“Shushing Won’t Work!”

Mark 10:46-52

October 23 and 26, 2003

St. Paul United Methodist Church

Rev. John A. Fleming

I like the story that I remembered while I was working on our sermon for this morning. It is a story that one of my favorite Christian authors, Max Lucado, tells in a book of his that I have been reading again. In the introduction to his book, Max tells the story of Bob Edens, a man that I am sure that Max knows personally. He tells that for all fifty-one years of Bob’s life, he had not been able to see things with his eyes. For five decades and a year, Bob had not been able to physically see things. He had wondered, more than a thousand times, what particular things looked like. It happened.

It does not often happen, but in Bob’s case it did. Modern medicine caught up with Bob’s particular vision condition and a skilled surgeon performed a complicated and successful surgery. When the bandages were removed, Bob, for the first time in his life, was able to see some things. The surgery did not give him twenty-twenty vision, but it did allow him to see things that he had never seen before. I think that it would have been neat to have been there when the surgeon’s nurse first removed the bandages from Bob’s eyes. I think that it would have been fantastic to follow Bob around for the first week as Bob walked around and noticed things. If we had, then we might have heard him say to one of his friends, “I never dreamed that yellow is so, uh, well, yellow. My friends have been telling my about yellow for years, but still, I can’t believe it.” Right after that, you might have heard him say, “But red is my favorite of all the colors! I am amazed by red!” Colors, as you probably can guess, were not the only things that astounded Bob. Again, if you were around him, you might have heard him say, “I love the shape of the moon.” On my way to write this sermon, Thursday morning, a few minutes after six, I saw a great moon. You could see the roundness of it, but there was only a hint of a curve near its bottom. Can’t you just imagine what it was like when Bob first saw a sunrise and then a sunset? Those who were with him when he saw those things heard him say, “I never could have imagined such a sight such as that.” He stood still and watched as an airplane shot across the sky, leaving a vapor trail behind it. In his story, Max tells that at night, Bob would lay down on the grass and look up in the sky and look at the thousands and thousands of stars as they glistened in the night In the morning, he would sit on his patio, with a cup of coffee in his hand, and watch as the birds flittered across the sky. But of all the things that Bob said in this story of Max’s, this one seems to be the most powerful of all. To his wife, Bob said, “You could never know how wonderful everything is!”

I think that Bob is right, but those of us who have lived a lifetime with vision cannot possibly know what it is like to suddenly be given sight. If you do not mind the preacher coming out in me this morning, then let me say that Bob isn’t the only one who has spent a lifetime near something without being able to see it! We can live with someone for years with our spouses and never take the time to look into their souls. Just because you have noticed a rainbow does not necessarily mean that you have witnessed it. Here is the truth. Few are the people who do not suffer from some form of blindness. Most of you know that Helen Keller was a wonderful author. She wrote and said some remarkable things. Once she said, “The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt within the heart.” Then there is this line that I think is a nice fit for our sermon. When Helen Keller was asked if she had any regrets about not being able to see, she said, “I would rather go my entire life without my eyes, than to have my eyes and not really see the things around me.”

Which, I think, is a nice lead in to our scripture lesson for this morning. We catch up with Jesus and his disciples as they are on their way to Jerusalem. This morning they are in Jericho, a day’s walk from Jerusalem. It is typical for Mark’s gospel to have the trip in and through Jericho to last less than one verse. Jesus clicks along at a pretty good pace in Mark’s gospel. Do you remember me once telling you that if Jesus ever sat down in this gospel, Mark never recorded it?

Jesus and the twelve were in and out of Jericho in no time, but as they were leaving the city, out there on the outskirts of town, begging others to help him in one way or another, was Bartimaeus. Mark tells us that Bartimaeus is Timaeus’ son. The truth is that this man does not have a real name. In the language of his day, Bartimaeus literally means son of Timaeus. Often, that is how it is with people without eyes or resources. You have seen people, haven’t you, at the foot of I-630 and University with a sign up asking for help. Don’t you hope that the light quickly changes so that you won’t have to make eye contact or to say no when asked for help. Maybe it was that way for Timaeus’ boy. Mark also tells us that Bartimaeus was both blind and a beggar. In his day, he would have to have been. Mark does not tell us where Timaeus is and in a world where a man’s living was made by physical labor and in a world where there were no social services in place, Bartimaeus had to rely on others to help him. On the ground near him was his cloak, which Bartimaeus used as a makeshift collection plate. As the coins were dropped on it, he might say something like this, “Thank you kind sir.” Or when he sensed that they were near, he might ask, “Could you help me today, please?”

So Jesus and his disciples and you would have to say the crowd, too, were all on their way out of town, on their way to the next town, Jerusalem, when they passed by Bartimaeus. There was the chance that someone had failed to take care of Timaeus’ boy. Often, when a honored guest came to town, someone would take someone like Bartimaeus home for the evening, for a good night’s rest and a hot meal. Because, after all, you would not want someone like Jesus to see him. But that did not happen, for some reason, and so when Bartimaeus heard the commotion as Jesus and his followers made their way toward him, he called out as loud as he could, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” Can’t you just imagine that someone went over to him and tried to shush him. He won’t be quiet! In fact, Timaeus’ boy is being down right obnoxious in his calling out to Jesus. You can understand why they want him to be quiet, can’t you? After all, if he is making all this noise, it might make Jesus notice him and not one of them. Someone from Jericho tries their best to get him to be quiet, but Bartimaeus will not oblige.

I want you to see what happens next. I want to point it out to you because I think that it is easy to miss. Mark says this of Jesus, “Jesus stood still.” What that means is that he stopped in his tracks. It might mean that he leaned forward and suddenly stopped. He stopped the way that he stopped as he and the disciples and a crowd stopped just five chapters back in this gospel. They were all on their way to Jarius’ house to see about his very ill daughter, when a woman reached for Jesus’ robe and touched it. Jesus stopped in his tracks then, too. He sensed that a healing had happened and he wanted to know whose faith reached for him. So he stopped in his tracks and he said, “Call him here.” Now friends, this is a miracle story in every sense of that word. It follows the pattern of other miracle stories. The pattern is this. There is a problem. Bartimaeus is not able to use his eyes. There is a solution. Jesus restored his sight. And there is evidence of the miracle. Mark says that Bartimaeus immediately regained his sight. It is that pattern, sure, but it is different, because Bartimaeus, during this entire scene, remains the main character. Usually in healing stories, Jesus is the main character. And then there is this. Typically a healing takes several verses to complete. But not in this story. This healing is less than a verse long. There is something different going on here. Did you notice it? Look carefully at the forty-ninth verse. Three times in two sentences, some form of the word “call” is used. “Call him here.” Jesus said. And they called the blind man, saying to him, “Take heart; get up, he is calling you.” Could it be, could it possibly be that this is more than a miracle story. Could it be that there’s something more going on here?

Those who know him call out to him and say to him, “Take heart...” Well that seems a little unnecessary to me. I think that his heart has already gone out to the one he knows will heal him. I would have liked to have seen the wild eagerness that went through him. I would have liked to have seen his body as it tried to catch up with his voice and his heart. We have had a picture of this man, sitting by the side of the road. It is a heartbreaking picture. Now, here is another picture of him, jumping to his feet to get near Jesus. Mark tells us, without using the words, that this man had faith. Did you notice what he did with his cloak, his make-shift collection plate? He threw it off, as if to say, “I won’t be needing you anymore! So he sprang up and came to Jesus. When he was there, Jesus asked him what seems to me to be a ridiculous question. Jesus asks, “What do you want me to do for you?” By the way, have you heard that question lately, maybe here, last week, sitting in your seat. In the story right before this one, James and John, walked ahead of the other disciples and whispered, “Jesus we want you to do something for us.” Jesus asked them, do you remember it, “What do you want me to do for you?” James and John ask for positions, on his left hand and on his right hand, in Jesus’ glory. In Bartimaeus’ case, it just kind of seems like a silly question to me. If I were Bartimaeus, I might have said, “Jesus, did you see me over there. I cannot see. I have to beg for my food! What do I want you to do for me, I want you to let me see again!” It seems kind of obvious to me, does it to you? But maybe this is it, maybe it is not so silly. Bartimaeus wanted to be able to see. But what about us? What if we were standing in front of Jesus and he asked us, “What do you want me to do for you?” How would we answer that. Maybe Jesus would say, “Well, it seems obvious to me what you need. I am not so sure that it is obvious to you yet.” “My teacher, Bartimaeus says, I want to see again.” And Jesus opens his eyes.

Well, we have to wonder here who is really blind here and who can actually see. Which, I think, is Mark’s main point. Mark has a way of framing things. In the eighth, ninth, and ten chapters, Jesus talks about what it means to follow him all the way to Jerusalem. He begins it with the story of the healing of man who was blind. He ends the story with the story of another man who was blind. There is spiritual blindness all around Jesus, but it is Bartimaeus who wants to see. There are disciples who see position. There are religious leaders waiting for him in Jerusalem who see Jesus as a threat to their authority.

Well, we cannot leave without me pointing this out to you. Bartimaeus receives his sight and then he does something with it. Do you remember what he did? Mark tells us that Bartimaeus followed Jesus on the way. Which means, on the way to Jerusalem. There would be little time for this new disciple to enjoy the approving crowds or the balmy days of resting at Jesus’ feet as he talked about important things. But still he followed and so we must follow, too.

I started our sermon with a story about the restoration of sight of one man. Let me close with another one. It is the story of a man who made his way to a group of Christian missionaries who happened to have a physician or two among them. The man was with the missionaries for some time and again, a remarkable thing happened, he regained his sight. In a few days, the man bid farewell to the doctor and these missionaries. They thought that they would never see again. They never expected to see him again. But in a few weeks he returned, but not alone. This time linked together with their hands, the man brought five more people to the place where he had

found healing. Isn’t that what we are supposed to do? This is a story not about healing but about following and a story about faith and being able to see things that we didn’t see before and a point of looking at things because of a relationship that we’re in. My hope is that you will follow Jesus, on the way, closely enough to let others know about how much you love him. Let us pray.

(Special thanks to Max Lucado and his writings for the opening story in this sermon. Special thanks to Helen Keller, for the courage that she had in her life and for her inspirational writings).