There is a simplicity in this week’s Gospel that I find refreshing.

Jesus seems to cut-out everything that was happening around him – the noise of the crowd following him, his own concerns, his fears that even his own apostles don’t understand the wonders of the Kingdom he is bringing about, the constant tests he faces and his awareness that he is now very close to Jerusalem, where his enemies await him – and he heard only the voice of a blind beggar desperate to be cured.

In fact, Jesus’ encounter with Bartimaeus was extraordinarily short: Jesus: “What do you want me to do for you?” Bartimaeus: “Rabbi, I want to see.” Jesus: “Go, your faith has healed you.” 

Jesus didn’t ask himself if it was the Sabbath, where curing the man would be considered ‘work’ and he would be giving his enemies more ammunition to fire at him. Nor did he ask if Bartimaeus was a Jew. He didn’t try to find out if he was a sinner or call on him to repent. He didn’t even appear to pause his journey for more than a few moments.

Jesus heard the voice of the man cry out to him. He heard others tell him to be quiet, and he heard the shouting continue. Somehow, in the desperate calling of Bartimaeus, Jesus recognised the voice of the poor calling to him. Bartimaeus was a man excluded by the crowd as unimportant or unworthy, and Jesus could not simply walk on, tacitly agreeing to his exclusion. Jesus did not hesitate or ask questions or seek answers. He heard a man calling out to him in hope and he cured him. It was the right thing to do. For Jesus, in that moment, it was the only thing to do…and as Mark tells us in the Gospel, “Immediately he received his sight…”

How refreshing to find in Jesus a person who does good simply because it is the right thing to do. It is refreshing but also challenging.

Britain, in 2020, voted to leave the European Union. Many of those who voted for Brexit did so because they wanted to be rid of the bureaucracy and red tape associated with European laws and applications for funding. Today, Doctors, nurses, teachers, social workers, and so many others, find increasingly that they spend most of their time writing reports, filling-in forms, being assessed and constantly being called to do another ‘on-line’ course – usually an updated version of one completed a month ago! So many people are put off doing good because it comes with so many risks: “Is this allowed?’; ‘Is there some law or commandment that says no?’; ‘Do I need to get permission first?;’ ‘Are there forms to fill-in before I can do it?;’ ‘Am I insured?’, ‘Is this in my job description?’, ‘Might this come back to bite me?’

We hesitate, vacillate, rethink ourselves and often find that the opportunity to do good is gone before we decide.

For Jesus, if there was an opportunity to do good, and if he was in a position to help, then there was only one decision to make; to do what was good and what was right.

We might be tempted to say that Jesus curing a blind man in this week’s Gospel has very little to do with Brexit, form-filling, doctors, nurses or things ‘coming back to bite us’. But let’s remember that in Jesus life things were constantly ‘coming back to bite him’. In the end the bites became so many and were so deep that they killed him!

Jesus was accused of healing on the Sabbath, which constituted ‘work’ for the Pharisees. Jesus was criticised for being seen eating and drinking in the homes of the wealthy rather than fasting as John the Baptist did. Jesus was pressured by some of his own disciples to take a stronger political stand against Rome. Some of the things Jesus taught about the Kingdom of God lost him followers.

The actions of Jesus, time and time again, did come back to bite him. His words were twisted against him; he was misrepresented, betrayed, arrested and executed for nothing more than doing good and preaching a Kingdom of love, peace, gentleness and joy.

If Jesus had taken more care; if he had not publicly criticised the Pharisees; if he had taken the advice of those who urged him to use his healing to become popular; if he had avoided words like ‘hypocrite’ and ‘clean on the outside, rotten on the inside’ when addressing those in authority; if he had done less, said less, been more politically correct, taken the easy options, he could have lived a long, relatively comfortable life as a popular healer and storyteller.

But Jesus did not choose that way of life. He was not fooled by the Kingdoms of this world; he did not pander to those who thought themselves great and he was not deceived by those who ignored the plight of the poor in society.

The choices Jesus had to make in his day were not hugely different to the choices we are called to make in our day. When faced with hypocrisy Jesus called it hypocrisy! When faced with a choice of doing good or accepting the petty laws of those who think themselves superior, Jesus chose to do good. When faced with truth or popularity, Jesus chose truth.

Jesus was not a ‘form-filler’ and he wasn’t frightened off by those who warned that his choices ‘would come back to bite him.’ He annoyed and upset the ‘form-fillers’ and the politically correct. He didn’t always take due diligence or say the ‘correct’ thing, and yes, the things he said did come back to bite him!

Before the reality of Jesus’ resurrection fully impacted his disciples, I’m sure some of them said to themselves, “if only he had listened to me”, “if only he had taken my advice”, “I saw this coming, but he wouldn’t listen.” The truth is that he did see his death coming, yet continued, doggedly, to do what was good and right.

There is another very refreshing aspect to this Gospel and that is Jesus’ use of the word, ‘faith’ when talking to Bartimaeus.

Looking at the story it is obvious that Bartimaeus did not know Jesus. It is also clear from the story that Bartimaeus was not searching for Jesus, or waiting for him to come along. Rather, Bartimaeus was sitting where he always sat, probably led there each day by a relative or friend and left to beg for the loose change people might have. It was a lucky accident that Jesus was leaving Jericho at the time Bartimaeus was there.

What is very clear, however, is that once he heard from passers-by that the commotion was because Jesus was passing, he did not lose his opportunity to be healed. Unable to move because of his blindness, all he had was his voice, so he used that to get attention. The well dressed and educated, those who presumed they knew Jesus well enough to speak for him, told Bartimaeus to shut up and be quiet.

But Bartimaeus was made of sterner stuff, and he was not prepared to lose the only opportunity he might have to be healed, so he shouted louder and more insistently. Jesus, however, was not too busy, and helping someone was not a waste of his time. He stopped and called Bartimaeus, and then, in a simple three-sentence conversation the life of Bartimaeus was changed forever.

Do we call the actions of Bartimaeus ‘faith’ in Jesus or just a selfish determination to be cured? There is no evidence that Bartimaeus was a man of ‘faith’ at all. He wanted to have his sight restored and when asked by Jesus he was refreshingly honest about that. He did not flatter Jesus by pretending to be interested in the message Jesus was preaching, and Jesus didn’t ask him. We might accurately say that Bartimaeus had no religious motivation in asking Jesus to cure him. He was blind and he wanted to see, and that’s it! If he felt John the Baptist, or Satan could heal him, his answer would probably be the same: “What do you want?”, “I want to see.”

Yet, Jesus had no hesitation in saying it was Bartimaeus’ ‘faith’ that healed him. So, what then was Jesus responding to in Bartimaeus? It had to be his courage and his tenacity.

Sitting at the side of the road as a blind beggar Bartimaeus was very vulnerable. In our own ‘civilised’ world we constantly hear stories of homeless people beaten up, robbed, ridiculed, abused simply because they are homeless or sit on our High Streets begging. It would have been no different in Jesus day. If people in an excited crowd told a blind beggar to ‘shut up and stop interfering’, it is very likely that ‘please’ did not come before or after it! Continuing to shout risked a kick or a punch or worse. In a world of perpetual darkness everything can be a threat or dangerous. However, motivated by desperation to see again, and fuelled by a hope that the stories he had heard about Jesus were true, Bartimaeus showed remarkable courage and dogged determination in continuing to call out.

Was this ‘faith’? Certainly, it was enough for Jesus to label it ‘faith’, and it would be a brave person who would argue with that!

As Churches we have theologised ‘faith’ all the way to Heaven and back again, and in so doing we may have lost the wonderful simplicity of what ‘faith’ is.

The faith that united Jesus and Bartimaeus was courage and a stubborn tenacity to keep going against the odds. That might seem surprising to us, but there is little doubt it is the faith Jesus is talking about.

Faith, it seems to me, is something we search for in one another that unites us.

Isn’t it a contradiction, then, that over the centuries we have allowed ‘faith’ to become a list of things that separate us rather than a list of things that unite us. Isn’t it sad that we have made of ‘faith’ something that we ‘have’ rather than something we search for in others?

Jesus could so easily have found reasons to ignore Bartimaeus. ‘He’s not one of us.’; ‘…his lifestyle is different; ‘…his beliefs are different.’ But Jesus didn’t look for any of these reasons. He had found a point of unity between them, and that was ‘faith’ enough to heal Bartimaeus.

Surely, there is something fundamental for us to learn here. If we search for the things that divide us, we will find them, and they will become steadily more divisive the more we focus on them. But if we search for the qualities that unite us –  tenacity, stubbornness, courage, determination, or maybe just a sense of humour, being optimistic (or pessimistic!), the ability to laugh at ourselves, patience, kindness, etc. – we will also find them, and they will become more abundant the more we search for them.

Bartimaeus, the poor, blind, unnoticed beggar did not have to do anything to be noticed and cured except be himself – stubborn, determined, hopeful that Jesus could help him. Maybe ‘faith’ is simpler than we think, and maybe, if we look, we will find it in surprising people and surprising places.

Many thanks,

Brian.

If you have any comments, questions or thoughts on this scripture reflection, please feel welcome to email me at b.maher@oblates.ie

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