"jesus Is Lord" Still Is A Revolutionary Affirmation

Thirtieth Sunday in Course 2024

Today’s Scripture lessons lead up well to what I believe is one of the three most important sentences in Mark’s Gospel. Two that immediately come to mind are at the beginning of the work, when Mark states his intention to prove that Jesus is the Son of God, and the scene at the foot of Christ’s cross, when the supervising centurion, official representative of Rome, declared that surely this man is the Son of God.

But the third statement today is loudly proclaimed by one of the dregs of Jewish society, a blind beggar who, unlike almost all seeking the help of Jesus, is named by Mark. He was sitting by the roadside. He is Bartimaeus, son of Timaeus (remember that the Hebrew “bar” means son of). He heard that Jesus was passing and he “began to cry out and say, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’” Rebuked by the many around him, he said it more loudly: "Son of David, have mercy on me!"

Jesus, we all know, was always brimming with compassion. He stopped in His tracks, and that made the whole retinue come to an abrupt halt. “Call him over,” Jesus commanded. Now the crowd changed its tune. "Take heart; rise, he is calling you." So, the blind man threw off his mantle, which had probably covered him for years, jumped up (his muscles worked, even if his eyes did not), and came to Jesus. The Lord said, “what do you want” and added “me to do for you?” “Master, I want to see!” Jesus told him, "Go your way; your faith has made you well." He opened his eyes to light, saw everything around him, and then made Christ’s way his own way by following Him.

This is every Christian’s story, is it not? We hear about Jesus, we ask Him for mercy, and He encounters us. What we all need is to see—to see a meaning for our lives, to see a way out of existential despair, to see hope for something after our death. Jesus gives us all that, doesn’t He?

But in attaining the status of Christ-follower, we must put aside the vain searches we were making before the encounter. Without Jesus, our life is focused on the material, on the self. We pursue wealth, pleasure, status, power. None of those are permanent. All of them leave us empty of real life. We must hold Jesus Christ as the most important person in our lives, because only He can heal us and guide us. We must call Him Lord of our lives. The only Lord, the High Priest whose offering of Himself on the cross led to a glorious Resurrection, not only for Himself but for all who believe and allow their faith to make us well. Only Jesus, the Lord, has the power and will to bring all His people “from the north country, and gather them from the farthest parts of the earth, among them the blind and the lame, the woman with child and her who is in travail, together; a great company,” coming to redemption and eternal life. All proclaiming the ancient hymn “Jesus Christ is Lord.”

St. Paul, in his great letter to the church at Philippi, quoted that hymn. It says that Jesus, Son of God, was by nature divine, but put that aside, emptying Himself of divine glory to descend to us, making Himself like a slave, lowest of humans, in total humility. He gave Himself up to the death of a slave, crucifixion, earning then by God’s power the highest place with a name above all others. So that His name, Jesus, should call everyone, humans, angels, even those in the nether world, to bend their knees and proclaim for God’s glory that Jesus Christ is Lord.

That statement of faith would have been a revolutionary act in the first-century Roman empire. Why? Because the statement of loyalty demanded of every Roman—citizen or not—would have been “Caesar is Lord.” The Emperor is in control, sovereign ruler, even himself divine. To declare anyone else, especially a crucified convict like Jesus the Nazarene, to be “Lord” would have been an act of treason punishable by death. But the Christians did it all the time, and joyfully paid any price to have that freedom.

St. Paul, again in his first letter to Corinth, as he was discussing discernment of spirits, wrote “Therefore I want you to know that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, ‘Jesus be cursed,’ and no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit.

Almost every Christian, at least in the United States, has heard of one of the presidential candidates, praising the right of women to have their unborn children killed, was confronted by a Christian yelling “Jesus is Lord.” We cannot make light of this candidate’s response, “"Oh, you guys are at the wrong rally.” [The audience erupted in cheers and laughter] then affirmed, “No, I think you meant to go to the smaller one down the street."