Hearing and Seeing

Transcript

Very clearly, why it is that they don't let me teach the kids, you know. I see a couple of them like my own, not singing, like, sing, you know. They're like, that's not how you do it, you know. So I go, well, you know, come to my house sometime, you know. All right, turn with me to the Gospel according to Mark, chapter 10.

00:00:21

And once you found chapter 10, verse 46, go ahead and stand with me as we read God's word.

00:00:35

Notice these words here. This is the word of God. Jesus and his disciples 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. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, jesus, son of David, have mercy on me.

00:01:05

Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, son of David, have mercy on me. 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. So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus.

00:01:34

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. Jesus said to him, go. Your faith has made you well. Immediately, he regained his sight and followed him on the way.

00:01:56

Lord Jesus, we thank you for your holy word. And we pray now today that your Holy Spirit would be sent to us in this room today to hear your voice, just as Bartimaeus did. We pray in your name. Amen. You can be seated.

00:02:16

What a powerful text of scripture here. And, you know, listen, we all kind of know this, perhaps theologically we would hold to this, that every word of the Bible is the word of God, and it's exactly the way he wanted it to be. In other words, he's the one who inspired each and every word. We call this technically the plenary verbal understanding of inspiration that is to say every single word. Now, I know when you're reading through the Bible, you're like, man, seems like a lot of wasted room here or there.

00:02:53

Perhaps maybe in numbers, right? Or maybe for you, it's First Chronicles. The first nine chapters are all a genealogy, right? So and so, beget so and so, beget so and so. And by that point, we're dozing off to sleep and we say, man, I don't know.

00:03:09

I don't. But let me just tell you, it is true that every word is the word of God for us. And he didn't Waste any room here. Okay? But sometimes we come to a passage like this where when you really start diving into it, it becomes very evident how beautiful literarily this passage is and how much is packed in that.

00:03:33

Every word. We're almost hanging on every word here of this famous story of blind Bartimaeus. And so I wanted to point out first this. And that is in the month of October, all right? The whole month we have been in chapter 10.

00:03:50

All right? Actually, so if you've been with us for all of the Sundays of October, you know, we've worked our way through the whole chapter 10 of Mark here. So the church in its wisdom has said, look here at chapter 10. Something's going on. And one of the things that's going on here is Jesus has his third prophecy where he specifically says, I'm going.

00:04:13

And this is the most clear he's going to be on this matter. I'm going to Jerusalem. I will be betrayed by the religious leaders, and I will be putting to suffer and then be put to death on a cross. You can't get any clearer about what's about to happen. And in fact, as we turn the page to chapter 11, guess what that is.

00:04:33

It's the triumphal entry into Jerusalem, his last visit to the holy city.

00:04:41

So he knows what he's doing. And the author here, of course, John, Mark, but inspired by the Holy Spirit, wants us to see one more blind person. We've already entered in chapter eight, we've already been introduced to one blind guy that is made to see. But remember, he gets partial sight and then he gets full sight after he comes back and says, I see people, but they look like trees, you know? And so it's almost.

00:05:06

It's almost. This is now a doubling or a bookend of people who are misunderstanding Jesus. Really, the whole month of October, people have been misunderstanding Jesus. For instance, the Pharisees. The disciples, remember, the Pharisees are trying to trick him.

00:05:22

The disciples are blocking him from the children. You remember this, misunderstandings all over the place. Then you have the rich young ruler, a very pointed story of, again, misunderstanding who really is standing before him. And then, of course, the sons of thunder last week remember James and John misunderstanding the nature of this kingdom. This kingdom is not about elbowing our way to the front, right?

00:05:52

But instead serving others to love God above all else and then to love our neighbor as ourself. And now we get a blind man, which is no accident, because spiritual blindness is really what is, what is in the purview here. We are meant to see ourself in the story of Bartimaeus. But notice first that we come to this city of Jericho, right? We just sang the song with the kids because it's on my mind and has been this morning.

00:06:26

That's why I quickly looked it up but was unable to learn the tune. And as Jack has helped me before, I don't even, you know, have the right keys. I probably was in 30 different keys, you know, So I don't even really know what a key is, to be honest with you. And so we come here to Jericho. The Jesus and the disciples come to Jericho and as they're leaving Jericho, it's mentioned twice.

00:06:49

So anytime something's mentioned twice in your study of the Bible, you want to go ahead and key into that. You want to go ahead and look at that a little closer. Repetition means the author or the teachers wanting you to remember something, right? Just like I do with my students. I say look at the syllabus, read the syllabus.

00:07:06

In fact, I start class every time and then guess what? I get an email. When is this due? Read the syllabus. Right.

00:07:12

You know, I should just have an automatic reply to be read the syllabus. Because it's all there. It actually is. But we need a lot of repetition in our life, don't we? We actually do, you know, and they even say like you don't really hear something until you hear it about seven times.

00:07:26

Which is why in a commercial or the advertising people, they know that very well, don't they? You know, Lysimpic or whatever this drug is, you know, Ozempic maybe. Okay, I don't know. Yeah, Ozempic, I think, right? They'll say it in the commercial like eight or nine times.

00:07:45

Why? You know why? Because, well, we have to hear things more than once. And so anytime you got repetition, the teacher is wanting you to remember. So what about Jericho is significant?

00:07:58

Of course, if you've read the Old Testament and you're kind of tracking along here, you know that Jericho is significant because of the walls there, right? It's this gentile stronghold that prevents the people of God from coming into the promised land. In fact, it's the first place they come to remember when God is going to give them the land. And this is the first big story where we really get it. It's not by their military might, how many AR15s they're going to have or bombs they're going to drop, or military wit.

00:08:30

No, it's not going to be through might of men that this is going to be accomplished. Instead, God is going to give them the land. If you don't believe that, then you have to read the first part of Joshua where the first thing God tells all the fighting men to do is to be circumcised if you're going into battle. I don't know, but that doesn't sound like a great strategy, does it? Like, here's the most elite Navy SEAL team.

00:08:55

You guys are getting circumcised. That's the way we're going to win this. But it's ritual purity, isn't it? In other words, God's law and obedience to him comes first. You see, it's a weird part of the story.

00:09:10

Why is this here? Well, it's here because it's not through military might. They don't do it through fighting, do they? They do it through singing, through liturgy. Truly worship.

00:09:22

That's how the walls come down. And notice when you can't see over a wall, right, you're sort of blinded. You know, you got this wall in front. You can't see over that till the walls come down. So you have sight here.

00:09:34

So we already are in Jericho, and we're already thinking, oh, wow. And now this guy kind of represents the Gentile population. Not only that, you remember there's a lady in Jericho, right? Remember the spies and all of this. And Rahab is her name.

00:09:50

She's in fact, the first Gentile convert in all of the Bible. So once the family of God gets put in place, in other words, Abraham's family, she's the first convert to that family that is not hereditary ethnically a Jew, but rather a Canaanite. And this shows us. This shows us that God was always for the nations. His election, again, is not for individual salvation of just this one family, but that this one family was elected to bless all nations, all peoples.

00:10:30

And already at the beginning of Joshua, we get a lady and her whole family that is safe. The walls all come down except for one wall, one part of the wall. And that was where her house was, and she was saved. And anybody that rallied to her. One of the things you'll pick up in the narratives of the Old Testament is this idea that God chooses a person and then you rally to that person and salvation comes through them.

00:10:57

You know, like Noah, God says, I'm going to save the world. If you want to be saved, it's going to be through getting on Noah's boat, right? It's going to be getting in Noah. And sorry, Abraham's family, ultimately, we rally to one man, don't we? Jesus Christ.

00:11:21

And in him is salvation. And when we're in his house, when we're in his family, that's where salvation is. So, interestingly, Rahab and I've never put this together till I was studying this week. Rahab married Salmon, some of you would say Salmon of the tribe of Judah. And she was the mother of Boaz, who then marries a Moabite Gentile.

00:11:56

You remember this, Ruth? Okay. Who then, of course, is, you know, Boaz is the father of Obed. This is the way Ruth ends. Obed, the father of Jesse.

00:12:10

And Jesse the father of who? David. King David. Now, what does this blind man say when he hears that Jesus is coming? Son of David, have mercy on me.

00:12:28

You see, it's not lost upon him that he's at Jericho with these walls of blindness up, and yet there's a new Joshua in town. Because, you know, the Hebrew for Joshua is Yahweh saves. And when we transliterate it over into Greek, it's Iesous, which is Joshua in Greek form. Jesus. Jesus is the same word as Joshua.

00:12:57

This is the new Joshua. Jesus is here. Now, he hears of Jesus coming, and he calls out, and he's about to be a part of the family of God. Now, we don't know if he's gentile or not, but I like to think he probably is. And this is maybe the first time, you know, here where we've got somebody in Jericho, again, gentile, that is saved.

00:13:18

Because that's how election works. Election is not meant to exclude, but to include. So in other words, the exclusivity of Jesus leads to massive inclusivity across the world. That is to say, Christianity is literally the most diverse religion in the world. Somebody said, well, hang on, I thought Hinduism.

00:13:46

No, no, no, no, no. Most Hindus are Indian. Well, Muslims. Right. Well, Indonesian, yes.

00:13:54

African, yes. You know, majority of Muslims aren't even Arabic, by the way. They're more Indonesian and North African. But nonetheless, Christianity goes across every single socioeconomic line more than any other religion in the world, period. That's just a fact.

00:14:17

Why? Why? Because of. Because of the exclusiveness of election of one man, Jesus Christ, who is not just man, but the God man. He's God in the flesh.

00:14:34

All right, so then we have this blind beggar, we're told, who's sitting by the roadside. I like to put it in my notes here. I've said, you know, he's a blind beggar. That is sidelined. He's riding the bench while other people are moving up and down the road, perhaps, you know, living their best life.

00:14:56

He is stuck on the side of the road, blind and begging.

00:15:03

And that's us. If we could see us, that's us. Before we meet Jesus, before we get on the way, we too are blind. We too are in great need. Whether we know it or not, we should be begging the Lord to have mercy on us.

00:15:27

And maybe you today feel in darkness.

00:15:32

Sometimes we drop into times of darkness where we can't see anymore. You know, some people have this interesting idea that once you become a Christian, you can just see and everything from here is up. I chuckle because, well, you've not lived very long on the way. Because trust me when I say there are times of darkness where we need to just stop, get on the side of the road, and wait until we can hear his voice again. You know, if the lights all go out in a room and you can't see, the worst thing to do is run, right?

00:16:12

Can you imagine? Just, boom, you know, no, you're going to get hurt. You know, bad things are going to happen. You need to just hang tight, hang tight until the light comes again. Until somebody comes to rescue you.

00:16:28

Just hang tight. You know, we get hurt when we're running in darkness. We're being led by the blind. That's when we get hurt. And this man is blind and he is sitting by the wayside.

00:16:42

But notice he hears that Jesus was coming near. This is hope for him. In Plato's Cave, famous philosophical text, there's darkness. And you remember how the darkness works when you're in darkness. You get used to it.

00:17:02

You actually do. You get used to being in the dark. You know, just like on a really sunny day, if you're inside and you like all the blinds, you know, closed like a cave. By the way, if I come over your house, I'm very tempted just to open those blinds. I'll just be honest with you.

00:17:16

Like, if it's daytime, the blinds need to be open. That's just my opinion, but it's just the way I live my life. Every morning, that's the first thing that comes open. The light comes in, right? But if you're in the cave, if you're in darkness and then you come out into broad daylight, you can't see very well, right?

00:17:31

You know, the whole dilation thing happens. Same thing in a movie theater. You know, you're in a movie theater, it's dark, but you're kind of used to it, you know, and some of us get used to the darkness. And that's not A good thing. And in a world of darkness, and we're told the world is dark.

00:17:45

In a world of darkness, we have to be ever vigilant to make sure that we are getting enough light, enough daylight, enough time in the sun, and enough time with the sun. It does the body good. It does the soul good. Sometimes when I'm doing my work, Jessica knows this, I will go into the backyard and just sit in the sun so I can just feel the sun. You know, now they call it even grounding, right, where you just go stand in the grass.

00:18:16

So you can just kind of be grounded rather than in the digital world. And, you know, there's so much darkness in our world and there's also so many voices that it's hard to know who to follow, isn't it? I mean, if we're just really honest, we've got all these influencers and our kids are just constantly watching it. And I get it. We watch them even, you know, in a way.

00:18:43

And you're not going to stop it necessarily. But we need to teach our kids and we even need to know how to recognize. Recognize the truth. The voice of God needs to be able to cut through all these other voices. In fact, I just recently heard a news story I was kind of shocked by about an AI chat bot that led to someone's death.

00:19:10

I'll just keep it, keep it simple here because we have little ears. But that led to someone's death because they were talking to this robot, this AI artificial intelligence, as if it was a person trying to find solace in a machine. Now, if you'd have told that somebody 20 years ago, they would not even believe that anything like that was. That's ridiculous. No one would ever follow.

00:19:38

And they did, and they do. And robots for other nefarious means. And you know what I'm talking about. Maybe. And if you don't, don't even worry about it.

00:19:50

But if you do. It's a sad state that we're in that we're trying to talk to a machine that's programmed by people only. It has no intelligence of its own, Period. We can argue that later. And we're trying to understand reality by that.

00:20:08

It is the epitome, my dear friends, of idolatry. We're making a robot into ourself and then trying to get it to tell us the ways of life. God help us. God help those people that are in darkness that don't know the light of truth like we do, like I hope you do. And even some of us, some of the ones that were closest to Jesus, think about this.

00:20:39

Were the ones who were blind. The disciples, we just. James and John, they didn't get it. And this blind man who can't even see Jesus, son of David, he's already saying he's the Messiah. He's already saying, God in the flesh, come to rescue us.

00:20:58

The new Joshua's in town, and he can't even see the guy. And the disciples are with him 24 7, and they still don't get it. That's us. We need to be careful that we're not high. And, oh, yeah, just because you have a Bible at your house doesn't mean it's in you.

00:21:16

It doesn't mean that you're walking in the light.

00:21:21

CS Lewis talked about this phenomena of generational snobbery. That is to say, each generation after the other thinks it's smarter than the one before.

00:21:38

But let me tell you something.

00:21:41

I'm like that Nate Bargotzi guy. He said, if I were to go back in time, I wouldn't be of much help, you know, because he's like, I would be able to tell people like, yeah, we can actually communicate over thousands of miles through a little device in my pocket. And they're like, oh, cool, can you help us make one? He's like, I have no idea how to do it.

00:22:00

Just because we're in a library doesn't mean we have all the knowledge there. And just because we have a lot of knowledge doesn't mean we have wisdom. And wisdom is how to live it. The ancients called it prudence.

00:22:19

We have access, literally, to all knowledge that mankind has ever thought of. We have it all. We have all of it. You can go read Plato, Aristotle, till your eyes bleed today for free, okay? But we don't.

00:22:36

We don't care. We just listen to the next influencer who helps us click our way through life. Right? I mean, listen, it's a sad state. My point is not to shame us.

00:22:46

I do the same thing. I do the same thing, okay? But here's the thing. We need to be able to recognize the truth. We need to be able to cut through.

00:22:54

It's fine to use these devices as entertainment, but as soon as we start trying to base our life on it, it's absolute idolatry.

00:23:09

Now, here's the good news. Jesus always comes near, doesn't he? Jack actually prayed it in our prayer meeting.

00:23:20

He heard Jesus was near because, remember, he can't see. He's got to listen. And he heard people. Jesus coming. Jesus coming by we got to get ready.

00:23:30

Now. Think about this. Jericho. That's also where we learn in Luke that Zacchaeus met Jesus. So this is the same story.

00:23:39

All right, this is the same story. So Zacchaeus, Jesus just got finished, probably at Zacchaeus house, and now he's leaving town. And you remember what happened to Zacchaeus. He can't. He's a little guy, remember?

00:23:48

He can't see. He can't see over all these people. And you notice in the Gospels, this happens all the time. The crowds often obstruct us from seeing Jesus. The multitudes.

00:24:03

The multitudes often obstruct us from seeing Jesus. But what does he do? He doesn't give up, does he? No, Zacchaeus, what does he do? You know, he climbs up in the sick.

00:24:11

I almost sang that song, by the way. I probably should have. I know that one better. Jack's like, no, just let me handle that. Next.

00:24:18

Zacchaeus climbs up in a tree so he can see Jesus, doesn't he? And guess what? All this diligence, this tenacity to see Jesus, guess what happens when Jesus comes by. He stops, interestingly, looks up and says, zacchaeus, let's go to your house, man. In other words, Zacchaeus was looking for Jesus.

00:24:44

But when Zacchaeus meets Jesus, he realizes that Jesus was looking for Zacchaeus.

00:24:51

And Jesus is always looking for us before we're ever looking for him. And so if you're looking for Jesus today, keep going. Because the reality is, when you find him, when you finally hear, you're going to realize he's been pursuing you the whole time. He's always first. That's what grace is.

00:25:09

He's always first.

00:25:14

Let me just say he's looking for you. The one in darkness, the one sitting by the wayside, the one that thinks life is passing them by. He says, no, no, Jesus on the way. You say, well, then, Pastor, how do I meet Jesus? Like this guy.

00:25:31

Please do it like this guy. You remember what happens, right? Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me. Hey, man, be quiet, dude. I'm trying to hear Jesus.

00:25:42

He's coming through teaching. I'm sure it was well intentioned, you know, by the crowd. They sternly, hey, shut your mouth. You know, somebody just yelling out in a crowd, it's like, I mean, if somebody. If one of you just started yelling out, you know, every first of all, everybody's head would turn.

00:25:59

Because that's what you guys do. If there's a little noise back here, your head starts some of you are very disciplined. You just keep looking at me, even though you really want to look back there. I get it. It's okay.

00:26:07

You can look. It doesn't bother me. I don't get offended, okay? But we all get distracted. We all lose our way.

00:26:14

We all are looking here to there with this thing, and this guy, he's crying out. And imagine somebody crying out in the midst. We'd be like, hey, man, you okay? What's going on? And then once we find out, like, well, you want to meet Jesus?

00:26:25

Well, yeah, I do, too, you know, like, then it becomes like this competitive thing, like, be quiet, man. We all want to hear him. Okay. And what does he do? Okay, yeah.

00:26:35

No, I'm sorry. Forgive me? No, of course not. What does he do? He starts yelling all the more, Son of David, have mercy on me.

00:26:46

Screaming, crying out, making a fool of himself. You know, I've done something like this similarly, and you know the story, so I'll be brief with it. But back in the day, Justin and I took a vacation with our parents to Atlanta. And we were going to see the Braves play, you know, and went to a water park, right? And at that water park, interesting.

00:27:09

Was some relief pitcher. I don't remember his name. And then all of himself, Greg Maddux, my favorite pitcher. But I was so stupefied, you know, like just. I was frozen, paralyzed.

00:27:22

I couldn't go meet him. So Justin went over there and met him, talked to him, you know, as a little kid. Who knows what he thought of that? But I was. I thought he just think I'm stupid.

00:27:30

So I'm not going to go over there, you know, and some of us. Some of us honestly think that way about God. He doesn't want to hear my problems. He won't be able to. He won't be.

00:27:40

He doesn't care about this. Yes, he does. You see, with us, if I give a lot of attention to Jessica, that means I don't give a lot of attention to you. If I give a lot of attention to the church, then it means I don't give a lot of attention to my kids, you see, because I have a limited amount. Not so with God.

00:28:04

He can give all of his attention to you and all of his attention to me and the other 8 billion souls that are across our world. He has no limitation. You are his primary concern and I am his primary concern all at the same time. Isn't that cool? In other words, he's not like a pie where if I get a lot of Jesus, then.

00:28:26

Hmm, too Bad for you. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's all of him. And he wants to give himself to all of you. All of you.

00:28:39

And here's the good news. He's not far from each one of us. Paul speaking at the Areopagus. You remember this? In Greece.

00:28:45

And by the way, I actually stood on the Areopagus. I mean, I just. It was one of the highlights of my life. I actually stood where Paul stood and he gave this speech at the Areopagus, because you're looking right there at the Parthenon, right? And he stood on that rock and he said to those philosophers, he said, here's why he did it.

00:29:04

That they should seek God. The nations, the nation. Notice. The nations should seek God and perhaps think about this, Feel their way toward him and find Him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us.

00:29:24

For we live and we move and we have our being in Him.

00:29:35

Do you think that's air you're breathing? Remember from the Matrix, Nobody. You think that's air you're breathing? Where did that air come? It's him.

00:29:46

We live and swim in all of what God has given to us.

00:29:53

And we say, I can't. I don't know that. I don't know that darkness. Lord, open our eyes. Cry out to him.

00:30:03

I would dare you just to cry out to him. Because here's the thing. I wanted to meet Drew Brees really, really bad, okay? And Jessica and I took this trip up to Tennessee. And I was from here to gym from Drew Brees.

00:30:16

And he was in this little short bus thing that was going to take him to the airport, I guess. And he got out, started signing autographs, and I like.

00:30:26

And all of a sudden somebody said, hey, man, we gotta go right now. So he got back in the bus, rolled off that close. That close. So then years later, I went out to Texas to an event that I knew he was gonna be at. I circled the whole place.

00:30:40

It's a long story. It was very cold. I circled the whole place. I saw a bunch of people in these blacked out suits with these blacked out cars. And I knew that was where the rich people were gonna leave.

00:30:50

And so I hung out there with this one other couple and we hung out there. I didn't have a jacket. And all of a sudden, here comes Drew Brees and all these other, you know, athletic people. And I knew, like, this is it. This is my only chance, you know, to try to do something here.

00:31:06

I had a little Pee Wee football, by the way. And I didn't even have a marker, and my phone was dead. And so I just literally started acting a fool. I don't really do this a lot, I don't think, but I was like, drew, Drew. Hey, who that?

00:31:25

Who that? Let's go, St. Drew. Drew. And he's like, talking to Colt McCoy.

00:31:31

Actually, he was talking to Colt McCoy, and I guess they were trying to make dinner plans, you know, and he's like, the heck is this maniac? You know? And he, like, he has to look because we all have to look, you know, when somebody's going nuts, right? And I'm like, let's go, Drew. You know?

00:31:46

And so. And I'm trying to keep my distance just to show him I'm safe, you know?

00:31:52

So finally he looks and he's like. He said, okay, I'll be over there in just seconds, you know? And so he finishes up his little thing there, runs over, and then, you know, the rest is history. I have a sign ball with him and a picture, because that nice couple took the picture of me with Drew Brees, you know, all because I acted a fool to get his attention. You know what?

00:32:12

This dude was not going to let anybody stand in his way of getting to Jesus. Now he can't even see. He doesn't even know how far Jesus is away. And maybe that's you. Maybe you're like, I don't even know where God is in my life right now.

00:32:26

I don't even know that I've heard him ever. Really. Could I tell you, please cry out to him in your heart of hearts. I mean, the real you down in there. Really.

00:32:37

Do you want to know him? Because that's the first thing Jesus asked. What do you want me to do? I want to see. I want to see.

00:32:44

I want to see you, Jesus. I can tell you this if you tell Jesus that in your heart of hearts, you're going to see him, you're going to hear him. He's coming to you. And when he does, you'll be like, oh, man, he's been looking for me all this time. I thought it was me that was the problem.

00:33:07

But he's been pursuing you all these years. Today could be the day where you call out to him and he comes to you. Jesus stood still and calls him here. And here's the other lesson that we have here is Jesus tells other people to go tell the dude. Did you catch that?

00:33:26

Isn't that interesting how that works out? Look at it. He says, call him here. And they called the blind man, saying, take Heart, buddy, get up, he's calling you. They probably were mad, you know, like, why am I not getting to go?

00:33:41

But this guy that was acting a fool, can't even see on the sidelines of life, that's who's going to meet Jesus and then notice what he does. Notice what he does. And that's our calling as a church, by the way, is to carry the message of Jesus to others just like these people did. Even in our weaknesses, we carry the message of Jesus. Now check that.

00:34:02

This is my favorite part of this whole story. I remember as a kid, my dad preached on this and at this point I was just blown away because notice what happens. So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus.

00:34:19

Blind people don't throw stuff around, right? Couldn't find it again. Think about it. He throws his coat off and springs up. I mean, this dude's ready to go.

00:34:32

He's like, as soon as Drew called for me, I'm hey, man, right here. Hey buddy, you know, he sprang up and came to Jesus. Came to his way. Listening to his voice, I'm sure people had to even get out of the way. Like, whoa, whoa, whoa, he can't see.

00:34:49

Get out of his way. Get out of his way. There he is. What's the lesson for us? We've got to throw off our old life.

00:34:59

In other words, he's not coming back to that cloak. Not if he doesn't get healed, not if he doesn't regain sight. He'll never see that cloak again. He never saw it to begin with. You see and notice.

00:35:10

Here's what's the other. And so that was a lesson as a kid. I remember thinking, man, this dude threw it all away to go after Jesus. That's necessary to find him. As long as you don't want to really find him.

00:35:26

He is totally satisfied to remain hidden in your life. But as soon as you give it all up for him, go to him. He's going to make himself known and he will heal us and give a sight.

00:35:46

Now, I had no idea about this. I'm just an amateur philosopher right now. But get this, this is nuts to me. Plato wrote a dialogue, alright, about 360 BC and it's called Timaeus isn't that nut? This dude's father's name is Timaeus, right?

00:36:06

Remember Bar? Timaeus. Bar in Hebrew just means like son of. Okay, so he's just son of Timaeus, right? Just like saying Jackson, son of Jack.

00:36:15

Even though that's not true, Bartimaeus, it's Timaeus. Listen. Plato writes a dialogue where his interlocutor is actually Timaeus, and they're talking about the world and trying to understand reality. Now think about this. He throws off this cloak.

00:36:33

And philosophically, symbolically, we might say it like this. If you've gone as high as you can go in trying to understand the world, which is philosophy, maybe perhaps throw that off too. Because when Jesus is in the room, the Creator himself, the Maker himself, is there to reveal way more than we can ever know with our mind. In fact, it carries us all the way up to the heavens. He throws off all of his knowledge here for the one who is the Truth himself, Jesus.

00:37:12

And so must we. So Jesus asked him, what do you want me to do? Let me see again. Let me see again. Go.

00:37:22

Notice this first. Go. For your faith has made you well. And immediately he was healed, and he followed him on the way. Do you know that the very first Christians were said to not be Christians, but rather followers of the way?

00:37:40

We're all supposed to get on the way with Jesus, not be sidelined, not be benched. He plays everybody. He plays everybody. He's not a coach that just plays the best of us. No, no, no, no, no.

00:37:53

Because I would be on the bench 100%. I'd be fired from the team, Truly. So how many of us feel like we're sitting on the sidelines riding the bench today? How many of us feel like life is passing us by, that we don't know the voice of God, that we can't see, that we don't know where we're going, that the walls are up? Let me tell you, if you worship Jesus Christ today, the walls will come down, darkness will turn into light, and you'll feel the warmth of his love.

00:38:29

Don't let Jesus pass you by today. Don't let him pass you by today. He's near right on the tongue. He's near right in the mind. He's near.

00:38:44

If we would but call his name, crying out to him, Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, May it be so. Amen.

Total Duration 00:39:00