Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, cycle B

Mark 10:56-52

Matthew and Luke also tell this story; Matthew talks about two blind men.  In Luke’s account it’s almost identical to Mark’s but he does not name the blind man.  Mark, as you may remember, was written about twenty years or more before Matthew and Luke, and some scholars think Mark’s gospel is really an account dictated by Peter because of its detail and because Peter looks bad in Mark’s gospel.  Mark does not tell the story just to amaze us once again.  He wants us to put ourselves, figuratively, in the blind man’s shoes and accompany him to Jesus.

I’ve never, thank God, been blind, but when I had the cataract removed from my right eye, I was totally conscious and could not see out of that eye because of the anesthetic.  It was frightening.  But Bartimeus, if he is like the blind people of that time, was cast off.  He depended for his living on the charity of strangers.  It’s doubtful that he had any close friends or relatives, otherwise he wouldn’t be on the street.  You can picture him sitting cross legged with his cloak folded on his lap to catch coins that were thrown to him.  He knew nothing better, expected nothing more.

Sadly, that’s true of a lot of people, Christians as well as non-Christians.  We don’t expect much.  Sure, we pray, we try to be charitable, but every day is like the day before.  

Bartimeus is not the only beggar on the road.  Since everyone was going to Jerusalem for the Passover, beggars turned out in droves because they expected that the pilgrims would be generous.  But Bartimaeus is different.  He’s restless and he has heard about Jesus.  So he does something totally out of character -- he cries out, "Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!”

Once in a while you see someone in church that you haven’t seen before -- a visitor from another town, maybe.  But I remember many years ago I saw such a person.  It was several weeks later that I met him again, because he was married to a woman who had just become a patient of mine.  I told him that I recognized him for the church, and he replied that he’d been to a lot of churches and had decided to sign up with the Vineyard church because he felt welcome there.  

The crowds following Jesus are there for many reasons.  They’ve heard him predict his death, more than once.  Some have turned away.  But crowds continue to follow, hoping that this is the Messiah, the one who will throw off the Roman yoke.  And like many of us “insiders” we are suspicious and not particularly welcoming of outsiders.  So when Bartimeus cries out, they shush him.  

Followers of Christ are of two kinds.  One kind looks for him to solve their problems, to work his miracles, to answer their needs.  But the true follower is sensitive to the cry of the poor, just like Jesus, who hears Bartimeus and demands that he be brought before him.  Notice that Jesus does not go to Bartimeus; he tells his followers to bring him before him.  And some do, some who, like Jesus, are sensitive to the cry of the poor. They say, “Take courage, get up, he is calling you.”

Now if you were a blind beggar, you would get up slowly, pick up your cloak -- because it’s probably your only possession -- and stumble along toward Jesus.  You would certainly not leave your cloak behind.  It kept you warm at night, it was a receptacle for alms, it was irreplaceable.  Not because you didn’t trust Jesus, but because that was always the way you moved about, holding the cloak in one arm and feeling your way with the other.  But Bartimeus doesn’t do that, he casts his cloak aside and leaps up, running to Jesus.  Bartimeus had a profession of sorts; he was a beggar.  Miserable as he might be he had some security, but now he enters a completely new life, not knowing what the future holds.  

When we make that leap to approach Christ, we have to leave something behind, because for every one of us there are things that are dear to us, people that we don’t want to abandon, comforts that we resort to at the end of the day.  We don’t like trouble.  At the end of the day we like things to be predictable.  Those who approach Christ will not have a comfortable and trouble-free life.  Bartimaeus gives up everything he has to receive the light of Christ.  His story ends with Jesus saying those familiar words ‘’ Go on your way, your faith has saved you.”  But Bartimeus doesn’t go on his way, he joins the crowd following Jesus.

I think Mark, or maybe Peter who told Mark what to write, insisted that Bartimeus’ name be in the account because people knew of him, a living witness to Jesus’ miracles.  And Bartimeus probably told his story over and over again -- If you want to be enlightened by Jesus, you have to choose between the old cloak and the new light.