It’s the 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time and today’s gospel is the familiar story of the encounter of our Lord Jesus Christ with the blind Bartimaeus in Jericho. I am blessed to have visited Jericho two years ago and even today it is still a small town. Our gospel reading comes from Mark 10: 46-52.
“46 They came to Jericho. And as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a sizable crowd, Bartimaeus, a blind man, the son of Timaeus, sat by the roadside begging. 47 On hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me.” 48 And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he kept calling out all the more, “Son of David, have pity on me.”
49 Jesus stopped and said “Call him.” So they called the blind man, saying to him, “Take courage; get up, he is calling you.” 50 He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus. 51 Jesus said to him in reply, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man replied to him, “Master, I want to see.” 52 Jesus told him, “Go your way; your faith has saved you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way.”
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Just close your eyes and picture this scene where our Lord Jesus Christ together with his disciples were now on their way out of Jericho and along the roadside was the blind Bartimaeus. Since he was blind, he couldn’t see the spectacle of our Lord walking with his disciples. But the disciples were far from silent, as they must have been talking amongst themselves.
Hearing that the group walking along the streets of Jericho belonged to the famous Nazorean, Jesus Christ, the blind Bartimaeus suddenly cried out in a loud voice, , “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me.” Then some people in the crowd got annoyed and told him to be silent. But all the more, the blind Bartimaeus cried out, “Son of David, have pity on me.”
Then our Lord stopped on his tracks and called the blind man to him and asked what he could do for him? The Blind Bartimaeus then said, “Master, I want to see.” Then Jesus told him, “Go your way; your faith has saved you.” Then immediately, Bartimaeus could now see and he joined the disciples of Jesus. So why did our Lord stop to heal the blind Bartimaeus?
Theologians apparently trace this to the use by the blind Bartimaeus in calling our Lord Jesus Christ as the “Son of David” to the Old Testament specifically in 2 Samuel 7:14-16 and let me reprint this for you. ‘The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you: 12 When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, your own flesh and blood, and I will establish his kingdom. 13 He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. 14 I will be his father, and he will be my son.”
There are many other verses in the New and Old Testament that referred to our Lord Jesus Christ as the “Son of David.” But in this scripture story, the blind Bartimaeus believed that the Nazorean named Jesus Christ was truly the Son of David… and because he was blind and could not see where Jesus was along the road, he shouted out loud “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me” and doing so caught the attention of our Lord and he cured the blind man because of his faith.
What are the lessons that we can get from today’s scripture reading? First that more often than not, people with perfect eyesight cannot even recognize that the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of David and therefore the Son of God. It had to take a blind man named Bartimaeus to recognize that Jesus was truly the Son of David. In calling Jesus as the Son of David, Bartimaeus was actually professing his faith that our Lord was the Messiah prophesied by many prophets in the Old Testament.
But the blind Bartimaeus was a nobody and in fact he was only a blind beggar, yet he had faith that Jesus Christ was the Messiah, which is why he called him the Son of David. Yet if you’ve been faithfully reading the Holy Bible, especially the New Testament, you will see many verses or passages where our Lord Jesus Christ had a verbal exchange with the scribes, the Pharisees or the doctors of the law.
Yet every time these people get the wrong end of the discussion with our Lord Jesus who exposed these so-called “spiritual leaders” following the Mosaic Law, yet they could not recognize the man before them as the very man whom Isaiah prophesied who would be born of a virgin and that his kingdom would never end. This prophecy clearly indicated that the Messiah would have a spiritual kingdom, not a kingdom here on earth.
Today we are bombarded by so many sermons by our parish priests every time we hear our Sunday Mass who proclaim that our Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of David and indeed the only begotten Son of God who was born from a sinless mother named the Blessed Virgin Mary. God bless you!
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