What Do You Want Me To Do For You?
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Mark 10:46-52
Rev. Brian North – Westminster Presbyterian Chehalis, WA
July 18th, 2010
We’re in a series of sermons this summer called, “Potopourri.” It’s an applicable sermon series title on a number of fronts. For one, there are different people preaching throughout the summer – it’s a potpourri of preachers; our worship order and style is different every Sunday – it’s a potpourri of worship; lastly, the Scripture passages from Sunday to Sunday are not necessarily connected to each other – we’re not going through a particular book or going through a series under a united theme – so it’s a potpourri of Scripture and topics. And in the midst of this potpourri, I trust that the Lord will bring a word to each of us each Sunday that meets us right where we are.
This morning’s sermon is a preview of our first sermon series this fall. We’ll kick off the fall with a series that’s going to be titled something like, “Back to School with Jesus.” And like all good teachers, Jesus doesn’t just give answers, he asks a lot of questions. Isn’t that what a good teacher does? We have a number of current and former teachers in our congregation…you all know that a teacher doesn’t just dispense information, but asks questions and gets students thinking. And so in that series we’ll be looking at some of the questions Jesus asked. This morning we’re looking at a question Jesus asked – one we won’t look at in the series later on – and will give you a preview of what’s to come this fall. With that, I invite you to listen or to also follow along in your Bibles or in the pew Bibles as Jean reads God’s Word to you and me from Mark 10:46-52…
46 They came to Jericho. As he and his disciples and a large crowd were leaving Jericho, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus, a blind beggar, was sitting by the roadside. 47When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ 48Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ 49Jesus stood still and said, ‘Call him here.’ And they called the blind man, saying to him, ‘Take heart; get up, he is calling you.’ 50So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus. 51Then Jesus said to him, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ The blind man said to him, ‘My teacher, let me see again.’ 52Jesus said to him, ‘Go; your faith has made you well.’ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.
It’s not very often that we have the opportunity to answer a question where the answer we give can have a major impact on the course of our life. When you think about it, most of the questions we’re asked each day, or even less frequently, don’t have answers that dramatically impact our lives, largely because usually answering these questions doesn’t take much faith. In fact, as I prepared this sermon, I could only come up with one question that I thought qualified for the ideal set by Jesus’ question this morning, in terms of the faith it would take to answer it. And that question is, “Will you marry me?” Other major questions we face really aren’t so important, so life-changing, or so dependent on faith to answer.
For instance, the question of which job to take can certainly be a big one, but that is changed relatively easily if it doesn’t work out. The question of where you’re going to live is a big one, but even the answer to that question is likely to be influenced by answers to other questions – such as where you work, where your closest friends live, what you can afford, and so on. Most of the questions we face each day are even more routine still: Cheerios or Lucky Charms? (Cheerios) Costco or Sam’s Club? (Costco) Snooze button or not? (Snooze – but only once or twice.) Country or Rock? (Rock) Paper or plastic? (plastic) UW or WSU? (Actually, that’s almost as important as “will you marry me? And the answer of course, is? [Congregation answers randomly.]) Every question we face has at least two possible answers, and the choice is ours to make. But far and away, in most instances, the answers to the questions we face do not have a significant bearing upon our lives, and do not require great faith to answer them. That doesn’t mean they aren’t important at that moment in time, but simply that in the grand scheme of life, they aren’t too significant.
But this morning’s question of Jesus’ to the blind man, Bartimaeus, is a question that ranks as one to which the answer has the power to alter one’s life. If you don’t agree then I suggest you read the text again, because Bartimaeus certainly would agree with me. The question that Jesus asks, “What do you want me to do for you?” (Mark 10:51) is a question that gets to the heart of our faith. It certainly got to the heart of Bartimaeus.
Here’s this blind man, sitting on the side of the road, begging for money. He probably sits there or at a place just like it, most every day. As a person who can’t see, he’s cast out from society, he’s an untouchable, he’s a nobody. Society has written him off as someone who has nothing to contribute and who according to their culture, probably isn’t worth the cost of the clothes he’s wearing. So, each day he finds a place to sit where he hopes that a few people will have compassion and put a couple of pennies into his worn-out Starbuck’s cup.
And so one day, as he’s sitting in his personal darkness in the middle of the day, he hears a crowd approaching. Being dependent on his other four senses, he’s acutely aware that this is not a normal sized group of people approaching. It’s much larger than would normally pass by. Perhaps this is Jesus walking by me! Maybe I can call out to him and get his attention! He cries out: “Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me!” (Mark 10:47). In spite of the opposition from the crowd as they try to shut him up, he calls out even louder, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”
Suddenly, the crowd stops moving, because Jesus has stopped. He asks the crowd to call the man. It’s kind of ironic how this works. All of the sudden the crowd, which thought it had authority over this socially discounted man, is now under the authority of Jesus. When Jesus speaks, people listen. And so they’re suddenly encouraging the man, “Cheer up! On your feet! He’s calling you!” (As if they had never tried to discourage him in the first place.) That’s the kind of change that Jesus speaking into your life can have. Just a word, or a phrase, and if you’re listening for his voice, hear it, and receive it, you can turn around 180 degrees, just as this crowd has. But the best is yet to come.
Bartimaeus jumps up and goes to Jesus. He may not be able to lift his eyes up to the hills, but he does know from where his help comes. How did he know where Jesus was? I don’t know. The Bible doesn’t tell us. Probably, he was helped along by the suddenly amiable crowd. And there he stands, face to face, toe to toe, with Jesus. And then comes the question. It’s the question he’s dreamed of hearing: “What do you want me to do for you?”
You see, Bartimaeus must have heard of this man Jesus. He almost certainly heard of the miracles he performed, maybe heard the rumors that Jesus just might be the long-expected Messiah. And probably deep inside, he had hoped that maybe, just maybe, their paths would cross and Jesus would be able to help him in some small way. He might have heard that Jesus had come to town a day or two ago and would be on his way to the next town soon. Bartimaeus must have felt that this may be his one opportunity to see Jesus. But as an outcast, it would be nearly impossible to get anywhere near him. So he picked a spot that morning on the road that exits town, where he thought Jesus just might walk by.
Or, maybe none of that happened, and simply by the miraculous grace of God he was in the right place at the right time. I suspect he knew Jesus was there. I suspect he knew where to go to meet Jesus, just as we’re here to meet with Jesus right now. Either way, here Bartimaeus is, just as we are, with Jesus standing in front of him, face to face, with his question lingering in the air. “What do you want me to do for you?”
The question has to pierce right to his heart. He’s hoped for this opportunity for so long; but does he now have the courage to say what he’s only dreamed of saying? He could just ask for a few coins to be thrown into his cup. I’m sure Jesus would have done it. Bartimaeus is sure Jesus could do it. But it’s not the cup that he wants filled. He could have asked for a meal, like a burger from McDonald’s or a burrito from the local Judeo-Mexican food place. But it’s not his stomach that he wants filled. His faith is bigger than that. He’s got a faith in Jesus that says he could produce a hundred burgers, or fill a hundred of those cups, let alone the solitary one he probably just left behind with his cloak on the ground, spilling his coins as he jumped up to come to Jesus. No, his faith is bigger than a cup.
“Rabbi, [he says] I want to see.” Jesus responds, “Go, your faith has healed you” (Mark 10:51, 52). And immediately, for the first time in years, he was able to look into the face of another human being, to see a friend, to look into the eyes of God, to see eyes filled with compassion and love, and to know that he was valued as a human being. For the first time since perhaps he was an infant, or perhaps ever – who knows how long it had been – he was able to look into the eyes of a person who had compassion on him as he said “Thank you. Thank you for having mercy upon me.”
With his response, with that simple reply expressed in faith, he opened the door to have his life changed forever. The question was asked, and he answered boldly, in faith. He came to Jesus, not with a cup, but with his whole self. He took the risk, and answered. He stepped off the edge, and was lifted up. He had faith.
How much faith did he really have? Who knows? How can we really measure faith? Maybe in his heart he was like the man a chapter earlier who, in asking Jesus to help his son, said, “I believe, help me overcome my unbelief” (Mark 9:24). Those are words that many of us can identify with. Maybe that’s where your faith is today. Maybe your faith is one that waffles between belief and unbelief. We don’t all have a faith as big as Bartimaeus’ faith. Maybe your faith is equivalent to the size of a mustard seed. But even that, Jesus says, is faith enough to move mountains. What matters is having enough faith to come to Jesus.
When Bartimaeus stood there face to face with Jesus, with Jesus’ question hanging in the air and the crowd surrounding them, he had enough faith to dare to answer the question with the answer that to most would seem impossible. “Rabbi, I want to see.” And indeed, we find that for those who have faith, all things are possible.
How would you answer his question if Jesus were standing in front of you right now? Would you ask him to fill your cup, your bank account, with money? Would you ask for your stomach to be filled up? Would you ask him for a new car? Would you ask him for wisdom? Would you ask him to heal you? Would you ask him to use you for his purposes? What you ask him to do is between you and Jesus. Nothing is too small or too big for Jesus to do.
I once heard a sermon from John Ortberg that he began with an old saying that goes like this: “If you bring God a thimble, he’ll probably fill it. If you bring God a bucket he’ll probably fill it.” If you ask God for a little comfort, a little peace, a small blessing, he’ll probably do it. But if you ask God to stretch you past your capabilities, to use you beyond your wildest dreams, to heal your deepest wounds, to let you see with new eyes, he’ll probably do it. It takes stepping out and trusting him. It takes faith.
What are you bringing to God, and do you believe that he’ll fill it? Are you bringing him a thimble? Or are you bringing him a bucket? Right now this morning, he’s asking us, “What do you want me to do for you?” Bartimaeus would tell us to go for the bucket.
I mentioned at the beginning of the sermon that the only question I could come up with that some people face today and was even close to the impact of Jesus’ question is, “Will you marry me?” I know that isn’t exactly an everyday question (at least I hope it’s not). The reason I think that question stands out from all others is that faith plays a much greater role in answering it than in answering other questions. Actually, from personal experience, I can say it takes faith to ask it, too!
My wife (Gwen) and I met in Sun Valley, Idaho, where we were both living at the time. We were both graduated from college. She had a real job, and probably because I graduated from the UW…I was a ski-bum. After about 10 months of friendship, we began dating. And after we had been dating a week, I wanted to ask her to marry me. It took me six more months to get up the faith and courage to do it, however. When I did propose to her, it was on the very top of the ski mountain, just after we’d had lunch. It was just two days prior to her birthday, and we were sitting in the snow, getting our pictures taken by a mountain photographer, supposedly for Gwen’s birthday as my gift to her. While the photographer was still there, I popped the question, with ring in hand. It was the only time I’ve ever managed to surprise Gwen in a significant way.
At that instant, Gwen had a choice to make: Do I wait to respond and take some time to think about this, or do I respond now? If I do respond now, do I say, “Yes!” or do I say, “No!”? Fortunately, she didn’t leave me waiting long for a response, and said, “Yes!” Undoubtedly it helped that she was staring at a really sweet ring, which I bought with money earned and saved from delivering newspapers as a kid.
Of course, soon after she answered, we still had to ski on down the hill. We were at the top of the 9,000 foot Baldy, and the valley lay more than 3,000 vertical feet below us. A word of advice to any of you who are considering getting engaged, or pass this along to people you know who are considering: Don’t propose in a place where your new fiancée will have to put her life in any kind of a dangerous situation immediately after becoming engaged. You just don’t know how the other person is going to physiologically react. For instance, when you’ve just promised to get married, skiing is not safe for anyone on the hill. Gwen is a very good skier; But you would not have known it if you saw her on what ended up being our last run as she skied in the biggest snowplow I’d ever seen and stopped every 50 feet to catch her breath for fear of hyperventilating and passing out.
Anyway, that’s an aside. The point is: When she said “yes,” Gwen asked God to fill a bucket. (Actually, I’d say she asked God to fill a really big dump truck.) It took faith for her to answer yes. It took faith for me to ask the question. And it took a bucket of faith for Bartimaeus to tell Jesus that he wanted to see.
Where is your faith right now? What are you bringing to God? What are you giving over to God? Are you trusting him for your health, your wealth, your time, your energy, your mind, and your soul? Are you leaving your cup and your cloak and in faith, coming to Jesus?
We are all here this morning in some way, either large or small, because of faith. It takes faith to come to a worship service on Sunday morning – especially if you’re a guest or if you haven’t been in church in a long time or ever. Some of you might not even be because of your own faith – maybe it was someone else who brought you here! So we come in faith. And like Bartimaeus, Jesus is asking us, “What do you want me to do for you?” We’re here offering ourselves to him, seeking his grace and love in our lives, asking him to touch us in profound, new, and beautiful ways. It takes faith to come to Jesus. What answer will you give to Jesus, who is asking you what you want him to do for you?
The faith that you have may not always feel like much. Perhaps you do identify with the man who believed and asked for help in overcoming his unbelief. Perhaps your faith is one that waivers between belief and unbelief. If that’s you, then Jesus says, “Come to me.” If you’re like Bartimaeus, then Jesus say, “Come to me.” Either way, he then asks, “What do you want me to do for you?” Come prepared with a bucket, and see if he doesn’t fill it one way or another. Let’s pray….Amen.
