About this sermon
Blind Bartimaeus sits by the road outside Jericho and cries out, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ The crowd tries to silence him, but he cries all the louder, confessing what little he knows. Jesus stops, calls him, and heals him, and Bartimaeus follows him along the road to Jerusalem. Saving faith takes God at his word, and the Christian life continues in daily faith and repentance.
Sermon transcript
as we continue to consider the Gospel of Mark. This is Lord’s Day morning. We are in Mark 10. My sermon text is Mark 10, verses 46-52. Mark 10, verses 46-52. Dear friends, let us hear with reverence and awe the Word of our God. Then they came to Jericho. And as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a large crowd, a blind beggar named Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the road. When he heard that it was Jesus the Nazarene, he began to cry out and say, Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. Many were sternly telling him to be quiet, but he kept crying out all the more, Son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus stopped and said, call him here. So they called the blind man, saying to him, take courage.
Stand up. He is calling for you. Throwing aside his cloak, he jumped up and came to Jesus. And answering him, Jesus said, what do you want me to do for you? And the blind man said to him, Rabboni, I want to regain my sight. And Jesus said to him, go. Your faith has made you well. Immediately, he regained his sight and began following him. on the road. Dear friends, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let’s pray for God to bless the proclamation of his word. Dear Lord and Father in heaven, we stand in awe at the fact that you have communicated to us, though we are sinners, yet you have communicated to us in the scriptures, your word of grace and salvation. We ask, O Lord, as we consider this portion of your God-breathed, inerrant, infallible Word, we ask, O God, that you would open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your Word.
We pray that by your Spirit, your Word would find a lodging place in our souls. We pray that this portion of Scripture would be spiritual milk for those who need the milk of the Word. May it be spiritual meat to those who need the meat of your Word. And may it be manna from above for all of us. We ask these things through Christ our Lord and all of God’s people said, Amen. You may be seated. Well, dear friends, my sermon today is entitled The Blind Beggar Who Saw. And if you have a sermon outline page, there’s a number of The key words, suggested words that you can keep track of as you hear the sermon today, if you find that to be helpful. Well, dear ones, in our passage for this Lord’s Day morning, we find our Lord Jesus Christ continuing his final journey to Jerusalem.
He has set his face like Flint to go to Jerusalem in order to fulfill the mission that God the Father has sent him to this earth to fulfill. And so Jesus and his disciples, along with a considerable crowd, are making their pilgrimage toward Jerusalem for the Passover, where Jesus will engage in his final battle with the satanic forces of evil by dying on the cross for our redemption. And so as we turn our attention to our text for today, we read the following in verse 46. As Mark records this event, he says, Then they came to Jericho. And as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a large crowd, a blind beggar named Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the road.” Now, it’s important, brothers and sisters, to understand the context here.
And it’s especially important for us to consider Mark’s account of this healing of Bartimaeus in light of the parallel accounts in the other Gospels, such as Matthew and Luke. The core of the accounts is similar in all three of the Gospels, but there are some differences in detail. But when we understand the historical and background of these details, we will recognize that there are not contradictions here or discrepancies, but there’s actually great harmony. Dr. Walter Wessel, in his commentary on Mark, introduces our passage as follows. He says, this last of the healing miracles in Mark’s gospel takes place near Jericho. Now, where was Jericho? Well, Dr. Wessel explains. Jericho is located five miles west of the Jordan and about 15 miles northeast of Jerusalem. Now, here’s an important detail. He says there was an old Jericho, that would be the biblical Jericho, and a new Jericho.
In Jesus’s time, the old Jericho was largely abandoned, but the new one extending to the south was an attractive city. It had been built by Herod the Great, who had his winter palace there. Matthew speaks of two blind men. Luke says that the healing occurred on the way to Jericho. Mark reports that it took place on the way out of the city. Now, how do we harmonize those two accounts? Well, as Dr. Wessel suggests, it is possible that the miracle was done somewhere between the old Israelite city and the new city of Herod. Mark is the only evangelist who names the blind man. Bartimaeus probably means son of Timae. And in the Middle East, a blind man sitting along the road begging is a common sight. So these are some important historical details to keep in mind as we seek to understand this passage.
And I hope you see from Dr. Wessel’s comments that the differences in detail between the gospel accounts need not be viewed as contradictions. For example, Mark’s gospel records the healing account of Bartimaeus from the perspective of Jesus leaving the old Jericho, whereas the gospel of Luke records this healing from the perspective of Jesus traveling toward the newer Jericho and all on the way towards Jerusalem. And it’s interesting that of the three gospel accounts that record this miracle, Mark’s record of this miracle is the most detailed. Well, friends, this passage of God’s word is rich with spiritual lessons, especially when the spiritual insight of blind Bartimaeus is contrasted with the spiritual blindness of our Lord’s enemies who will push to have our Lord put to death. In this passage, we have a wonderful picture of the transforming power of the gospel, the good news of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
So what do we learn from this portion of God’s word? Well, let’s focus, first of all, on verses 46 through 48. We notice, first of all, a plea for mercy, a plea for mercy. Again, verse 46. Then they came to Jericho. And as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a large crowd, they are headed towards ultimately towards Jerusalem for the Passover. As they are traveling along that road, what do they see? A blind beggar named Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the road. So again, as they are leaving Jericho to go to Jerusalem, they come across a very common sight. at that time, namely a blind man who’s identified by name. Now, why does Mark identify Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, by name? Well, we’re not told why he identifies Bartimaeus, but could it be that Mark identifies this man by name because perhaps some of those amongst his original reading audience would have known this man?
I believe that is a distinct possibility. And then in verse 47, we learn this about Bartimaeus. It says, when Bartimaeus heard that it was Jesus the Nazarene, or Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. We have a plea for mercy here. Have mercy on me. How did Bartimaeus know about Jesus? Well, obviously, the news of Jesus’s healing powers had spread far and wide in that region. So no doubt Bartimaeus had heard about Jesus by word of mouth. He’d never seen Jesus with his eyes. He was incapable of seeing the Lord with his eyes. But he had heard the word, the news about Jesus of Nazareth. And how does Bartimaeus address Jesus? Bartimaeus recognizes and confesses Jesus as the Son of David. Now, we’ve considered on numerous occasions in the Gospel of Mark the significance of that title, Son of Man.
That is a messianic title. But what about this title, Son of David? Well, in other this title, son of David is an even more, in a sense, even a more explicit confession of the Messiah ship of Jesus. It was a messianic title. Jesus, Messiah, son of David, have mercy upon me. And did you notice there’s no record of Jesus rebuking him for doing so? There’s no record of Jesus saying, listen, fella, yes, I can heal. I’m a rabbi, I’m a servant of God, but I’m not the Messiah. No, Jesus does not rebuke Bartimaeus for acknowledging him as the Messiah. Now, it’s very likely that Bartimaeus, like most of his fellow Jews in those days, had a very imperfect understanding of what kind of Messiah Jesus was. This is a theme that we have seen over and over again in Mark’s gospel, is that even Jesus’s own disciples had worldly minded and political notions of what the Messiah was supposed to be.
They viewed the Messiah as a great anointed king who would come and as a military conqueror, conquer the Romans and set up again the theocracy of David, of King David in Jerusalem and rule the nations from Jerusalem as a political king. And it’s quite likely that Bartimaeus shared these Jewish assumptions of our Lord’s contemporaries. But however imperfect his theology was at the time, the truth that he did know, he openly confessed. He did so vigorously and unashamedly. And his cry to Jesus for mercy, what does that show us? That shows us that Bartimaeus recognizes that the Lord Jesus is the source of mercy. And indeed, he looks to the Lord Jesus as the one who had the power, the divine power to help him in his need. Though Bartimaeus was physically blind, he clearly saw with the eyes of faith with spiritual eyes that Jesus was his only hope.
And then verse 48, how do the crowds respond to this blind beggar beside the road, crying out to Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me? How do they respond to this poor blind man? It says in verse 48, many were sternly telling him to be quiet. And how did he respond to their admonitions that he be quiet, that he shut up, basically. But he kept crying out all the more, Son of David, have mercy on him. He was not going to let anyone stop him from crying out to Jesus for mercy. Now notice, friends, the uncaring crowds and their lack of compassion for the plight of this poor, blind beggar. Again, this was a common sight, but such hardness, telling him to be quiet. It’s as if they were embarrassed by this needy man.
Why were many in the crowds telling Bartimaeus essentially to shut up? Well, as a blind beggar, Bartimaeus held a very low social position in the social hierarchy of that day. So perhaps Some were embarrassed that a man of such low social standing and position would dare to bother an important man like Jesus of Nazareth. Or perhaps some in the crowd were either bothered by or made uncomfortable by the fact that this man was so clearly and so openly confessing Jesus to be the Messiah. Perhaps they feared repercussions from Rome. And they’re basically saying, quiet down. We don’t want you to be so open about that. Well, either way, whatever the case may be, the crowd demonstrated its uncaring hardness of heart in the way that it responded to this blind beggar. So we see this plea for mercy.
What are some of the takeaways or applications that we can glean from this portion of our passage for today? Well, let me suggest a number of things. Friends, Bartimaeus was obviously not a theologian. He was a poor, blind beggar. And his understanding of Jesus was probably quite limited. But what he did know, he confessed and he used to his soul’s advantage. The late Dr. William Barclay in his commentary on Mark says this, he says, we must ask people to think, but we should not expect them to become theologians before they are Christians. The case of Bartimaeus illustrates that one may be saved and come to faith even with a very limited understanding of the person and work of Christ. Now, certainly some things must be known. You need to know that Jesus is Lord, that he’s the son of God, that he died for our sins and rose from the dead and so forth.
But nevertheless, you can have a childlike simple faith and and that faith by God’s grace can still be saving faith. But though Bartimaeus had limited spiritual light, he used well the light that God had blessed him with. Whereas, I would suggest, brothers and sisters, that so many churchgoers today who are exposed to such great gospel light, sadly, many seem indifferent to the great gospel knowledge with which they’ve been blessed. We are awash in Bible knowledge here, brothers and sisters. You’ve heard that saying that familiarity breeds contempt. Or at least it can breed indifference. We’ve heard if you’re a churchgoer and you’ve been a Christian all your life, you know the old, old story of Jesus and his love. You know the glorious good news. You’ve heard it week in and week out proclaimed from the pulpit.
The danger is that we come to take this glorious gospel light for granted. Yes, we should seek to grow in our understanding of the gospel, in our theological and doctrinal knowledge. We in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church highly value, as we ought to, sound Bible doctrine and faithful, reformed theology. At the same time, let us not take the light that we have received for granted and let us not look down on our nose at down our noses at those who maybe have not yet come to the the sound understanding that we have been blessed with. How about you, dear listener? You may not be a Bible scholar or a theologian. But are you responding with faith, repentance and obedience to the gospel knowledge with which God has blessed you? By the grace of God, let us use well the knowledge and the light, the spiritual light that we have received through the word of God.
Also, as a blind man, Bartimaeus had never seen Jesus perform miracles. He had heard the word, however, He had heard the message about Jesus, and that hearing led him to put his trust in Jesus. I’m reminded of what Paul the Apostle writes in that very familiar passage, Romans 10, 17. Faith cometh by what? Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. The Holy Spirit uses the word, the message of the gospel, in the scriptures as it is read, but especially as it is preached to bring sinners to faith in Christ. We, too, like Bartimaeus, we’re in a similar situation with respect to Jesus as the late great evangelical Anglican Bishop J.C. Ryle writes in his expository thoughts. He writes, We, too, are not allowed to see Jesus with our bodily eyes. But we have the report of His power and grace and willingness to save in the Gospel.
He goes on to say, what is the beginning of all saving faith but a soul’s venture on Christ? Oh, I love that sentence. What is the beginning of saving faith? A soul’s venturing upon Christ. He goes on to say, what is the life of saving faith when once begun, but a continual leaning on the unseen Savior’s Word. Basically, saving faith is, through God’s sovereign grace, taking God at His Word in the Gospel. Believing that God means what He says and says what He means and believing that it applies to you. For example, we’re probably all familiar with that famous passage, John 3 16, for God so loved the world that he did what he gave his one and only son. God’s love for a lost and sinful world is expressed in the giving of his son so that what so that whoever believes in him.
That is to say, whoever trusts in him might not perish, but have everlasting life. Oh, well, that promise is for others, not for me. I’m too wicked. I’m too corrupt for that. I’ve gone too far. No, that promise is for all who through sovereign grace come to believe. Saving faith takes God at his word, trusts in his promises. And the promise is what? Believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. Dear listener, do you believe? Do you trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as your very own Lord and Savior? Your faith might be weak. It might be feeble. But your Savior is great. Your Savior is great. Even the weakest, smallest faith in the Savior is sufficient to receive the Savior’s benefits. So, repent and believe upon Christ this day for your salvation from sin.
So, we see an act of a cry for mercy, but we see next in verses 49-52 an act of grace. An act of grace. It goes on to say in verse 49, Mark writes, “…and Jesus stopped and said, call him here. Probably some in the crowds who were telling this blind man to shut up, probably they were kind of surprised. Oh, I thought Jesus wanted to get to Jerusalem fast. Well, he certainly did. But Jesus was willing to stop in his tracks and give this poor man his personal attention. Jesus stopped and said, call him here. So they called the blind man, saying to him, take courage, stand up. He is calling for you. We can imagine some of the same folks in the crowd who, at a moment before, had been telling him to shut up, are now saying, oh, hey, take heart.
He’s calling you forward. I want you to notice a couple of things. Even though Jesus is in the midst of His all-important task of heading to Jerusalem so that He might die on the cross for our sins, That was the mission that the father had sent him to accomplish, even though he’s in the midst of accomplishing that great mission. Yet he is willing to stop in his tracks in order to minister to the specific needs of this particular individual. Our Lord Jesus values Bartimaeus as an individual and therefore Jesus gives him individual attention, even in the midst of the craziness of His schedule and mission. Praise be to God that Jesus, our Lord and Savior, does this for each and every one of us who trust in Him and cry unto Him for salvation. Notice also how the crowds hypocritically changed their tune.
Before, they had rebuked Bartimaeus for making such a scene, But now that Jesus calls Bartimaeus to himself, the crowds change from words of rebuke to words of encouragement. And I don’t see, I don’t know about you, but I don’t see any recorded apology here to Bartimaeus. Maybe there was. We don’t know. But Mark doesn’t record it. They go from saying, be quiet, to saying, oh, be encouraged. Ah, the fickleness of crowds. Perhaps this is instructive to us not to just go along with the crowds, but instead to have our thinking aligned with the Word of God, our thinking and our behaving. How does Bartimaeus respond to this? He’s been crying out to Jesus to have mercy upon him. And finally, he hears, hey, he’s calling you to himself. Verse 50 is almost comical in its expressiveness.
Throwing aside his cloak, that would be his outer garment. Bartimaeus is so excited that he throws aside his cloak. Perhaps he had spread it by the road to collect the donations that people would give to him. But whatever the case may be, he dramatically throws aside his cloak. He jumped up And he came to Jesus. Now, some scholars have suggested that, well, this proves that Bartimaeus was not entirely blind. He wasn’t completely blind. After all, he was able to get on his feet and find Jesus in the crowd and go to him. But I think that’s really kind of reading too much into the text. Certainly, his ears were well attuned to where Jesus was in the crowd. And so. whatever the case may be, he enthusiastically heeds the call of Jesus and responds to that call.
And what does Jesus say to him in verse 51? And answering him, Jesus said, what do you want me to do for you? Now, why does Jesus ask this question? Isn’t it obvious what Bartimaeus wants him to do for him? This is a blind man who’s been begging. by the side of the road. No doubt Jesus knew what Bartimaeus wanted from him, but nevertheless, he asks him what he wants. Why does Jesus do this? Well, perhaps to help make it clear to the crowds that Bartimaeus is not asking for a handout. But probably, I suspect more likely, Jesus did this so that Bartimaeus might have an opportunity to express his faith in Jesus by having to express his request directly to Jesus. In other words, he is drawing out a confession of faith from Bartimaeus.
And what does this teach us? Well, beloved, this teaches us that Jesus is not just interested in healing Bartimaeus. He’s interested in establishing a personal bond, a personal relationship with this man. And Bartimaeus responds by addressing Jesus as Rabboni in the Greek. Bartimaeus says, Rabboni, I want to regain my sight. What does that word Rabboni mean? Well, it’s a stronger word than rabbi. Rabbi means teacher, but Rabboni carries with it or can carry with it the sense of master or Lord. So by using this title to address the Lord Jesus, Bartimaeus indicates by implication his recognition of our Lord’s authority and his trusting submission to Christ. And what does Jesus say in response to Bartimaeus’ request? It says, And Jesus said to him, Go, your faith has made you well. And what happens? Well, we’ve learned in our study of Mark’s gospel that one of Mark’s favorite words is the Greek word euthus, or immediately.
And we get one of those immediately’s here. Immediately, he regained his sight and began following him on the road. Notice a couple of things. First of all, Jesus immediately grants Bartimaeus his request and heals him. Jesus doesn’t linger. Jesus immediately heals him simply by speaking the word. Notice also that our Lord Jesus attributes Bartimaeus’ healing to his faith, his trust in Jesus the Messiah. Go, your faith has made you well. Your faith has made you well. Now, wait a minute, Jesus, that’s technically wrong, right? Theologically speaking, it wasn’t Bartimaeus’ faith as such that healed him. It was Jesus Christ who healed him. However, it is Bartimaeus’ personal faith in Jesus that connects him to the Lord and to the Lord’s healing power. And that is why sometimes that which is technically belongs to God is ascribed to the faith of God’s people, such as, you know, such as.
I mean, think about justification by faith. We are declared righteous by God through faith in Christ. Technically, Christ is the one who justifies us or God justifies us in union with Christ. But we receive that blessing through the instrumentality of faith, trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. And that is that is how Jesus is using the term here. So what do we learn? A couple applications. Just as Christ shows personal concern for Bartimaeus’s individual needs. So, dear believer, he cares for you as an individual. It’s tempting for us because we are so small, we are so limited. God is busy. We imagine God is busy running the universe. He’s got too much on his plate to be concerned about us and our individual needs. That is not the case. Your Savior, dear believer, cares for you and your individual needs.
Trust in his tender watch care over you. And consider also that just as our Lord wanted Bartimaeus to express his desires and needs personally to him, so let us express our personal needs and desires to the Lord in prayer. It reminds me of that wonderful hymn, What a Friend We Have in Jesus. Oh, what pain we often forfeit. Oh, what needless pains we bear all because we do not carry everything to God in prayer. Take it to the Lord in prayer. He hears the cries of his children who cry unto him. Notice also that faith connects us to Christ and his benefits, just as it did for Bartimaeus. So let us strive to nurture our faith by the diligent use of God’s means of grace. Remember, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ.
And faith is nurtured by the word of God as well. Let us be in the word and in communion with our God. But finally, we see here in this passage a response of gratitude, a response of gratitude. Jesus said in verse 52, Go, your faith has made you well. Immediately he regained his sight. And what did he do then? Said thank you and turned and went the other way. No, began following him on the road. Notice that Bartimaeus responded to our Lord’s healing, not by saying thank you, or at least there’s no record of him doing so, although no doubt he was thankful to the Lord. But Bartimaeus shows the reality of his faith by following Jesus on the way. Now, this could mean a number of things. This could mean that Bartimaeus formally attached himself to Jesus as one of our Lord’s traveling disciples.
That’s a possibility. Or it could simply mean, as I think more likely, that he simply chose to follow along with Jesus in order to accompany him to Jerusalem for the Passover. But whatever the case may be, it is clear that he had become in his heart, at least, a follower of Jesus. And he desired to be in the company of his Savior and to walk with the Savior’s community of disciples. As J.C. Ryle puts it, he would not leave him from whom he had received such mercy. At once he devoted the new powers which his cure gave him to the son of David who had worked the cure. Brothers and sisters in Christ, our salvation results in transformation. Salvation results in transforming the saved into followers of Jesus. Saving faith bears spiritual fruit in a life of discipleship.
Having tasted the mercy of Jesus Christ in your life, are you seeking day by day to faithfully follow Him as your Lord out of heartfelt gratitude for the grace that He has given to you. None of us follows Christ perfectly. And that’s, by the way, why Christians need the gospel, too. The gospel isn’t just for unbelievers to bring them to faith in Christ. The gospel is for Christians because the normal Christian life is a struggle. It is a struggle. It’s not just onwards and upwards. You know, there’s this notion of the victorious Christian life. We do live a victorious Christian life because our life is in union with Christ, the victor. His victory is ours through faith. But nevertheless, in our daily experience, sometimes we stumble. We often stumble. We daily a war against the world, the flesh and the devil.
And the good news continues to be good news for us as believers. God continues to forgive your sins, believer in Christ, as we continue to walk day by day in daily renewed faith and repentance. Remember, Martin Luther reminded us that the Christian life is a life of repentance. You don’t just repent once at the beginning of the Christian life and then you’re done with it. Repentance is daily, daily mortification of sin and vivification renewal in faith. That is a day by day experience of every Christian. But as we have tasted that the Lord is good, let us show our gratitude for God’s goodness by seeking to be faithful followers of the Lord Jesus Christ out of gratitude for his gift of salvation. Dear listener, have you tasted the Lord’s goodness? He is good. And in Christ and through the gospel, he offers you his mercy.
Jesus is the God-man. He was crucified for the forgiveness of sins. He rose from the dead for our justification, and so that all who believe in Him might not perish, but have everlasting life. Come to Jesus today in faith and repentance, and He will receive you, and you will taste the goodness of the Lord. And then, like Bartimaeus, follow your Lord along the way. For he is the way, the truth, and the life. Amen. Let us pray. Gracious Lord and Father in heaven, we thank you and praise you, O God, for the Lord Jesus Christ, for his word of grace to us in the gospel. We pray that this word would never become too old for us, that it would always be new and fresh. that we would always love to tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.
We pray all of these things, Heavenly Father, through Christ our Lord and all of God’s people said, Amen. Dear ones, let’s rise and as we respond to what we’ve heard proclaimed, let’s rise and sing together 446, Be Thou My Vision, 446.
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