there, he is at
that place of openness, that place of receptiveness, and from that place he
calls out to Jesus: “Son of David, have mercy on me!” But the crowd is outraged, that this outcast
beggar, this unclean . . . thing would presume to call out, to try and rise above
his station to get Jesus’ attention . . . But such is his faith that he cries
out even louder: “Son of David, have mercy on me!” And now we can see why Mark gives us a name,
or at least tells us who his father is: Bartimaeus, son of Timaeus, is calling
out for Bar-David, son of David . . . And this is the first mention of his
royal heritage in Mark’s gospel, but it won't be the last . . . in the very next
passage, Jesus enters Jerusalem on a colt, the foal of a donkey, and the crowd
shouts it out: “Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor
David! Hosanna in the highest heaven!”
Bartimaeus, who was made to see, nevertheless saw the same thing the
crowds did, the same thing as his disciples did, really: that Jesus would bring
back the glorious reign of his ancestor David, the once and future King.
“Bar-David,”
he says, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”
And Son of David stands stock still, he halts his progress for the outcast,
and says “call him here,” but he doesn't rebuke the crowd for their callousness
but invites them into his ministry, invited them to help him out, and when they
do—saying courage! He is calling for you!—when they lead him up, Jesus asks him
a simple question: “What do you want me to do for you?” And we remember—because we talked about it
just last week—we remember the last time he asked that question, in the episode
just before this, to James and John, and we also
remember what they asked for: to sit,
one at his right hand and one at his left, in his glory. His disciples, his followers, who you'd think
would see, are nevertheless blind to the true nature of Jesus’ reign.
And
what does the beggar who is blind, he of the openness, he of the faith, what does he ask? “My teacher,” he
says, “let me see again.” And it's clear
that Mark wants us to draw a contrast between James and John, who request to
share in Jesus’ supposed upcoming power, and this wretched beggar, who simply
asks for what he needs at that very moment, and in Jesus’ response to that we get a hint of what it may be:
“Go: your faith has made you
well!” It's his faith, or some quality of it, that has made him well, that has
rescued him, as the literal Greek would have it, distinguishes him from Jesus’
other followers. Even though he still
buys into the dominant, son of David narrative—which Jesus will put the lie to soon,
in Jerusalem—his faith is nevertheless different, so much so that's Jesus
commends him for it, so much so that It causes Bartimaeus to follow him, which
we have never seen in Mark, though as we know, not for long.
A
quick search in my Bible software revealed that although Jesus commends the
faith of those he heals frequently, he never once—at least in Mark—commends the
faith of his followers, even the twelve . . . When Peter makes a similar
statement—calling Jesus Messiah, equivalent to Son of David—he just shuts him
up . . . Then shortly afterward calls him Satan. The so-called “faith” of the disciples rests
in a willingness to follow Jesus, all right, but only if it is to power and
might. After all, they desert him at the
cross, when the true nature of his ministry is finally revealed. The faith—the openness, the receptivity—of
Bartimaeus is open to the possibility of grace, and that's all he requests.
In
a few minutes, we will recite the prayer we do every Sunday; we pray the prayer
Jesus taught us—no, commanded us—to
pray. And in it there is one line that
stands out for me today: give us today our daily bread, give us what we need,
nothing more. Bartimaeus is the
embodiment of that prayer, he asks for only what he needs, nothing more. And in doing so, he teaches us something
about the nature of true faith, which son of Timaeus had before he even laid eyes upon son of David. James’ and John’s so-called faith was
grasping, greedy . . . We want you to do for us whatever we ask, they
said. And looking back on the other
healings in Mark, it's clear that the person being healed’s faith was like that
of Bartimaeus: humble, unassuming, and open
to the possibility that Jesus’ mission was something different than the run of
the mill, worldly desires of more and more and more.
And
this morning, I want to ask you all: how's your
faith? Is it open to revelation, is it
open to something new? Is it open to the possibility that God will
do a new thing, that God will give you what you need? Is it open to the
possibility that it will give us as a
congregation what we need? We are in a time of increasing age and
declining membership, and anxiety sometimes runs high. Is our faith like that of Bartimaeus, that
God will provide what we need? That,
brothers and sisters, is what Transformation 2.0 is doing: asking God humbly
and wth great faith for what we need, not necessarily for what we want. As you are increasingly asked to participate
in this bold process, keep old Son of Timaeus in mind. Amen.
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