5th Sunday of August Healing Service

Andre-Rublev's Saviour

The Healing of Blind Bartimaeus: 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. ⁴⁷47 When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ ⁴⁸48 Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ ⁴⁹49 Jesus 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. ⁵¹51 Then 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.’ ⁵² Jesus said to him, ‘Go; your faith has made you well.’ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.” *

It is, I think fair to say that every person will approach passages of scripture from their own perspective.  Some will find depths within the passages, others may not see.  On other occasions, we will get an insight into something we had not thought of before, even though we may know the passage very well.  This is I believe the work, or prompting, of the Holy Spirit.  Each revelation has its own purpose and meaning.  If we listen, the Spirit has a way of speak to us, just the words we need, when we need them.

Today we have a healing service, so remember always, that there is a difference between healing and curing.  We often confuse the two terms.  If we understand that healing is something that affects our spirit, our beings.  We may need healing for a past emotional hurt; or to help us come to accept the existence of an illness, disease or condition that may be with us for the rest of our earthly lives.  To be cured of an illness, disease or condition means that it has been completely removed from our physical bodies.  We can then see curing is something most often performed by the medical profession.  Miracles excepted, of course!  If we use these two terms in this way, then we can see that it is possible to be healed, and not be cured, of the illness, disease or condition we are suffering from.

In Mark’s telling of the healing we know a lot about Bartimaeus.  He was Timaeus’ son.  He was blind.  He was a beggar.  He lived outside Jericho.  He had a loud voice.  He knew who Jesus was.  He was not afraid to call out.  He knew he needed Jesus’ healing touch.

Does this sound like any of us? We have things in common with Bartimaeus.  We are someone’s child, we know who Jesus is, and we are, in some way also needing God’s healing touch.  Bartimaeus sought his healing through God’s mercy.  Do we also seek God’s mercy?  Are we certain that we can attain God’s mercy?  Do we perhaps prefer to listen to ourselves, or those around us who make us feel unloved, rather than seeking God’s love and mercy?

* Scripture is from: ‘New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.’

Do you shrink back from reaching out to God?  Do you think it is safer to be lost in the crowd?  Bartimaeus did not think or do this, nor should we.  Healing comes through seeking God’s mercy, not shrinking from it.  When Bartimaeus knew Jesus was near, and could have mercy on him, he shouted, standing out from the crowd.

Jesus heard Bartimaeus calling out to him and stopped.  Jesus told the crowd to call Bartimaeus forward.  The crowd listened and then encouraged Bartimaeus to go forward.  Perhaps there are times when we call out, but are not so certain that we have been heard.  We expect a response, a reply to our calling out.  When what we expect does not happen, how and when we want it, then we become disillusioned and perhaps even abandon our faith.

Bartimaeus did not know he had been heard.  It was the crowd around him, which told him to take heart.  Moreover, when Bartimaeus was called he went.  There was no hesitation, no delay no question.  He held fast to his faith.

Do we do the same?  Perhaps in love and mercy, God has answered your call for healing and you did not hear it?  Did you delay, question or just simply ignore the reply?  Be attentive for the reply (others may tell you of it) and then be decisive - go and do.  Hold onto your faith.  Remember, Bartimaeus took decisive action when he sought, and heard, God’s mercy.

St Mark tells us a lot about that Bartimaeus’ healing.  He received his sight, after Jesus had told him he was healed.  Jesus spoke the words of healing - Mark does not say Jesus touched Bartimaeus.  Then Bartimaeus followed Jesus along the road.

His faith that Jesus could heal him was all that Bartimaeus needed to be healed.  When we read this, it seems so simple.  Yet we like to make it all a lot more complicated for ourselves, why?  Perhaps we are not certain of our faith.  Perhaps we look for an ‘insurance policy”, a “backup plan.”  Just in case!  Bartimaeus was not content to be healed and then go back to his old place, his back up plan.  He was healed and so he started a new journey.  Is this our experience?  Is this what we do?  Do we follow along the road?

If it was our faith that brought us to God, to seek God’s mercy, love, and healing, surely we can do nothing else but be certain.  To do otherwise is to doubt.  So take heart, start, or re-start your faith journey.  It is a wonderful, mysterious and loving trip.

Remember, it was Bartimaeus’ faith that healed him.

Amen.

Easter 6B: Not A Suggestion but A Loving Command.

“Moses said to YHWH, “But, never in my life have I been a man of eloquence,either before or since you have spoken to your servant.” Ex 4:10

Not A Suggestion but A Loving Command.

We are getting close to the end of the Easter season. Soon we will celebrate the disciples receiving of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost and their being sent out to preach what they experienced and learned from the Risen Lord. If they were asked to sum up what their experience with Jesus was, what would they say? I am sure they would respond by saying: 'in the end, HIS LOVE triumphed'. Sin and death and brutal powers did their best to Jesus, but his love both human and divine was the winner. That realization would enable the disciples to say that even though death and sin seem to have the last word in our world, but because of Jesus' victory, love will triumph. It feels at times that good and evil are battling it out. How can the forces of love win out over so many destructive brutal displays of sin in the world? Still, God's love for us, shown in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, has won the victory over sin and death.

In the gospel reading of John (15:9-17) we find a summary of what has been given to us as disciples of Christ. It also holds a promise we can trust while we wait love's final victory. The love Jesus had for those he calls "friends," moved him to lay "down his life" for us. He remind us that; "You did not choose me, no, I chose you." He freely "chose" us, and gave us concrete signs of his love. That love has the power to transform our lives and then, through us, the life of the world. Robin Maas in her book Crucified Love, offers a wonderful insight: “Few, if any of us, will be called to martyrdom; but all of us are called to a series of little deaths in the form of invitations to restrain or deny self….The sending of God by God was the sending of Love – a crucified Love willing to lay down its life for friends and enemies alike. Your mission and mine – which we can only perform insofar as we are in communion with God and with one another – is to submit, out of love for one another, to countless, daily ‘little deaths’ until we have yielded every least and last remnant of self to the purpose of Christ.” (pages 98, 121)

Jesus is saying, 'I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another' (15:17). The Beatles sing the song, "All You Need Is Love" and many who hear it will hear different messages. It is true that all we need is love - but who's love? and what love? When we get past all the sentimental feeling and greeting card sweetness we have the teaching of Jesus. All you need is love is true - his type of love. "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. (15:12) As I have loved you??? No one has greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. (15:13). Oh! Yes!!! That type of love. John reminds us that the kind of love Christians are called to embody takes a particular, cruciform shape. We hear this truth in Jesus' words, "As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love."(15:9) The experience of Christ's love for us makes it possible for us to love others, even our enemies. The phrase "... as I have loved you ..." refers not only to his gentle generous giving but also to his willingness to bravely lay down his life by suffering for others. The first letter from John (4:7-10), our second reading, announces a similar truth. "Let us love one another, since love comes from God." We can love one another because God's love is at work in us transforming our lives, and moving us from being self-centred to being other-centred.

From the moment we are created, God constantly offers himself to be with us. In the mythological accounts of the Book of Genesis God dwells with humans in the garden of Paradise, wanting to be close. But they/we try to hide from God, not responding when God calls. It is only when Jesus came that we realised that it was not God who forbade our access to the tree of life, but our own stubbornness and disobedience. It was necessary for us that Jesus the Word of God should start anew a conversation with us, to breach the distance, to restore God’s presence to us. The desire of God to share divine life and love with us is expressed by Christ who says: ‘I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you’. In Christ, God gives us a sign of true love and friendship. There is no end to this great love even if we are faithless, ‘He remains faithful – for he cannot deny himself.’(2 Tim 2:13) Doesn't friendship require giving not just receiving? Yes, it does require mutuality and sharing, so God gives us the Holy Spirit; the Gift from above of love's power, so we can return love for love. And we are made heirs of the Kingdom by being made one with Christ, who emptied himself to become one of us, to become our equal - to be our friend. Now he prays that our joy may be full; that is, as love-driven-disciples we may achieve loves fulfilment of the vision of God, by DOING day-by-day through our 'little deaths' loves work of selfless service. (See: Matthew 25)