Let’s get it straight: Living God’s way in the
world is not for the faint-hearted. Our readings in the next
few weeks challenge our discipleship, calling to its very
foundations. We are invited to face our prejudice, to analyze
our motives for doing good, to reflect on our seemingly
endless capacity for conflict, to observe our desire for
status, as well as our murmuring and moaning against God when
the least thing upsets our way of doing things. And as they
say in the movies, "We’re the good guys!"
Most of us suffer from spiritual blindness. Bartimaeus,
who was blind, called out to Jesus, but before Jesus could
restore his sight he had to find out if that is what
Bartimaeus wanted— "What do you want me to do for
you?" "That I may receive my sight," he
replied. Let’s get it straight: What do you want me to
do for you? is the same question Jesus asks of us.
October 26
What Do You Want Me to Do?
Psalm 34:1-8, 19-22; Job 42:1-6, 10-17; Hebrews
7:23-28; Mark 10:46-52
What a difference it makes how we answer the same
question! On their journey to Jerusalem, Jesus asks the
squabbling disciples, "What do you want me to do for
you?" They answer him, "Grant us to sit on your
right and left hand" (Mark 10:36-37). A few days later,
Jesus is accosted with the shouts of the discriminated
against, disenfranchised blind beggar, Bartimaeus. "What
do you want me to do for you?" Jesus asks him, and he
replies, "Teacher, let me see again" (Mark 10:51).
Jesus cannot answer the request of the disciples, because
they are seeking self-aggrandizement and the power that goes
with it. Jesus can help Bartimaeus, on the other hand,
because he understands the true nature of his condition: He
is blind.
One of the "last" has become "first,"
and those who might reasonably have thought themselves
first—we who "have left everything and
followed"—have become "last." The writer
to the Hebrews draws a distinction between those called to
high office in the church who are subject to weakness, and
the Lord, who has real "power to save those who come to
God through him who is absolute, since he lives forever to
intercede for them" (Hebrews 7:25).
In a world whose values are almost permanently
topsy-turvy, people with integrity, uncontaminated by the
self-seeking of the world, are usually the disregarded, the
discriminated against. To choose to live life in the way of
God, despite the worst the systems can throw at us, requires
opened eyes. It calls for us to move beyond the simplistic
condemnation and blaming of God that so often mark
discipleship under pressure. Like Job we need to confess that
we have so often been those "who misrepresented your
intentions with ignorant words" (Job 42:3), and
recognize with the psalmist that "though hardships
without number beset the upright, the Lord God rescues...from
them all" (Psalm 34:19).
Reflection and Action
If Jesus were to ask, "What do you want me to do for
you?" how would you answer? How have you
"misrepresented God’s intentions with ignorant
words"? Where have you discovered God rescuing from
hardships?
