30th Sunday in Ordinary Time

If we observe the stories of people who encounter Jesus in the Gospel, they are by and large people who are seeking help from Jesus, normally in the form of some physical healing. Invariably Jesus provides them with the help that they are seeking and they depart from Jesus with a fuller and brighter life. Their encounters with Jesus do not lead them to want to follow Jesus, and in the rare cases where they do, as was the case with the Gerasene demoniac, Jesus refuses to allow him to become a follower and instead sends him back to his own people to recount what the Lord has done for him (Mk 5:20) Today’s gospel is the notable exception to this general rule. Apart from Mary Magdalen, Bartimeus is the only other person, who, having been healed by Jesus, decides to follow Jesus and is allowed to do so by Jesus. Bartimaeus is also the only other person who is healed by Jesus and who is given a name in the gospels. This detail lends further support to the theory that he became a long-term disciple of Jesus, which would explain why the Markan tradition took care to preserve his name as this story was handed down orally for the three decades that it took to commit this story to writing.

The opening scene of the gospel is one that is full of movement. Jesus is accompanied by a huge crowd as he travels along the road that exits the city of Jericho. They are thronging around him, surging forward as they head towards the holy city of Jerusalem. Bartimaeus is sitting on the side of the road, immobile as this crowd press forward and threaten to engulf him. He must have already heard about Jesus who would have been the talk of the town. As he is engulfed by the crowd that surge forward after Jesus, Bartimaeus calls out to Jesus with the words, “Son of David, have mercy on me.” His words get drowned out by the crowd as they press forward. Some of the crowd see Bartimaeus as an inconsequential distraction. Jesus has made it clear that he is headed for Jerusalem. Many in this crowd expect him to come out clearly as the Messiah once he arrives in Jerusalem and so they are probably anticipating a big showdown with the chief priests and the leaders of the Jewish nation. Bartimaeus does not merit any of Jesus’ time, and would be delaying his highly anticipated arrival in Jerusalem. This is why many in the crowd tell Bartimaeus to be silent.

Bartimaeus is undeterred, he has had people ignore him and curse him all his life. He is used to being discouraged by people, he is used to being put down by people. All his life he has been under-estimated and derided by people as a good for nothing beggar. But he will not let these people stand in his way. We might reflect profitably on how so often we fail to push back at those who discourage us, and at the first sign of resistance to our plans, we give up all too easily. Perhaps this is an indication of how little we actually desire what we are seeking. Bartimaeus’ desire for healing would not let itself be suffocated so easily by the crowds who rebuffed him. It was him against the world, and he was going to win. So he shouts even louder, so that finally Jesus hears him and then tells the crowds to call him to come over.

Jesus asks Bartimaeus what he wishes to be done for him. Bartimaeus requests the gift of sight and Jesus says to him: “Go your way, your faith has saved you.” Those who approach Jesus for healing always get more than they bargained for, but very few actually realize it. They come to Jesus with a plain request for physical healing and Jesus almost always ups the ante and raises the level of their encounter with him to one of faith and salvation. Most people don’t take up Jesus’ offer to continue the dialogue of faith and salvation, they simply part ways with him, happy that they got what they were looking for, which was physical healing. They could have decided to stay and ask “wait, what do you mean, my faith has saved me? What faith? Saved me from what?” Perhaps they just presume that their encounter with Jesus saved them from a life of being handicapped by physical disability. So many of us have such a poor understanding of what salvation is. Jesus says to the Samaritan woman that he meets at the well “if you but knew the gift of God and who is offering it to you” (Jn 4: 10). Noone who approaches Jesus fully understands the gift that Jesus offers us, including Bartimaeus. But the difference with Bartimaeus is that instead of simply being content with having got what he wanted from Jesus, he sticks around to find out more about this man who has told him that his faith has saved him.

St. Ignatius, the founder of the Jesuit order, like many other saints, had quite a dramatic conversion story. After his conversion, he attempted to distill the trajectory of this conversion into a format that would be able to guide others through. He did this through inviting people to undergo a special retreat that he had formulated known as the Spiritual Exercises. Ignatius knew that his own conversion experience would not be a direct template to map onto the spiritual experience of others and so he counseled that not everyone should be given the Spiritual Exercises in the same way. He divided the Spiritual Exercises into four weeks, which correspond to different stages of following Christ. He counselled that not everyone should be made to do all four weeks of the Exercises, for he realized that some people would only be ready for the First week of the Exercises. The first week of the Exercises can basically be summed up as the experience of a sinner encountering God’s all embracing mercy and love and being transformed by this healing experience of forgiveness.

Many Christians end their spiritual journeys at the First Week, having got out of Jesus what they were looking for. They are like the majority of people who come to Jesus in the Gospel looking for healing and when they get it, disappear off into the sunset. There are a few Christians, however, who realize that there is more to the encounter with Jesus than simply our own salvation and that there is more to our own salvation than simply our own healing. It is such people as these that St. Ignatius recommends be given the full Four Weeks of the Spiritual Exercises that trace the trajectory of Jesus’ life through his public ministry, his passion, death and resurrection. Following Jesus through his Pascal Mystery is more than simply wishing to benefit from the grace of the forgiveness and mercy that are mediated to us by the Cross, for this is the grace that is received in the First Week. Following Jesus in the Second, Third and Fourth weeks is more about wanting to become like Jesus and share in his Ministry. This is what true discipleship is all about, and while “many are called,” it would seem that “few are chosen” (Mt. 22: 14), partly because so few chose to respond to the call of Jesus to a deeper experience of discipleship. Bartimaeus responded to this call and joined Jesus on the road to Jerusalem, what about you, do you wish to follow Jesus along this path that will lead him to the pain and suffering of rejection and death and ultimately into the glory of the Resurrection?

Questions for reflection

1. How do I respond to set-backs in my plans, to people who resist me and try and get in the way of me accomplishing what I set out to do?
2. Do I view my own healing from sin/addiction/physical ailment as only the first step towards a deeper following of the one who has saved me?
3. How do I feel about following Jesus on the road to Jerusalem where I know I will have to follow him into his Passion?