Mark for Lent 27
Today’s reading has the healing of Blind Bartimaeus and the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.
Mark 10:46-11:11
Jesus Heals Blind Bartimaeus (Matthew 20.29-34; Luke 18.35-43)
46Jesus and his disciples went to Jericho. And as they were leaving, they were followed by a large crowd. A blind beggar by the name of Bartimaeus son of Timaeus was sitting beside the road. 47When he heard that it was Jesus from Nazareth, he shouted, “Jesus, Son of David, [a] have pity on me!” 48Many people told the man to stop, but he shouted even louder, “Son of David, have pity on me!”
49Jesus stopped and said, “Call him over!”
They called out to the blind man and said, “Don’t be afraid! Come on! He is calling for you.” 50The man threw off his coat as he jumped up and ran to Jesus.
51Jesus asked, “What do you want me to do for you?”
The blind man answered, “Master, [b] I want to see!”
52Jesus told him, “You may go. Your eyes are healed because of your faith.”
Right away the man could see, and he went down the road with Jesus.
Jesus Enters Jerusalem (Matthew 21.1-11; Luke 19.28-40; John 12.12-19)
11:1Jesus and his disciples reached Bethphage and Bethany near the Mount of Olives. When they were getting close to Jerusalem, Jesus sent two of them on ahead. 2He told them, “Go into the next village. As soon as you enter it, you will find a young donkey that has never been ridden. Untie the donkey and bring it here. 3If anyone asks why you are doing that, say, `The Lord [c] needs it and will soon bring it back.’ ”
4The disciples left and found the donkey tied near a door that faced the street. While they were untying it, 5some of the people standing there asked, “Why are you untying the donkey?” 6They told them what Jesus had said, and the people let them take it.
7The disciples led the donkey to Jesus. They put some of their clothes on its back, and Jesus got on. 8Many people spread clothes on the road, while others went to cut branches from the fields. [d]
9In front of Jesus and behind him, people went along shouting,
“Hooray! [e]
God bless the one
who comes
in the name of the Lord!
10God bless the coming kingdom
of our ancestor David.
Hooray for God
in heaven above!”
11After Jesus had gone to Jerusalem, he went into the temple and looked around at everything. But since it was already late in the day, he went back to Bethany with the twelve disciples.
Copyright © 1995 by American Bible Society
March 28th, 2006 at 1:35 pm
Jericho. The disciples were afraid of going to Jerusalem but here we are getting closer in Jericho the site of one of the most famous stories of non-armed direct action bringing down great walls of division (Joshua anyone?).
Someone by the road, not yet on the road following Jesus, hears of Jesus and wants to see. He wants pity or mercy and he wants to see. Not just half see, not just shut his eyes because he doesn’t like what Jesus is showing him. He wants to see and he wont be shut up.
There is some irony in the crowd (or is it the disciples?) telling him not to be afraid beacuase there is no indication he was afraid in the first place unlike some others we could name. *cough* disciples*cough*
The man threw off his coat - something the rich man was unable to do but this blind man can.
Jesus heals him, or at least names and celelbrates the healing that has taken place “Your eyes are healed because of your faith.” and the seeing man follows Jesus.
The staple of the first act (YesI do like to think of it as an opera) was Jesus’ interaction with the crowds, the people at large who wanted to be fed, but were too busy swallowing the rotten diet dished out by those people or structures or spirits who held some sort of sovereignty over them - pharisees, the herodians, the Roman millitary and ‘teachers of the law of moses’ etc.
Jesus crossed all sorts of geographic, cultural, language religious, gender, family, ecconomic, age and ability boundaries to see that people were fed a different diet - one about the good news of the soverignty of God.
The second act has focussed more on the smaller group who travelled with Jesus on the road towards Jerusalem. At issue has been seeing who Jesus is, seeing him as ‘Son of Man’, and the cost of heralding or bearing or enacting the reign of God in the midst of other corrupt rulers of our lives (be they Herod’s household or our riches) The act ends with someone who is prepared to leave everything behind, has faith, sees and follows Jesus to Jerusalem - here finally is an ‘ideal’ disciple.
Act three opens with Jesus entering Jerusalem. Well kind of.
He deffinatley enters in a wonderful piece of street theatre parodying a military parade. “Hooray, God bless the coming kingdom!” indeed.
But its late, so he turns around leaves again for Bethany to come back another day. It looks like I will have to be patient and let the Jerusalem action doesn’t start tomorrow.