While we're at it, here's the little bit that I preached this past Sunday!
http://www.lectionarypage.net/YearB_RCL/Pentecost/BProp25_RCL.html
Go, your faith has made you well. I find myself pulled in two different directions by this ever familiar exhortation. At first I am jealous or bitter of a man like Bartimaeus who found himself so close to Christ. Faith would be so easy if I could just see Jesus for myself. Of course Bartimaeus believed, he had the Son of Man right there to soothe every momentary slip or passing fear. And don’t get me started on Job! How much easier faith would come with God talking at your from a whirlwind. I would certainly not want to tread his path but who cannot feel a even a little twinge of envy knowing that Job’s suffering and his plea for answers was actually met by the Almighty.
And yet, how could they be so sure? How could they not doubt? Even Job must have had a few misgivings once the wind died down and the skies cleared; even the voice of God must lose some power as time passes and memory thins. Since Bartimaeus--like several others in the gospels--was healed because of his faith, or more accurately, by his faith, one naturally wonders: could my faith do the same? Am I strong enough in belief that Christ would not need to heal me, that my confidence in him would have already been enough? It is easy to condemn oneself as lacking when comparisons like this are readily available.
But this, as I see it, is a painful and cruel way to view the gospel story. To pretend that a life lived in faith is as easy as 'just believing’ belittles all seekers of God and their multitude of paths. Faith is not a zero-sum game--total conviction or nothing--and like anything else it takes work. It takes patience and struggle and determination. It requires a willingness to close one’s eyes and listen, even when God has not been speaking for years. I don’t pretend to know any more about what faith is than those of you gathered here--my youth would quickly betray me--but I think I have a sense of what faith is not. Faith is not simple or easy or at all straight forward. It often isn’t what you think it is and it rarely means what you think it should. Faith is not “belief” so much as it is practice.
And so we return to Bartimaeus and his self-healing faith. Bartimaeus, the blind beggar, who shouts for Jesus as he passes by on the way to Jerusalem. Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me! The great biblical scholar Marcus Borg states that faith in the early Christian context faith meant two things: loyalty and trust. He writes: “Loyalty was about commitment and allegiance--not to a set of statements but to a person. It’s opposite was not doubt, but betrayal.Trust was about who or what you trusted. It’s opposite was not intellectual doubt, but anxiety.”
It is certainly trust that leaps out from the story. Bartimaeus, as a blind man, was used to a small and insignificant lot in life. A man who could not provide for himself but through his meager beggings and was likely more used to being ignored than being seen. Bartimaeus had every reason to expect the same treatment as Jesus and his followers passed by--in fact, “many sternly ordered him to be quiet.” This could have been just another cacophonous parade passing Bartimaeus by, a spectacle that meant as little to the beggar as he did to its leader. And yet Bartimaeus, in a moment of audacity that may have even surprised himself, cried to Jesus in faith and was healed.
Though we cannot know how familiar Bartimaeus was with Jesus, it seems safe to say that we all know a bit more about Christ than he did in that moment. The blind man was not healed because he totally agreed with a codified set of beliefs; his sight did not return to him because he was totally convinced of Jesus as the messiah. He simply called out and trusted that he would be heard. What nature Bartimaeus’ faith took beforehand is uncertain but we know what came after his healing--like hundreds or even thousands of others he left what little he had behind and joined Jesus.
And so we see the example of Bartimaeus as a faithful servant in both prayer and deed. He did not know what he would receive nor could he presume he would even get a reply but he asked God for help and his eyes were opened. And when his life had been restored to him, a new life beyond what he could have hoped for, he praised the Lord and followed him.
I would be extremely surprised if Bartimaeus never wavered after that--I’m sure confusion and doubt must have appeared at least once in his life post-miracle--but I’m inclined to think that whatever challenges arose were met with the same faith that healed him, with hopeful prayer and patient trust. Though we don’t have Jesus in the flesh to affirm our faith we can, in the end, be like Bartimaeus; it just takes a bit of work.
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