Sunday Worship
Everyone is most welcome to join us for our Sunday Eucharist at St Thomas' Church at 11 am or at St Agnes' at 9.15 am. Reverend Amy-Elizabeth will be preaching and presiding on the 21st Sunday after Trinity at both churches. Some of our Covid precautions remain in place to keep everybody safe, but we'll be singing a couple of hymns and offering refreshments after the service, and Sunday School is now back at St Thomas'.
If you're not able to be with us in person, you can find the Gospel, reflection and prayers below.
Our first hymn today is "Just as I am, Without one Plea"
Today's Gospel
Mark 10:46-52 Blind Bartimaeus Receives His Sight
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!” 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. 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.
Reflection
This short Gospel passage seems very straight forward – it’s just another example of Jesus healing someone isn’t it? After all, that’s what Jesus does and why everyone like to be around him. But as with most of the Gospels, there is more to this than is immediately obvious.
There is much in here about the power of prayer, faith, determination, courage and trust of Bartimaeus. Next, there is the behaviour of the somewhat fickle crowd around him. Last but not least there is the compassion and friendliness of Jesus in the way he responds to Bartimaeus.
Bartimaeus was a poor beggar, an outcast in society that had little time for those who were disabled in any way. But he was clearly conversant with the scriptures, the word of God. He knew of and believed in the promise that God would send a Messiah to rule His people and bring unity back to the tribes of Israel, just as David had done in times of old. Though he was blind he recognised that Jesus was that promised Messiah and he deliberately called to Jesus referring to him as ‘Jesus, Son of David’.
Despite his lowly position, Bartimaeus bravely shouted to Jesus to get his attention. Sure, enough the crowd scorned him and we are told tried to angrily prevent him from coming forward or being heard. Being blind, Bartimaeus would not have been able to see where exactly Jesus was. His predicament must have felt perilous and frightening but his faith was strong and his trusted in the Lord. He summoned up even more courage and shouted even louder so Jesus could here him. And his persistence paid off when Jesus called him forward.
Bartimaeus’ next act was also one of even more courage as we are told that he threw off his cloak. Why is that a big deal? To understand the significance, we need to understand how precious a cloak would be in those times and in that part of Middle East. The temperatures could fluctuate quite widely. In the daytime it could get quite hot so a cloak could be used to provide shade but in the evenings and night-time it could be very cold, especially for someone that didn’t have a house. To sum up a cloak was deemed to be one of the most essential items you could have as protection against the elements.
Yet, here we see that, in order to come to Jesus, Bartimaeus was willing to leave his cloak and being blind he risked not being able to find it again. It is a symbol that his faith was so strong, he was willing to risk his greatest possessions, to come before Jesus unshrouded and lay his problems in Jesus caring hands. His faith and trust were absolute.
Then what of the crowds? How quick they were to condemn and put Bartimaeus to shame. To try and obscure this beggar from their wonderful teacher. But then we learn that as soon as Jesus calls to Bartimaeus, their whole demeanour changes. They now start to encourage him to come forward. There is a clear example of how two-faced people can be especially when in a group. In this instance they were so keen to ‘be seen’ to do the right thing that they changed their behaviour despite what their initial inclination had been.
We too have to guard against such behaviour. In our modern society it is all too easy to ‘jump on the band-wagon’ or ‘follow the crowd’. Especially, now we have the technology of Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and other social media. It can become all too easy just to ‘share’ things without taking time to really understand what the underlying message might be or whether the person who originated it may have an ulterior motive.
For those who don’t use technology so much, we still need to be careful about carelessly sharing opinions and the way we react to each other. We are striving to be an inclusive church and we need to take every aspect of that to heart so we do not commit acts of unconscious bias based on misguided or populist attitudes.
We can see how Jesus behaved in an inclusive way in the manner in which he dealt with the beggar. Imagine what emotions the beggar must have had going through his head in those few moments. There was the fear of the treatment he had received from the angry crowd, and now he was being jostled by them whilst not being able to see where he was going and finally, he was in front of Jesus. Was he scared? Daunted? Excited or nervous? Maybe all of these?
Although it was obvious what was wrong with the beggar, Jesus chose to communicate by voice and asked, “What do you want me to do for you?” In doing so, although the beggar couldn’t see the love in Jesus’ eyes, he would know where Jesus’ face was and could sense the caring and support in Jesus’ voice. He took away all the beggar’s anxiety and gave him permission to ask for what he wanted. He showed the love and compassion that Jesus has in unlimited amounts – He answered Bartimaeus’ prayers and rewarded his trust and faith.
