ON THE WAY
A sermon preached by
Rev. Dr. Randle R. (Rick) Mixon
First Baptist Church, Palo Alto, CA
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Text: Mark 10:46-52
Today we come to the end of our journey with Jesus through the gospel of Mark. At the conclusion of chapter 10 we come to the last of Jesus’ earthly healing ministry and the final episode before he enters Jerusalem. Chapter 11 begins the passion story, for which Jesus has been trying to prepare his followers as they walked along the dusty roads from Galilee to Jerusalem. .
They have come down the west side of the Jordan to Jericho, the ancient city located some 15 miles and 3000 feet downhill from Jerusalem. The law demanded that any Jewish male within 15 miles of Jerusalem be present in the holy city for Passover, plus all of the 20,000 priests and Levites, many of whom lived in Jericho, would have been needed as well. So it is not surprising that a large crowd would be walking with Jesus as he left Jericho to make the steep ascent to Jerusalem. Also, William Barclay says that “when a distinguished Rabbi or teacher was on such a journey it was the custom that he was surrounded by a crowd of people, disciples and learners, who listened to him as he discoursed while he walked. That was one of the commonest ways of teaching” (William Barclay, The Daily Study Bible: Mark, p. 270.)
This is the setting for the story of blind Bartimaeus. Take a minute to see if you can imagine yourself in this scene. Feel the heat, smell the dust, hear the buzz of the crowd. What is it like to be in the midst of such an animated gathering? Some are excited to hear what Jesus has to say; some are skeptical; some are hostile; some – perhaps his own disciples – are anxious, fearful of what lies ahead. I don’t know about you, but being pressed into a crowd is not one of my favorite things. I think of Pride Parades or rock concerts or the year I went to Mardi Gras in New Orleans. All were good, or at least interesting experiences, but all carried a dimension of anxiety and discomfort at being closed in by a mass of humanity and jostled about. At moments it was overwhelming.
From our own urban environment, I’m sure we have images of panhandlers standing by freeway entrances and people sitting on sidewalks, begging in San Francisco or San Jose or Palo Alto. This is Bartimaeus. We probably wouldn’t know him personally but we surely have encountered him. We don’t know how Bartimaeus has lost his sight, but we know he has become a beggar in order to survive. Maybe he was doing fairly well as a day laborer, maybe he had a good position as a scribe, maybe he had been on a fast track to success when he became blind. Whoever and whatever he had been before, he now sat beside the dusty road, on the outskirts of the city, begging for alms to support his meager existence. Figuratively and literally he had been shoved to the margins and was given only distracted, passing attention by those who traveled in and out of the city. Does that sound at all familiar?
The plight of Bartimaeus reminded me of a song that Joan Baez and Ramblin’ Jack Elliot and the Grateful Dead have all covered:
Only a tramp was Lazarus that day
He who lay down by the rich man's gate
And he begged for the crumbs from the rich man to eat
But they left him to die like a tramp on the street
He was some mother's darling, he was some mother's son
Once he was fair, once he was young
Some mother she rocked him, her little darling, to sleep
But they left him to die like a tramp on the street.
(The Tramp on the Street, Grady and Hazel Cole)
Lazarus and Bartimaeus both knew what it felt like to be lonely, lost, abandoned, hungry, left out in the cold to fend for oneself in hard times and hard places. Yet both were human beings weren’t they - Mother’s sons, children of God? But who knew? Who could see? Even they didn’t really believe in their own worth anymore. It had been a long, painful road to the bottom of the heap and all they could do was hang on to existence through their begging. God forbid that you or I should ever feel that far down.
As Jesus journeyed to Jerusalem, word must have raced ahead about his healings, his exorcisms, his feeding of the crowds and other miracles, his care for the poor and outcast, his teaching about the coming Kingdom of God. This was no modern multimedia culture, so the major media would have been word of mouth. Someone must have whispered word of this itinerant teacher from Galilee as he absent-mindedly dropped a coin on the beggar’s outspread cloak. Bartimaeus clearly did not have the whole picture, but he knew something extraordinary was in the air. Passersby spoke excitedly about Jesus. Had he positioned himself that morning in anticipation of Jesus’ passing by or was he just at his usual spot at the right time? We don’t know, but there he was. He could hear the rising volume of voices, he could feel the dust swirling, he could smell the growing crowd, he could sense the mounting excitement and the crackle in the air.
“Jesus,” he heard the name and realized that this teacher, this healer he had heard about was now near. He couldn’t see exactly where. So, he began to cry out loudly in desperation, his shrill voice rising above the noise of the crowd. “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Bartimaeus cried out for compassion. He wanted Jesus to know what was like to be Bartimaeus, to get inside his skin and feel what he felt. “Jesus Christ, here I am over here. Can you see me? Can you hear me? Can you know me?” Have you ever felt like that? Have you ever cried out in your own pain and frustration, in your need and hope, in your deepest desire? “Oh Jesus, I need your compassion. Hear me, know me, help me, heal me.” I know I’ve never been as down and out as Bartimaeus, but there have been times, my friends. There have been times!
And what does the crowd do? How do the respectable people respond? What do his neighbors say to him? We’ve already considered their response. “Be quiet! Shut up! Don’t bother the teacher! Don’t spoil our good time! Don’t rain on our parade, you dirty, whining beggar!” Does that seem like overly harsh rephrasing? I don’t know. I will confess that more than once I have looked down my nose at someone in need and thanked God that I was not like her, a beggar, not like him, a sinner. Perhaps the real point of the story is that it is the judgmental, silencing crowd who should be crying out for mercy. Maybe it is the seemingly superior, seeking security in their exclusive circles, who are most in need of compassion and liberation.
Jesus response was typically unexpected. He stopped in his tracks. Maybe Bartimaeus’s cry really did pierce the noise of the crowd. Perhaps Jesus’ radar was just tuned to Bartimaeus’s frequency. “Call him here.” Was the crowd shamed by his response? Would we be? They certainly didn’t expect him to take the time to talk with a blind beggar. But that’s exactly the problem. It raises the question of who really fails to see here. How could they have been traveling with him, listening to him, watching him all this time and not know that this is exactly the kind of response he would make. Of course he’s going to reach out to the needy, to his sisters and brothers who are socially and economically judged as the least. This crowd, or at least some part of it, caught on quickly, “Take heart; get up, he is calling you.” Can you see them stand part, making a way for Bartimaeus as he jumps up, throwing aside his cloak and whatever coins are gathered on it, moving awkwardly, though steadily, toward Jesus?
“Well Bartimaeus, what do you want me to do for you?” This is the same question he asked James and John when they were jockeying for positions in glory. But there was no nonsense on the part of Bartimaeus. He minced no words in asking, “My teacher, my sight.” Already an intimacy had grown between Bartimaeus and Jesus. Just because Jesus stopped and paid attention, Bartimaeus named him “my teacher.” Something powerful transpired between these two, electricity surged through the channels of faith, a deep connection was made. Bartimaeus was already freed of his victim state, liberated from his sense of worthlessness, simply in the encounter with one who saw him, heard him, knew him and called him by name. The healing was almost secondary to the saving moments that preceded it. And Jesus knew it immediately. “Go, friend, your faith has made you well, in fact, has made you whole.”
Jesus freed him to go, but Bartimaeus would not. At least, he would not go from Jesus; he would instead go with him! For not only was his vision restored, he had seen with the eyes of his heart and in his heart he knew he must follow, not through any sense of compulsion but through the inexorable lure of divine love. “If someone sees me, hears me, knows me, helps me, heals me, loves me, why would I want to be anywhere but with that one?” Bartimaeus received his sight and he followed Jesus on the way. Kate Huey writes that “Bartimaeus didn't care what people thought, and didn't let anything deter him from reaching Jesus. For him, following Jesus wasn't just a good idea or a nice self-improvement program or the thing to do or a good habit to form. For Bartimaeus, as for so many others, trusting that Jesus cares about them and wills good for them is indeed a matter of life and death” (Kate Huey, Samuel, Pentecost +21, 2009, at i.ucc.org.) and they follow willingly on the way.
The disciples had been on the road with Jesus. It’s true that they had left all to follow him, but at this point they were following in anxiety and fear. They thought they knew what Jesus was all about but he kept surprising them and challenging them. They were on the road with him alright but they were not yet “on the way.” It is ironic to note that in Mark’s gospel the last healed, Bartimaeus, becomes the first to follow on the way. That the way will lead to the cross is of no concern to him because he has known love that will not let him go. He sees the promise of that love will last long beyond any obstacles the future may hold. All of us who profess to follow Jesus are on the road with him. We share the ancient, ongoing journey. Sometimes we even have glimpses of the way and walk it as well. Often we walk in anxiety and fear, in uncertainty and wonder even as we long, like Bartimaeus, to join Jesus faithfully and joyfully on the way - the way, the truth, the life that is characterized by compassion and salvation, even for blind beggars, yes even for the prosperous, privileged citizens who make up the crowd.
As we consider what it might mean for us truly to be on the way with Jesus, let’s close with the prayer of Alan Paton that are our Words of Preparation today:
Oh Lord,
Open my eyes that I may see the need of others;
open my ears that I may hear their cries;
open my heart so that they need not be without succor;
let me not be afraid to defend the weak
because of the anger of the strong,
nor afraid to defend the poor
because of the anger of the rich…
and so open my eyes and my ears
that I may this coming day
be able to do some work of peace for thee. Amen.