For Sunday
Proper 25B
Collect
Almighty and everlasting God, increase in us the gifts of faith, hope, and charity; and, that we may obtain what you promise, make us love what you command; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. **
Amen.
Reading
Reflection
Finally arriving at the outskirts of Jerusalem, Jesus encounters a man who is blind, named Bartimaeus. There are some interesting things to note about this encounter, first of which is that the man is named. People healed by Jesus are almost never named in any of the gospels, but this one is. That should raise our awareness straight away. That this isn’t just a normal healing story, really.
I love the subtle little bits of tension in the narrative, like how they approach Jericho and the man shouts—which evokes the famous story of the Hebrew people bringing the city’s walls down. How the disciples’ first response to a person shouting for Jesus’s help is to shut him up—like they tried (and failed) to do with the exorcist and the people bringing children to him. And finally, when Jesus heals him, he tells the man to “go” and the man follows him.
It shouldn’t surprise us that a story like this would invite us to think more deeply than the simple notion that Jesus heals people—that this represents the work he comes to do—and that we must think more deeply about it ourselves.
If we recall the challenge for the disciples through the last few chapters of Mark has been with listening to Jesus in the midst of struggle—that Jesus has been quite clear—that they are to keep doing what they’ve been doing from the beginning. And yet, things are getting in the way. Notably, how the world sees itself, how they should evaluate “success” for Jesus, and how they ought to support the mission. That the disciples keep thinking they know better than Jesus—and they keep failing.
Meanwhile, these other people, like Bartimaeus come along, hear the mission, and go I’m going where you’re going! We are called to be more than followers—to be disciples. We also need to harness that eagerness, joy, and ability to listen, too.