(Note:
This blog entry is based on the text for “On Wilshire”, originally shared on October
21, 2021. It was the 159th video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of
Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)
Is it possible to not see but to see at the same time? Can we live on our streets and follow Jesus on the way? Today, we’re going to find out.
In the run-up to the
one-half of a Bible verse we are going to look at today, Jesus and his
disciples visit the city of Jericho. On their way out, a blind beggar named
Bartimaeus calls out to Jesus, begging for mercy.
People ordered him to
tone it down, but he calls out all the more. Wouldn’t you? Bartimaeus implores
Jesus to heal him, and Jesus, in Mark 10:52a, says, “Go; your faith has
made you well.” And then we come to the other half of the verse, Mark 10:52b,
Immediately he
regained his sight and followed him on the way.
I was in town the other
day, standing on Wilshire Boulevard, one of the main
East-West thoroughfares through the City of Los Angeles. It goes from downtown
LA for almost 16 miles to Ocean Avenue in Santa Monica. I was about 2/3 of the
way from the Financial District to the ocean, near the Sassoon Salon and across
the street from Saks Fifth Avenue in Beverly Hills.
Along
the way, are some of LA’s most densely populated districts, the Miracle Mile,
Park Mile, and Millionaire’s Mile, as well as world-class museums, commercial
buildings, and the Fox and MGM studios.
Mark
10:52b ends by telling us that when Jesus healed Bartimaeus, Bartimaeus,
followed him on the way.
Bartimaeus became a
follower of Jesus. Why? Well, yes, Captain Obvious, I’m sure that was a big
part of it.
But, with all of the
possibilities that being healed opened up to Bartimaeus, from work to family to
travel, why follow Jesus?
I think that the answer
lies not in his healing but in his faith.
Wilshire is one of the major “ways” across Los Angeles and tracking its
large buildings, its historic districts and its cultural centers is one way to measure
its importance.
But another
is to consider the people in this urban landscape. Think of the racial,
economic, and cultural diversity. The variety of aspirations, generations, and
desperations along this way. Think of the people who live together here, work together
here, study together here, and eat together here. And think of the people who
prey on others, who slide their shopping carts, and who sit crumbled with their
hands out along this way.
Jesus
is present on every corner and in every block. And he is knocking on the door
of every heart.
Bartimaeus called out in faith for mercy and Jesus made him see again.
And when Bartimaeus followed him on the way, it was to the people in the
streets, and workplaces, and housing that Jesus encountered on the way.
This
is the way we come to faith. It is the gift of a relationship. Jesus said, preparing
his disciples for his death,
John 14:4-6,
4 And
you know the way to the place where I am going. 5 Thomas
said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the
way?” 6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the
truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Christianity was not generally known as “Christianity” for its first
three generations. Some Jewish Christians called themselves “The Way” during
this time.
People
were first called “Christians”, which means, followers of Jesus Christ, in
Antioch, the third most important city in the Roman Empire, now in Turkey.
We
read in Acts 11:26-27,
25 Then
Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul, 26 and
when he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. So it was that for an entire
year they met with the church and taught a great many people, and it was
in Antioch that the disciples were first called “Christians.”
Jesus’ disciples followed him on the way to
Jerusalem, and when at least one of those out-of-towners, got to the big city,
he did what most people from other kinds of areas do. We see it in Mark 13:1,
As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples
said to him, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!”
Yet,
Jesus said, they are transitory, in Mark 13:2,
2 Then Jesus asked
him, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon
another; all will be thrown down.”
Things
are temporary. Buildings are temporary. Jesus is God. The way of Jesus went to
the cross, and when they got there, every one of the 12 left him and all but
his mother and a few others abandoned him. Yet he followed that way to the end.
Jesus gave his life to redeem all who receive him, as he gave sight to Bartimaeus.
God’s grace is a miracle. God’s greatest miracle is the cross.
Bartimaeus saw Jesus before he regained his sight. He saw Jesus because
he had received another miracle, the miracle of the gift of faith in the one
true living God. There’s a difference between sight and insight.
A
former American president told a story that favored his party, so I’m just
going to tell the non-partisan version. Once, there were two political parties,
the Hittites and the Amorites, and they held their national conventions in the
same location, just a few weeks apart.
The Amorites
were up first and every day, as the proceedings finished and crowds were
streaming out of the convention center, a little boy stood there selling a
litter of puppies. “Amorite puppies, $1,” he yelled. He sold some, but had some
left over, so when the Hittite convention came to town, he was there.
Every
day, as the proceedings finished and crowds were streaming out, the little boy
stood there yelling, “Hittite puppies, $1.”
A
reporter who was covering both conventions, and had seen the boy earlier,
approached him and asked, “Hey kid. Aren’t you the same kid who was selling
puppies at the Amorite convention?”
“Yes.”
“And
aren’t these the same puppies?”
“Yes.”
“So,
how come they were Amorite puppies then, and now they’re Hittite puppies?”
“Well,” the boy said, “now their eyes are opened.”
Bartimaeus’s eyes were
opened but faith did not heal Bartimaeus. Faith in faith is idolatry and
ignorance, and we hear it promoted as something like positive thinking all the
time. Faith isn’t a feeling or positive thought, or a groundless belief.
Faith is an expression of
a living relationship with the one true living God.
Bartimaeus first
indicates his faith by addressing Jesus as God. He believed that Jesus could
show him mercy and heal him, and when he is told that Jesus is calling for him,
he jumps up and turns to Jesus. He first recognizes Jesus for who Jesus is
because he already had that relationship of faith. Faith didn’t mechanically heal
Bartimaeus. Jesus did.
Bartimaeus was one of
those who are invisible to the world but is seen by Jesus and is healed.
Bartimaeus had already
been following Jesus in faith. When he is healed, he sees with his eyes what he
has already seen with his heart.
Jesus, in his miracles,
points backwards to God’s Creation, before our rebellion messed it up, and
forward to the restoration of all things where, as we read in the Bible’s last
book, Revelation 21:3-4,
3 And I heard a loud voice from the
throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals.
He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be
with them;
4 he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be
no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things
have passed away.”
On Wilshire, what do you
see? A major thruway from downtown to the ocean in one of the world’s great
cities? A main artery through its heart, carrying traffic, its life’s blood
here and there? It’s people, seeking a way through?
How many stories are
being told today along that corridor? How many lives are rich and successful
and healthy and know no need of God? How many lives are broken and collapsed
and lost and no one who is walking by sees the people who are living them?
Jesus walks these streets
today. God dwells within us.
How many of us who can
see normally today can’t see that?
Open your heart and
receive the living presence of the living God. Allow the Holy Spirit, the
streams of living water described throughout the Bible, to dwell within you and
give you the eyes to see God.
Tell your story of grace
and salvation. How did you become a Christian, a person in a living
relationship of faith with the one true living God, and why do you remain one?
Or, open your heart to
God and start your story today.
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