Luke 18:35 - 43
35 As he drew near to Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. 36 And hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what this meant. 37 They told him, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.” 38 And he cried out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” 39 And those who were in front rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he cried out all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” 40 And Jesus stopped and commanded him to be brought to him. And when he came near, he asked him, 41 “What do you want me to do for you?” He said, “Lord, let me recover my sight.” 42 And Jesus said to him, “Recover your sight; your faith has made you well.” 43 And immediately he recovered his sight and followed him, glorifying God. And all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.
Questions:
ReplyDelete1. Did his faith make him well? What does that mean?
https://hartmangroupdevotionsmark.blogspot.com/2018/10/mark-1046-52-46-then-they-came-to.html says:
ReplyDeleteMy two cents on faith and healing:
I looked at articles on this for a week. There are certain topics that really brings the kooks out of the woodwork. Faith and healing is one of them.
The point of this is that miracles are a response of God to seeing faith in us (among other things). We need to keep in mind that faith does not have any power within itself to do anything. Faith does not unlock hidden power within ourselves.
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People often treat faith and prayer like some Harry Potteresque charm to cause something to float in the air. No, faith and prayer are communications with God who is the actual causer of the events.
I understand that language can't always be taken quite so literally (even Jesus seems to use it as he says your faith has healed you) but misunderstanding this can push us to some very bad theology.
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I used to have almost the opposite view, in that faith accomplished nothing at all (except that it believed in what God wanted to do anyway).
A long time ago going through Matthew. When I got to the first examples of Jesus saying to someone something like, "Your faith has healed you," I remember thinking it was an anomaly. At the time, I thought that it was all God, and God decided when to heal someone or not (and that it was all for His glory). But when I kept reading example after example in Matthew of Jesus talking about what faith does, I had to back off my position.
I hope my current position on faith comes closer to reflecting reality. My position is that God takes such delight when we have faith in Him that He will move things as a result of it. I might go so far as to say that our faith is a driver of God's ultimate plan. While I used to view God's plan as something solid and immovable that He made before the beginning of time, I now have the view that our faith is something that is woven into God's plan. So am I saying that God's plan is fluid and depends on us? Yes and no. God's plan is solid and our faith-actions were predetermined, and went into His plan from the beginning.
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Bartimaeus's faith is not about reciting the correct confession or subscribing to certain dogmas. It is his unrelenting conviction that Jesus can and will rescue him from his need. We see this faith in what Bartimaeus does:
- He grasps who Jesus is. No one else so far in Mark has been able to perceive so much about Jesus from so little data. The title Bartimaeus uses, Son of David . . .
- He persists despite hindrances. Faith does not come easily to people in Mark; it must surmount obstacles to obtain what it seeks (see 2:4; 5:27, 35-36; 7:27; 9:18b).
- He expects a transformation. Presumably Jesus could have walked to Bartimaeus to talk with him. Instead, he tells the onlookers to summon Bartimaeus to him. Now those who sought to inhibit the beggar must assist in Jesus' ministry to him. Then Mark adds one more delicious detail: Bartimaeus tosses aside his cloak. Obviously he expects to regain his sight, for a blind beggar would ordinarily do well to keep his possessions close at hand. He obviously expects a change in his status. When Bartimaeus casts off his cloak, he confidently prefigures that he will no longer sit on his garment dependent upon handouts from passersby.
- He asks for the right thing. Also, when we consider that Jesus' question repeats what he asked James and John in last week's Gospel lection (10:36), we note that Bartimaeus seeks no special privileges. This reiterates that Jesus has not come to bestow power and honor but to open eyes to the new spiritual, social, and material realities made possible when God reigns. When it comes to understanding what Jesus has come to do, the disciples James and John are more "blind" than Bartimaeus.
https://hartmangroupdevotionsmark.blogspot.com/2018/10/mark-1046-52-46-then-they-came-to.html continued:
ReplyDeleteIn these chapters, we have two stories of the healing of blind men (8:22-26 and 10:46-52). Between these two stories, Jesus travels with the disciples toward Jerusalem. On the way, he tells the disciples three times of his coming death (8:31-33; 9:30-32; 10:32-34), but they respond to each of these predictions inappropriately, showing that they are blind to the future that Jesus is seeking to reveal to them.
Mark uses these two stories of blind men to bracket a series of stories about disciples who are spiritually blind. Furthermore, he singles out Jesus’ inner circle—Peter, James, and John—for special attention. They were privileged to be with Jesus at the Transfiguration (9:2-8), but seem to be blind to the truths that Jesus is trying to show them.
There are strong parallels between this story and Jesus’ earlier blessing of little children (10:13-16):
• The disciples tried to prevent parents from bringing their children to Jesus just as the crowd tried to shush Bartimaeus (vv. 13, 48)
• Jesus’ instructions to the disciples “Allow the little children to come to me” (v. 14), parallel his instructions to this crowd, “Call him” (v. 49).
• In both cases, Jesus reaches out with authority to include powerless, vulnerable people, modeling authentic Christian ministry.
“He, casting away (apobalon—casting aside—abandoning) his cloak, (Bartimaeus) sprang up, and came to Jesus” (v. 50). This man’s cloak is as important to his livelihood as boats are to a fisherman or a booth to a tax collector. Just as others abandoned boats and booths to follow Jesus, this man tosses aside cloak and coins to stand before the Son of David. He is quite unlike the rich man who, earlier in this chapter, could not bring himself to abandon his wealth (10:17-27).
He asks the same question that he asked of James and John (10:36) in the incident immediately preceding this story. James and John responded by asking for places of honor at Jesus’ right- and left-hand—positions where they would be seen and envied—where ordinary people would have to look up to them.
The blind man’s petition is very different from that of James and John. He asks not to be seen, but to see—not for honor, but for vision—not to be superior to ordinary people, but to become ordinary himself—not to rule over others, but to join them in their experience of a normal life.
https://hartmangroupdevotionsmark.blogspot.com/2018/10/mark-1046-52-46-then-they-came-to.html continued:
ReplyDeleteQuestion: "What did Jesus mean when He told people, ‘Your faith has made you well’?"
The power of Christ was what effected the cure, but His power was applied in connection with their faith. Just as the faith of some enabled them to receive healing, so healing was sometimes stymied by a lack of faith (see Matthew 13:58). In the same way, salvation comes to a sinner through faith. Everyone who is saved must believe, but it is the power of Christ that saves, not the power of faith. Faith is only the instrument, not the power itself.
In other words, the value of one’s faith does not come from the one who expresses it but from the object in which it rests (Mark 10:52; 11:22). Ultimately, healing is not contingent upon the quality of one’s faith, but upon the Healer.
We must recognize that Jesus did not indiscriminately heal all the people all of the time. For example, in the scene of the disabled man at the pool of Bethesda where multitudes gathered to be healed, Jesus chose only one man to heal (John 5:1–11), and his is an interesting case. Jesus asked the man if he wanted to be made well. His answer was steeped in superstition: there was no one to carry him to the pool, and he wasn’t fast enough to get into the water at the right time. This confused and needy man was healed by God’s grace. He had no faith in Jesus; he didn’t even know it was Jesus who had healed him until later (John 5:12–13).
Another example of someone who was healed before faith is the man born blind in John 9. He did not ask to be healed, but from many others, he was chosen to be healed—another example of God’s grace. In the case of the man born blind and in the case of the man at the pool, Jesus dealt with their physical problems separately from dealing with their spiritual need—the man in John 9 later comes to a full realization of who Jesus is and exercises faith in Him (verse 38). Jesus’ healing of these men was not about their faith as much as it was about His will.
Everyone whom Jesus willed to be healed was healed. Sometimes He healed those who expressed their faith in Him, and He made a point of emphasizing the condition of their heart: “Your faith has made you well.” Other times, in His great mercy, He healed those who had no faith and later drew them to Himself.
https://hartmangroupdevotionsmark.blogspot.com/2018/10/mark-1046-52-46-then-they-came-to.html continued:
ReplyDeleteQuestions and findings:
1. What does Timaeus mean?
2. Is there some significance to this story?
3. Did Bartimaeus' faith heal him or did Jesus?
1. It looks like it means son of honor. There's theories that Mark grabbed the significance of this name and placed the story as a counterpart to the disciples asking for places of honor, showing, once again, the blindness of the disciples.
2. Many people think there is a lot of significance to this story. Mark's theme is blindness towards who Jesus was and what He was about. The Jewish leaders were blind, and so were the disciples.
This story shows how a person went from physical blindness to physically seeing. Jesus is in the process of healing us (and the disciples) of our spiritual blindness. But, it seems like we must first be prepared to receive that healing. The story of Bartimaeus shows what it looks like for someone to be ready (i.e. have faith).
Bartimaeus saw his own great need, believed Jesus was the source of addressing that need. This realization drove him to shout out desperately to Jesus, and be willing to leave all his baggage behind. Once he was healed, his faith caused him to change the direction of his life to follow Jesus.
What would have happened if Bartimaeus was healed when he had no faith? It would have made his life on earth more comfortable, but his spiritual eternity wouldn't have changed.
3. Did Bartimaeus' faith heal him or did Jesus?
Jesus (through the power of Holy Spirit) healed Bartimaeus. But, Bartimaeus was in the place where God was going to heal Him. God was the source of the healing, but God's reaction to Bartimaeus' heart was a given. God is entirely consistent in how He reacts to us. If we are ready (i.e. have faith) God moves. Since our faith is a condition of God moving, it is not inaccurate to say that our faith does it. However, we must be careful how we view this.
It's sort of like how a magnifying glass works. Line up the magnifying glass just right and something gets burnt. Was it the sun or the magnifying glass that was responsible? We all know it was the sun that had all the power. But, it's still not inaccurate to say that the magnifying glass did it.
If we line up exactly in God's will, powerful things happen. Our faith focuses God's power. It's important to note that we don't know what will happen (unless it's revealed to us) when God's power is applied. It may be completely invisible to us.
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/luke/18-35.htm says:
ReplyDeleteSee Notes on Matthew 20:29-34; Mark 10:46-52. St. Luke, for some reason, passes over the ambitious request of the sons of Zebedee. He agrees with St. Mark, and not with St. Matthew, as to there being one blind man, and as to the miracle being wrought on the approach to Jericho, not on the departure from it.
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An apparent discrepancy exists in the three accounts given of this act of our Lord. St. Luke speaks of one blind man who was healed as our Lord was entering the town. St. Matthew and St. Mark mention that the miracle took place as our Lord was leaving the place, and St. Matthew mentions that two blind men received their sight at the bidding of Jesus. Several solutions of this little difficulty have been proposed. in the words of Dr. Morrison, "the case seems to have begun as he entered into the city, but it culminated in all likelihood as he departed." A later explanation, apparently preferred by Godet and Farrar, is that, as Josephus and Eusebius distinguish between the old and the new Jericho - the old town on the ancient site, and the new Herodian town which had sprung up at a little distance from it - the blind man might, according to some traditions, have been healed as Jesus was leaving old Jericho; according to others, as he was entering the new town. Mark and Luke only mentioning one blind man is easily explained. There was one evidently (as we shall suggest further on), a well-known character in Christian story - Bartimaeus. Two of the evangelists recorded his cure, as being of special interest to the Church, leaving the second among the numberless unrecorded miracles of healing of Jesus.
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/luke/18-36.htm says:
ReplyDeletefor it is most certain that Christ by his Divine power was the efficient cause of this blind man’s healing; but he exerted this Divine power upon that exercise of faith which he discerned in the blind man.
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https://biblehub.com/commentaries/matthew/20-29.htm says:
"And as they departed from Jericho." This was a large town about eight miles west of the Jordan, and about 19 miles northeast from Jerusalem. Near to this city the Israelites crossed the Jordan when they entered into the land of Canaan, Joshua 3:16. It was the first city taken by Joshua, who destroyed it to the foundation, and pronounced a curse on him who should rebuild it, Joshua 6:20-21, Joshua 6:26. This curse was literally fulfilled in the days of Ahab, nearly 500 years later, 1 Kings 16:34. It afterward became the place of the school of the prophets, 2 Kings 2:5. In this place Elisha worked a signal miracle, greatly to the advantage of the inhabitants, by rendering the waters near it, that were before bitter, sweet and wholesome, 2 Kings 2:21. In point of size it was second only to Jerusalem.
It is now a small village, wretched in its appearance, and inhabited by a very few persons, and called "Riha, or Rah," situated on the ruins of the ancient city (or, as some think, three or four miles east of it). There are perhaps fifty houses, of rough stone, with roofs of bushes and mud, and the population, two or three hundred, in number, is entirely Muslim.
As they departed from Jericho - Luke says, "As he was come nigh unto Jericho." The original word used in Luke, translated "was come nigh," commonly expresses approach to a place, but it does not of necessity mean that always. It may denote nearness to a place, whether going to it or from it. It would be rendered here correctly, "when they were near to Jericho," or when they were in the vicinity of it, without saying whether they were going to it or from it.
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/matthew/20-34.htm says:
ReplyDeleteFaith had no power to open the eyes, but it led the blind men to Jesus; it showed that they had just views of his power; it was connected with the cure. So "faith" has no power to save from sin, but it leads the poor, lost, blind sinner to him who has power, and in this sense it is said we are saved by faith. His "touching" their eyes was merely "a sign" that the power of healing proceeded from him.
https://www.preceptaustin.org/luke-18-commentary#18:35 says:
ReplyDeleteA T Robertson's note on reconciling leaving Jericho by Matthew and Mark and approaching Jericho in Luke - Luke (Luke 18:35) places the incident as they were drawing near to Jericho (eis Iereichō). It is probable that Mark and Matthew refer to the old Jericho, the ruins of which have been discovered, while Luke alludes to the new Roman Jericho.
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Some say that Jesus was leaving old Jericho and about to enter the rebuilt Jericho when this incident occurred. This view is possible, but the problem is that old Jericho was not inhabited in Jesus’ day, and thus it would be unusual to speak of Jesus leaving the ruins as if He were leaving the city itself. Others propose that a two-part event was condensed into one account. Bartimaeus cried out as Jesus entered the city, tagged along with the crowd, and eventually was heard by Jesus and healed along with the other beggar as Jesus left the city. Another variation is that Jesus entered and passed through the city when He encountered Zaccheus (Lk 19:1). When Zaccheus responded, Jesus turned to go back into the city, at which point He met Bartimaeus. Thus, depending on how you view it, Jesus had left the city or was entering it. Luke merely separates the accounts for his purposes.
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The Pharisee and the rich young ruler were likely candidates for salvation who missed it because they trusted in themselves and refused to acknowledge their sin. Bartimaeus and Zaccheus were unlikely candidates for salvation who obtained it through faith in God’s mercy, apart from anything in themselves. Thus Luke uses this unlikely blind beggar to teach us that…When Jesus passes by, we should cry out to Him in faith and He will be merciful to us.
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if you are a seeker, do not be surprised that the majority will not be for you but against you when you seek the Lord, for the majority are themselves not on the right road (cf Mt 7:13, 14-note). Notice also where the opposition to this blind beggar came from -- from those who were "following" Jesus! How often I have seen an older believer try to throw a damp blanket on the enthusiasm of a new convert.
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Steven Cole - Luke wants us to see that we all are blind beggars before God. Satan has “blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ” (2 Cor. 4:4). Before God we are “wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked” (Rev. 3:17). This is perhaps the major stumbling block that keeps people from coming to Christ: they want to commend themselves and their good deeds. God has to open our eyes to our true condition before Him. We have nothing in ourselves to merit His salvation. We are spiritually blind sinners, and the only way we can come to Him is to ask for mercy, not for merit.
https://www.preceptaustin.org/luke-18-commentary#18:35 continued:
ReplyDeleteHis faith was instrumental in his healing. It is worth noting that this is the last miracle recorded by Luke and other than causing a fig tree to wither, is the last miracle before the Cross and before the greatest miracle, His resurrection from the dead.
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Hendriksen comments that "Moreover, in view of the fact that faith is itself God's gift (see Eph. 2:8), it is nothing less than astounding that Jesus here and elsewhere praises the recipient of the gift for exercising it! This proves the generous character of his love.
Questions and findings:
ReplyDelete1. Did his faith make him well? What does that mean?
This is a story of our spiritual blindness and how Jesus can open our spiritual eyes and save us. To be saved and have our spiritual eyes opened, we need to have faith in Jesus. That faith is impossible unless God gives it to us.
So, yes, his faith did make him well - the faith that God gave him to be able to accept Jesus' physical and spiritual healing. Faith is appropriating what God is giving us. Without faith we cannot receive what God gives. We cannot have faith unless God gives us that faith.
I like the analogy of the magnifying glass - very apt.
ReplyDelete