WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT

WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT?

(Preached on Sunday, November 1, 2003)

Then Jesus said to him, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man said to him, “My teacher, let me see again.” -Mark 10:51

A devout and wise man of another generation [I think it was William Law] once wrote something that goes like this: “If we ask ourselves why we have not performed as well as we should as Christians, the answer often is — because we did not want it enough.”

We will come back to that weighty statement later on.

Now to a different era and scene.

It is Spring in Jericho, one of the oldest sites in the world.

Under a blue sky the palm trees are rustling in a slight breeze, the clear waters of the abundant springs are rippling through the town aqueducts and gutters.

The shopkeepers are busily displaying their wares, people greet each other with “Salam” and gather in clusters to gossip or bargain, and a young Rabbi and his disciples set out on a fateful journey to Jerusalem.

As they leave the city, a blind beggar who is sitting in his favorite spot under a shady tree, cries out for some mercy.

Some of the locals tell him to stop whining and to shut up.

But he cries the louder for the young Rabbi to come and help him.

The Rabbi is not so impatient as the onlookers.

He stops and asks the beggar, who is called Bartimaeus, to come to him.

Did you note that?

This insightful Rabbi wants the beggar to make some effort, to show willing.

The fellow stands up, throws off his beggar’s cloak, and approaches the teacher.

Rabbi Jesus then puts to him a simple yet profound question, “What do you want me to do for you?”

Jesus often asked that question of people he encountered.

In fact, Mark records in the story immediately before this one, how Jesus asked that question in response to a question put to him by two of his disciples, James and John.

The brothers Zebedee had come to him asking him to do them a favor, and Jesus responds, “What do you want me to do for you?”

What did they want, these two intimates of Jesus, who had been traveling with him for several years; who had seen marvelous, miraculous things; who had heard his teachings and been able to explore their meaning in depth in private sessions with the Rabbi?

What did they want? World Peace? The elimination of hunger and poverty? Curing of diseases? To see God?

No, what they asked for was favoritism for themselves.

They lobbied Jesus for special position and authority in his government.

“When you come into your kingdom, let us sit by your side, one on your right and one on your left.” They wanted the chief cabinet posts!

Thick-headed fellows?

They had good eyes yet were much more blind than many of those, like Bartimaeus, who had no eyesight!

They could not see beyond their own noses.

As you would expect, Jesus poured cold water on their stupid request.

After that story Mark takes us directly to blind Bartimaeus.

I reckon Mark does it quite deliberately.

Mark is using these contrasting incidents like parables.

Put together, they carry a vigorous punch.

The beggar cried out for help.

People told him to shut up.

Jesus overrode them and asked the blind man to come close.

The man came. Then the key question: “What do you want me to do for you?”

Without hesitation Bartimaeus cried: “Rabbi, I want to see!”

This beggar did not want to remain in his familiar groove, receiving charity from passers by.

Nor did he look for favoritism such as James and John wanted.

All he wanted was restored sight.

He received it!

By faith he received it there and then!

He was now able not just to hear Jesus but to look on him with his own eyes.

Immediately, Mark tells us, Bartimaeus became a follower of Jesus.

Where do we stand?

With James and John or with the beggar of Jericho?

If Jesus were to ask us: “I give you one wish. What do you want me to do for you?” what would be our honest answer?

I say “honest” answer.

Not some pretty answer, dressed up to look religiously nice, but the raw, uncensored stuff of our souls.

What do we really want.

What do we profoundly hanker for?

C. S. Lewis, in his eloquent Evensong sermon at Oxford on June 8, 1941, put it like this: “Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are halfhearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

What do we really want?

Material security? A good spouse or child? Security in power, education, good looks, social status? Security that removes all fear?

Or do we seek new vision? The ability to “see” with the eyes of God?

There’s a woman who received eyes to see.

A few years ago, with the help of Presbyterian mission money, she helped to establish a halfway house for women who are recovering drug addicts.

She schedules twelve-step groups, arranges for child care, and generally tries to get the women back on their feet.

In a lot of ways you would never expect her to be involved with such work.

She is even-tempered, gentle, and articulate.

But something happened a few years ago that caused her to see the world through new eyes.

She was a graduate school student in Pittsburgh, looking for a part-time job.

A newspaper listed an administrative position with a soup kitchen.

That looked interesting, so she clipped it and prepared for the interview.

On the day of her interview, she put on a dark blue business suit, put together a manila folder full of resumes and references, and clipped back her hair.

Arriving a few minutes before noon, she saw the sign: “East End Cooperative Ministry.”

She knocked on the door.

Someone inside said, “It’s unlocked.”

She went in only to find a long line of people in front of her.

Disappointment washed over her.

Then she realized it was lunch time.

The people in the line weren’t there for the same interview, they were waiting for soup.

She grew nervous as she looked at the people in line.

Some of them, in turn, looked at her.

She felt self-conscious about the way she was dressed.

A woman in a moth-eaten sweater smiled and tried to make conversation. “Is this your first time here?”

“The scales fell from my eyes that day,” reflected the young woman. “I went there looking for a job, and that woman thought I was there for soup. As far as she knew, the world had been as cruel to me as it was to her. But in the kindest way she could, she welcomed me as a fellow human being. She saw me as someone equally in need, which I was and still am. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that was the day when God began to convert me.”

Looking around the halfway house, she smiled and said, “You see all of these wonderful things God is doing here? They began when God gave us eyes to see where Jesus was leading us.”

A church could ask for more prestige, a greater impact, and a sense of power. But for a church with the eyes of faith, the answer is clear: “to see thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, follow thee more nearly.”

Jesus told us over and over again that loving God and loving neighbor are what God says is most important.

And if we boil off the residue, what we are left with is the word relationship — the relationship between God and us and the relationship between other people and us.

These relationships matter more than wealth or honor or religion or anything else.

That wise comment from an earnest soul: “If we ask ourselves why we have not performed as well as we should as Christians, the answer often is — because we did not want it enough.”