I have always loved the story of Bartimaeus the blind man who called out to Jesus as Jesus was passing by. You can find the account in Mark 10:46-52.

I was first introduced to this passage by my youth pastor, Dean Woodward, many years ago. I can still see him telling the story reinacting Bartimaeus crying out to Jesus “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” I loved the way Dean would tell about the disciples trying to hush Bartimaeus and then the way they changed their tune when Jesus stopped to address Bartimaus. They went from rebuking Bartimaeus to encouraging him! “Take heart. Get up; [Jesus] is calling you.”

While in college at Columbia International University I was assigned a word study for the words “all the more” found in verse 48. Sounds like a strange word study, but I loved it! This phrase is used several times in Scripture. It is used here to describe Bartimaeus’ response when rebuked, he cried out to Jesus “all the more”. It is used when the crowd is asked by Pilate if he should release Jesus “and they cried out all the more Crucify him!” (Matthew 27:23) In Romans 5:20 we are told, “where sin increased, grace abounded ALL THE MORE”! What an amazing picture!

So I came to this passage last week already loving it and by no surprise God showed me a new adoration Brian and I are currently reading Sacred Rhythms by Ruth Haley Barton together. Last week we worked through chapter one individually and then had a great date night discussion! The chapter was on desires and it lead us to Bartimaeus. Here is a blind man sitting on the side of the road who decides to cry out to Jesus for help. I love the way he does so “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Bartimaeus asks for mercy. He asks to receive that which he does not deserve, he knows his own sin, his own brokeness and the fact that before the Lord he needs mercy. Bartimaeus does not give up when told by others to be quiet! Oh, no! He cries out all the more! Then Jesus calls to him, and asks him the most beautiful question “What do you want me to do for you?”

Barton writes “Jesus himself routinely asked people questions that helped them to get in touch with their desire and name it in his presence. He often brought focus and clarity to his interactions with those who were spiritually hungry by asking them, “What do you want? What do you want me to do for you?”"

Bartimaeus has a precious gift, Jesus is asking him “what do you want me to do for you?”, and he responds with a deeply personal request. “Rabbi, let me recover my sight.”

Barton challenged her readers to answer this question “what do you want Jesus to do for you?”. As I sat and pondered this I was struck by Bartimaeus’ personal request. He asked for something in his own life. He was honest about his deep desire to see. There is a balance in our prayers, we should not always be coming with our own needs in mind. We should ultimately be deeply burdened with the very glory of God increasing in this world. I agree and feel this strongly, but I was also deeply moved by the fact that Jesus wants to know the deep personal desires I have in life! Tears came to my eyes as I answered the question “I want you to bless my family Lord!” I don’t mean “Lord, give me lots of money and stuff and make everything perfect.” What I do mean is “Make your face shine upon us! Help us to be the godly parents you desire. Bless us with a close relationship with our children. Guide us in wisdom. Bless us with your presence. Bless us with you Lord!!”

I think Bartimaeus was brave! I think he was beautiful! And even more so I think Jesus was a blessing to Bartimaeus as a result. Ponder anew what the Almighty can do! My new adoration for Mark 10:46-52

“Christianity is not about a new moral teaching – as though we were morally clueless and in need of some fresh or clearer guidelines…Christianity isn’t about Jesus offering a wonderful moral example, as though our principal need was to see what a life of utter love and devotion to God and to other people would look like, so that we could try to copy it…Nor is Christianity about Jesus offering, demonstrating, or even accomplishing a new route by which people can ‘go to heaven when they die.’…Christianity isn’t about giving the world fresh teaching about God himself…Christianity is all about the belief that the living God, in fulfillment of his promises and as the climax of the story of Israel, has accomplished all this – the finding, the saving, the giving of new life – in Jesus.  He has done it.  With Jesus, God’s rescue operation has been put into effect once and for all.” (N.T. Wright Simply Christian)

That is the story of the whole of scripture…God’s Epic Rescue of his creation, heaven and earth colliding and the power of grace and mercy triumphing over the power of the law.  We are to daily experience the rescue of God in our lives and be the rescue of God in others’ lives!  David Crowder’s song Remedy constantly pours through my head…

Oh, I can’t comprehend
I can’t take it all in
Never understand
Such perfect love come
For the broken and beat
For the wounded and weak
Oh, come fall at His feet
He’s the remedy
He’s the remedy

He is the one who has saved us
He is the one who forgave us
He is the one who has come
and is coming again

We are currently teaching an 8 week series through the story of all of scripture and making sure we don’t lose or cut up our scriptures into unrelated parts, resulting in just a collection of stories and truths.  I am rediscovering how by keeping the whole in perspective, it brings out the richness of the details and specifics of scripture AND how my life is still part of this great rescue story.  This isn’t something that has merely taken place thousands of years ago, but a new-life story that is played out over and over through the days that you and I live!

If you are interested, I am posting the audio recordings of each week in my podcast media tab of this site.
(We have had some problems with some of the recordings that we hope to have worked out in the future.)

I came across a neat idea in my kids school news letter, and I would like to share it with you!  It is a pumpkin globe!  Here are the instructions:

“Use a pumpkin “globe” to make learning geography fun.  With a magic marker, have your child draw the equator and the continents.  The North Pole can be the stem.  The pumpkin’s natural grooves can be lines of longitude.  Ask him to tell you about what he’s drawn on his “globe”.”

I thought this sounded fun and plan to make our own family pumpkin globe   I thought I might get creative and crazy and try to cut out the continents or practically do so, so that the light of a candle shines through – but don’t hold me to that.  I always dream up stuff bigger than I can accomplish, and the point is for my kids to have fun.  Not for me to WOW everybody!!  They would have fun with markers and probably not need to cut stuff out…

If you give this a try let me know and send pics!!  I will share mine when we have done ours.

Happy Fall everyone!  I just LOVE the fall!!! – and pumpkins too!!  pumpkin bread, pumpkin muffins, pumpkin lattes, pumpkin pie, pumpkin pie dip….mmmmm!!!!