Mark's Gospel

Mark 10v32-55 - what do you want me to do for you?

President Franklin D. Roosevelt got tired of smiling that big smile and saying the usual things at all those White House receptions. So, one evening he decided to find out whether anybody was paying attention to what he was saying. As each person came up to him with extended hand, he flashed that big smile and said, "I murdered my grandmother this morning." People would automatically respond with comments such as "How lovely!" or "Just continue with your great work!" Nobody listened to what he was saying, except one foreign diplomat. When the president said, "I murdered my grandmother this morning," the diplomat responded softly, "I'm sure she had it coming to her."

In today’s passage Jesus might legitimately wonder whether anyone was paying attention to what he was saying!

It looks like we have a couple of apparently unrelated incidents on the road to Jerusalem, but there is a thread which joins them together. In each case people come to Jesus with a request and Jesus responds with a question (v36 & v51) “What do you want me to do for you?”.

Although I’ll deal with it section by section, if I were to put a title over the whole passage it would be this: Jesus the suffering Messiah, has come not to give glory, but salvation.

v32-34 Jesus the suffering Messiah

This is the last of three times in Marks gospel where Jesus explains what is going to happen to him. It is the most explicit and detailed of the accounts, and includes information he has not mentioned before – specifically that he will be condemned to death, that he will be handed over to the Gentiles.

He will be mocked. Spat upon. Flogged.

What kind of a Messiah will Jesus be? A suffering Messiah. “A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” as Isaiah 53v3 puts it. “Despised and rejected”.

We have already set aside some time earlier in our service to remember the cross, to think about the horrible shame and suffering which Jesus endured for us, to buy our pardon. We have taken the bread and the wine as part of a continuing memorial for the sacrifice that Jesus has made for us.

A sacrifice which will never change and never fail, thanks be to God!

Now to you and I this seems to be a staggering and horrible revelation that Jesus has made. Yet to his disciples? They seem to have missed the point again.

v35-45 James and John ask for glory – but Jesus is not here to give glory

By way of introducing James and John here, I’d like to ask you whether you are familiar with the Far Side cartoons by Gary Larson? I love them, but the rest of my family don’t understand them. Have you seen this one?

I think if I were to have something that said “What disciples hear” our last few verses would have read “we are going up to Jerusalem blah blah blah blah blah blah blah he will rise”.

In Chapter 8 we had that tremendous moment of recognition, Peters famous confession “You are the Christ”. The second half of the gospel Jesus progressively reveals just what kind of a Christ, what kind of a Messiah he is going to be. But it seems as if the disciples just don’t want to know. Every time that Jesus has revealed something about his mission they get all concerned about their own position! After Jesus speaks in 8v31 Peter assumes a false mantle of responsibility and says “No Lord, this won’t happen!” and gets roundly rebuked for it. After Jesus speaks of it again in 9v31 we see the disciples arguing with on another on the road about who is going to be the greatest!

Now after the latest outpouring of Jesus’ heart, James and John make a bold pre-emptive strike for the top places in the kingdom!

James and John are brothers, and were nicknamed the ‘Sons of Thunder’ which tells you something about their character! They are bold as brass, coming to Jesus and, in v35, effectively asking him to give them a blank cheque! Considering the circumstances, Jesus’ question he asks in reply is very gracious. “What do you want me to do for you?”

Look at v37. No half measures for these boys! Here they are, walking up the road to Jerusalem with the Messiah, (who is obviously going to come into all his power, right?) so they want top spots in the glory! We want to be your right-hand and left-hand men, we want the position of authority in your kingdom! It’s perhaps not surprising that the other disciples become indignant (although whether it is because the brothers were attempting to cut them out of the picture or because the brothers had got in first, it isn’t clear!)

On a recent ‘listening skills’ course I was told about the importance of active listening… too many people are not really listening, they are just marking time until they get to say their bit again.

James and John don’t seem to have taken in what Jesus was saying earlier at all. Event to the extent that when Jesus asks them the rhetorical question in v38, they blithely say ‘yes we can’. They really don’t know what they are asking.

But interestingly, Jesus also says “you will drink the cup I drink and be baptised with the baptism I am baptised with”. Being Jesus’ disciples is a costly matter, and the time will come when they would have to pay that cost in full. Nonetheless, that is a completely separate issue to the position that people will have in glory.

And it is interesting to see that Jesus says that this is not something that is his to grant. Whatever future glory there may or may not be is in the hands of God.

There is a key point that they must learn about the kingdom of God. Jesus explained last time (in 9v31) that anyone who wants to be first must be last and a servant of all. Now he spells it out in more detail in 42-45. (nb ‘and their high officials’ aka ‘right-hand men’).

The kingdom of God is not like the world.

Want to become great? You must be a servant.
What to be first? You must be slave of all.

Why? In the start of v45 the ‘For’ is used in the sense of ‘Because’.

Because the Son of man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.
Because the disciple is to follow the way of his master.

The disciples were selfish, thinking only of themselves. And so often we are the same if we’re honest. We think everything is for our benefit, everything is to make us happy, comfortable, satisfied. It is easy to complain when our comfort zone isn’t quite what we would like it to be, when something isn’t working out quite to our liking. I’ve been in churches before where huge amounts of energy and effort were expended on agreeing something relatively trivial like the colour that the curtains were going to be.

And yet disciples – people like us – are supposed to be walking Jesus’ way. That means a way of serving others. It is fantastic that so many of the church are involved in serving one another through the various ministries within the church – it is a sign of the servant heart which is so vitally important to the life of the church.

Yet may I share a concern with you? I’m concerned about the masses of humanity who don’t think that Jesus means anything to them, I’m concerned about the neighbours of our church and the neighbours around where we live who don’t know about Jesus’ love for them. I’m concerned about the husbands of believing wives who don’t mind their wives coming to church but don’t think it is for them. I’m concerned about our children, our parents, our siblings who don’t yet know Jesus.

And a huge part of living as disciples, living unselfishly, is bringing the gospel of salvation in Jesus to the people who have not yet decided. And I long to see that become a bigger part of our church life too.

v46-52 Blind Bartimaeus asks for help – and receives salvation!

Now we turn to Bartimaeus. Did you know that he is the only person healed that is named in Mark’s gospel? This is also the last of the healing miracles in this gospel.

The scene opens with Jesus, his disciples and a large crowd leaving the city of Jericho and continuing upwards towards Jerusalem. And sitting beside the road is a blind beggar. There is a crowd of people walking past and he hears that Jesus is there and immediately he takes his faith in both hands and starts shouting into the darkness ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ He doesn’t realise it, but this is the last time that Jesus will walk this way again. It was an opportunity that would never be repeated for him.

What he lacks in eyesight, he makes up in insight. He is calling out using a Messianic, prophetic term – “Son of David”. He is trusting that this Jesus that he has heard of is the Messiah who can help him, the Messiah who can have mercy upon him, the Messiah who can heal him.

Many of the crowds tell him to shut up, to stop bothering Jesus (much like the disciples rebuking those who brought small children for Jesus to bless) but he doesn’t want to miss this chance and he continues crying out “Have mercy on me!”

And Jesus stops. He was passing by, and yet he pauses for the weakest and most powerless of men, and says ‘call him’.

Unlike the wealthy young man we read of a few weeks ago, Bartimaeus has no hesitation. Even though blind he jumps up, casting aside all that he owns in his hurry to get to Jesus.

Jesus asks him the same question he asked two of his most favoured disciples. “What do you want me to do for you?”. Everyone else saw this man as an annoyance, or perhaps a problem to be solved. Jesus saw him as a man and treated him with unheard of respect.

Bartimaeus’ answer is simple. “Rabbi, I want to see”. Not glory. Not greatness. Just relief from the ongoing trials of life.

Jesus heals him – and the word used for healed also means saved so Jesus effectively says to him “you faith has healed you and saved you”. Not because of the greatness of his faith, not because of the placebo effect of faith but because of the person he put his faith in.

And Bartimaeus, who started this passage as a beggar beside the road, is now a follower along the road.

I heard a story recently about the hymn writer Fanny Crosby who wrote more than 8000 gospel songs. Although blinded at the age of 6 weeks, she never held any bitterness in her heart because of it. Once a preacher sympathetically remarked “I think, it is a great pity that the Master did not give you sight when He showered so many other gifts upon you” to which Fanny quickly replied, “Do you know that if at birth I had been able to make one petition, it would have been that I should be born blind”? “Why?”, asked the surprised clergyman “Because when I get to Heaven, the first image that shall ever gladden my sight will be the face of my Saviour”.

There are many people today who might find themselves in the same circumstances as Bartimaeus. They’ve got a desperate problem that they can’t solve, they have one chance as Jesus passes by, but it is up to them to cry out in faith to Jesus. Like Bartimaeus, they can’t see if he is really there or not, like Bartimaeus they have to take a chance on looking foolish. Like Bartimaeus they may find all manner of voices around them shouting them down, telling them they are stupid.

My hope and prayer is that like Bartimaeus they will press on, because all those who seek Jesus will find him.

Jesus the suffering Messiah, has come not to give glory, but salvation.

What do you want to ask Jesus today?

Jesus the Messiah is passing by today too. Some of you have been followers of Jesus for a long time, like the disciples. Some of you maybe are waiting beside the way, watching Jesus from a distance. All of us have the opportunity to speak to Jesus today and ask him a question.
And Jesus is going to say to us “What do you want me to do for you?”

And if you are a Christian, a disciple who is already following Jesus, he will probably remind you about the cost of discipleship, the need to be a servant, the importance of walking the same path that Jesus took in his attitude to people.

And if you wouldn’t describe yourself as a disciple yet, but you know who Jesus is and you know that you have no way of resolving the issues that you are wrestling with, then call out to Jesus today.

Alex White

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