Cheer Up! On Your Feet! He’s Calling You
Mark 10:46-52
In our Gospel Lesson for this morning, Jesus and His disciples, together with a large crowd are on their way to Jerusalem where Jesus will be arrested, mocked and put to death.
The disciples and the crowd have no idea that this is what they are headed.
They think Jesus is going to Jerusalem to conquer the Roman occupiers and set up His earthly Messianic Kingdom.
And they are excited, they want to get there quickly.
They can’t wait for Jesus to blast the Romans to kingdom come.
They can’t wait to be on the winning side.
And then, this annoying blind beggar starts calling for Jesus: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”
Doesn’t he know they have more important things to do than to waste time with an indigent man on the side of the road?
We are told that many of the disciples and people in the crowd “rebuked him”…in other words, they told him to “Shut up!”
But this guy, Bartimaeus wasn’t having any of it.
He just shouted even more.
Does it trouble you that the people following Jesus are trying to stop a person who is crying out for Jesus?
A few years ago, at the last church I served, a young high school age female started coming to our church.
She didn’t come with her family.
She just showed up.
When I asked her what brought her to our church she told me that she had grown up in the church down the street.
But recently, she told the Youth Director that she is gay.
The Youth Director told her to “go find Jesus somewhere else!”
And so, she did.
I had to give her a lot of credit for not giving up on the church altogether after having experienced that kind of treatment.
Sometimes, we who follow Jesus can make it difficult for others to get close to Him.
That seems to be what was happening in our Gospel Lesson for this morning.
But then, Jesus heard Bartimaeus shouting and He stopped in His tracks.
At that moment, nothing was more pressing to Jesus than attending to the blind man on the side of the road who was crying for mercy.
And so, Jesus told His followers to “Call” Bartimaeus.
And in that moment, the crowd is transformed.
They are no longer telling Bartimaeus to “be quite.”
As a matter of fact, their excitement is downright palpable: “Cheer up!,” they say to him, “On your feet! He’s calling you.”
And in this scene we see our job as Christ-followers.
Our job is to seek out those who do not know the love of Christ.
Those who have, perhaps, been hurt by the Church…
…or those who are poor and, on the margins, feeling as if no one cares for them…
…those who are lost…
…hopeless…
…feeling defeated by life…
We are to run to them saying: “Cheer up! On your feet! Jesus is calling you!”
And we do this by inviting people to sit with us at church.
Handing out the new invitation cards that proclaim that this Church is “A Safe Place for All.”
We do this by loving people that so many ignore.
(Pause)
I read that when Andrew Young was the Mayor of Atlanta, he was deeply disturbed by the number of homeless people on the streets and the city’s apparent inability to address the issue.
He told his staff that he wanted to better understand those who lived in the streets, the roots of their problems, and the city’s inadequate response.
So he decided he was going to put on old clothes and be with the homeless for three days and two nights.
His staff reacted a lot like Jesus’ followers when Bartimaeus was first calling for attention:
“Mayor, you are too busy,” they said.
“We need you in the office.”
Naysayers warned him, “Everyone knows you and you’ll be recognized, so you’ll learn nothing.”
He went anyway.
He walked, he talked, listened and learned.
When he returned his staff asked, “Well, what have you to teach us?”
Mayor Young’s reply was: “No one recognized me.”
No one looks into the eyes of the poor.
As mayor of a major American City, Young was on the evening news; he was a frequent speaker at political events, civic meetings, and churches.
“But this was different,” he explained.
“No one looks into the faces of the homeless.
There is no encounter.
We simply do not see the person.
We are blind to their humanity.
So it is with the hungry, the hurting, the hopeless, the jobless,” he concluded.
As Jesus spoke with and focused all His attention on Bartimaeus, I wonder if the listening crowd began to recognize their own blindness.
Bartimaeus was physically blind and his disability kept him poor.
But the crowd had been blind to Bartimaeus…
…blind to his importance as a person created in the image of God…
…blind to the fact that he was human just like them, and no less important.
It’s interesting that Jesus asked Bartimaeus, “What do you want me to do for you?”
Do you suppose that those listening thought to themselves, “Duh, Jesus.
What do You think He wants?
He wants You to give him some money”?
But Jesus doesn’t assume to know what Bartimaeus wants.
So, He asks him.
I told some of you this story already.
A few months ago, a man came to the church asking us to fill-up his gas tank.
I told him I would meet him across the street at the Exxon, but because he has a bad leg and had parked in the Lutheran Church’s parking lot it took him a while to get there.
In the meantime, I was standing in front of the gas pumps waiting for him.
A man drove up and pulled into the space ahead of me.
As soon as he got out of the car, he said, “Don’t even bother to ask. I’m not giving you any money!”
I thought it was funny, but it also gave me a very small taste of what it feels to be someone like poor Bartimaeus.
So, Jesus didn’t assume to know what Bartimaeus was going wanted.
And it’s interesting what Jesus says to Bartimaeus because if you remember from last week’s lesson, James and John came to Jesus and said to Him, “We want you to do whatever we ask.”
To that, “Jesus asked them, “What do you want me to do for you?”
And even though James and John were trying to talk Jesus into allowing them to sit on His right and His left in His glory, Jesus listened and took them seriously.
I think this is how Jesus responds to all of our requests.
He may not always give us what we want, but He listens.
He takes us seriously.
He doesn’t ignore us.
Our prayers are not in vain.
There is, however, one prayer—when prayed earnestly, that Jesus does answer every time.
That is the prayer of repentance and the request for mercy and salvation.
It is the reason Christ came to this earth.
It is the reason He gave Himself up to die.
“For God so loved the world…”
So, Jesus treats Bartimaeus in the same way He treats any person for He loves us all the same.
Jesus stops, calls Bartimaeus to him, asks him what he wants and listens to him.
“Rabbi, I want to see,” Bartimaeus says.
When we take time to listen to the poor, instead of assuming the worst, we might hear surprising things.
Things like, “We need public transportation, a way to get to work or the grocery store.”
“I need daycare for my child so I can get my degree.”
“I need a low-interest loan.”
These aren’t requests for handouts.
They are requests for empowerment, for mercy, for a chance.
The people following Jesus had been blind to Bartimaeus—spiritually blind.
So when Jesus works His miracle on Bartimaeus, it’s also a miracle for the crowd and for us as well.
Not only does Jesus empower Bartimaeus to live a new life, He gives the crowd and us new eyes and new lives as well.
“Your faith has healed you,” Jesus said to Bartimaeus.
What do we see when we open our eyes of faith?
Do we see Jesus at work in the world?
Do we see Jesus in the faces of the homeless, the prisoners, the physically and spiritually destitute, the outcastes and the hungry?
In the scene of the last Judgment in Matthew Chapter 25, some of the people don’t recognize Jesus.
They said, “Lord, when did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and not help you?”
They were more blind than Bartimaeus.
And if truth be told, there are many times that I am just as blind.
There are many times that Jesus has walked right by me and I’ve missed Him completely…
…or ignored Him…
…or told Him to be quiet.
And, if truth be told, we all have.
Don’t you remember?
We all need to cry out with Bartimaeus, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”
And when Jesus asks what He wants Him to do for us…
…well, we all need to see, do we not?
Amen.
