Pastor Jonah Sage preached from Mark 10:46-52 in our “Kingdom Living” series. He said that the way up in the Kingdom of God is the way down. Lector: Meagan Baker
Pastor Jonah Sage preached from Mark 10:46-52 in our “Kingdom Living” series. He said that the way up in the Kingdom of God is the way down.
Lector: Meagan Baker
We come to our last story about greatness in this series.
As he has shown us repeatedly, Jesus will again reveal to us that the way up in the Kingdom of God is the way down.
This will help us begin to answer the next question Mark poses for us.
Here, we answer "what is true greatness in God's Kingdom?"
Soon, we will answer, "what does it cost?"
Like Jesus, we will be invited to take a Journey Into Night.
Journey Into Night Artwork
Thanks be to God we have these stories because this kind of invitation may be scary
Just like the world has a skewed understanding of greatness, so too does the world have a skewed view of what it takes to get there.
Jesus will tell us that journeying into the light of resurrection and life will first mean a journey into night, facing our own darkness.
And the final story he gives us in preparation could not be more fitting.
Follow the logic of Mark with me:
In Mark 9:38, the disciples want greatness through Brand Management.
They want to make a name for themselves, be seen and noticed, important:
John said to Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone using your name to cast out demons, but we told him to stop because he wasn’t in our group.”
-Mark 9:38
The world says greatness comes through achievement and notoriety.
Jesus says greatness comes through smallness, obscurity, child-like innocence
Religious people come to trap Jesus about a touchy social topic, divorce.
Jesus affirms the Bible, calls men to honor God's design, and gives women empowering protections...all in less than a minute of talking.
Jesus says greatness comes through equality, interdependence, and protecting the vulnerable.
Then some parents want Jesus to bless their children, but again the disciples have a problem.
The disciples scolded the parents for bothering him.
-Mark 10:13
The world says greatness comes through important adult stuff.
Kids should be unseen and unheard.
But Jesus says let the children come to me, they are the model of discipleship.
Then a rich man, who has done everything right, wants to get into heaven.
So Jesus tells him to sell all he has...and the man went away sad.
The world says to cultivate possessions, status, and riches.
But Jesus says to give it away and learn to depend on him just like a child depends on parents.
Then Jesus, thinking the disciples might get it now, tells his followers he will die...and the disciples ask who gets to have the best seat in heaven.
Over and over Jesus shows and tells his disciples that the way up is the way down.
And over and over, the disciples keep asking how to get higher in the world's eyes.
They do not want to face the darkness of Jesus' death, they do not want to face the difficulties of Christ's counter-cultural kingdom, they do not have the imagination for anything other than what they've always known.
Be seen. Be important. Be great.
So...watch what happens:
Then they reached Jericho, and as Jesus and his disciples left town, a large crowd followed him. A blind beggar named Bartimaeus was sitting beside the road.
-Mark 10:46
The large crowd looks good. It must be working!
But what do you think the disciples thought about Bartimaeus?
I bet they did like we do when we see that man holding the sign at an intersection.
They looked away, pretended not to notice him, reminded themselves of the important work they had to do.
But what might Jesus, and Mark, be trying to say to us?
After all the misunderstandings, after all the misplaced desires for greatness...we come to a story about a blind man.
What might Jesus be saying it takes to understand life in his Kingdom?
When Bartimaeus heard that Jesus of Nazareth was nearby, he began to shout, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!"
-Mark 10:47
What have the disciples been asking for? Make us great.
The disciples, with all their faculties intact, with all this access to Jesus...they want worldly greatness. They want status.
And then someone we would all rather avoid shouts out MERCY!
He wants mercy. The difference is stunning.
But people yelled at him to be quiet. He was interrupting important church work!
But he only shouted louder, "Son of David, have mercy on me!"
-Mark 10:48
And just like he did with the little ones, Jesus ignores the disciples and invites this needy man near.
Just like he does last week to the disciples, Jesus asks Bartimaeus perhaps the most important question he asks any of us:
"What do you want me to do for you?" Jesus asked.
-Mark 10:51
Do you think James and John's ears perked up, remembering Jesus asking them the same thing a short while ago? Just a few verses earlier, they faced the same question
As we saw, they had worldly greatness on their minds.
Before, Jesus held up a child to try and show them the way forward.
But that wasn't enough. They still didn't understand.
So now, we have as the model of discipleship, the pioneer pathway of greatness, a blind beggar.
What might Jesus be trying to say to us?
Perhaps the vulnerable, the desperate, the needy have something significant indeed to teach us about following Jesus.
"My Rabbi," the blind man said...
-Mark 10:51
Do you notice the difference in posture between the Bartimaeus and the disciples?
He does not come as one with a long list of aspirations.
He does not view Jesus as a genie come to grant him his wishes.
He calls him rabbi. My teacher. You say that to someone you need to learn from.
Even more so, in that day, to follow a Rabbi wasn't just to say "i want to learn from you", it was to say "I want to live as you live."
This one who cried out for mercy calls Jesus Rabbi.
He comes to listen, to learn, to follow, and hoping to receive not greatness, but mercy.
The way up in the Kingdom of God is the way down, admitting you need help, crying out for mercy, looking to Jesus as your Rabbi.
"I want to see!"
-Mark 10:51
Now it's not in the text, but I see Jesus very slowly side eyeing James and john.
I see a long, pregnant pause here to let the moment sink in.
The man who asked for mercy does not want greatness, he wants healing.
He does not want status, position, or possession. He wants to be restored.
The way up in the Kingdom of God is the way down.
We do not strive for position or possession, but for healing and wholeness in Jesus.
Our great aspiration is to know and follow Jesus, become who we truly are.
Blind as we are, needy as we are, we cry out for mercy, not status.
"Go, for your faith has healed you." Instantly the man could see, and he followed Jesus down the road.
-Mark 10:52
Mark is asking the attentive hearer of these words "do YOU see, now?"
Do you see how much you have to learn from this blind beggar?
I was talking with a pastor from another church, different culture, last week.
He observed something I found true and fascinating.
He said, "folks like you seem to feel so much pressure to achieve," he said.
"You grew up with so much expectation, and people like you get to your mid 30s and if you're not running the world you feel like a failure."
When I served in student ministry in college, we were told the more kids came the more successful we were.
We invited speakers from other youth ministries to come and teach us how we could get ours as big as theirs. If it was bigger, the Lord was with us.
We never invited people who had small ministries to speak, because what would they have to offer?
When we had fund raising banquets, we only told stories that were exciting, spectacular, unusual. Because those were the only important stories.
In my 20s, my college roommate and I started a company with the stated goal of restoring American Democracy and a free market economy. Not ambitious at all.
Because it had to be big, because we. Had. To. Be. Big.
We had to be seen. We had to be successful.
When I went to seminary nearing 30, I was given classes on how to grow a church.
Speakers were brought in from big churches to teach us how to make our church as big as theirs.
We were told to grow our church large enough so we could write a blog.
If the blog got big enough, we could get a book deal.
And if enough people bought our book, we could speak at conferences.
Everything about my life from my earliest memories until my mid 30s told me we have to make it bigger, faster, and better.
We said it was for God, but really it was for us.
Do you feel this pressure?
Do you feel the weight of a life you suspect is not important enough?
Your job doesn't matter. Your house doesn't matter. Your friends, your car...
It needs to be bigger and better. Our church needs to be bigger and better.
More more more! Do you see?
One of the greatest pains of my life lately is I look at how I was discipled, I look at what I was told was most important, and I cannot find any of it in the life and teachings of Jesus.
Many of us have been discipled by corporate America far more than we have by Jesus.
We push the children away and avoid the eyes of the beggar because surely we have important adult work to do here. This is for God, after all!
But when God came, he did not go big, he went small.
He went to the vulnerable, to the oppressed, to the voiceless and choiceless.
And here, in Jesus' final happy miracle of the gospel of Mark, he goes to a blind man.
What might he be trying to SHOW us about who we are and where he wants us to go?
You have heard it say climb the ladder and make a name for yourself.
But Jesus says to us "You are blind."
That burning for greatness and significance inside of you comes from being made in the image of God.
It is not wrong. It is not sinful.
But the world's way towards greatness is.
The way up in the Kingdom of God is the way down.
We do not strive for bigness, we follow Jesus.
We do not make a name for ourselves, we follow Jesus.
We do not cling to position or possession, we follow Jesus.
The way up in the Kingdom of God is the way down, and so each of us is invited to head down with Jesus and descend to greatness.
Let's pray.