If there’s anything that 2016 has taught me it’s that I am a man who wants to see.
In the ancient gospel story of blind Bartimaeus, Jesus was walking on crowded streets when a particular shout transcended the many and varied voices among him, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”
Apparantely, something about that distinct cry captivated Jesus.
In the gospel of Mark as well as the gospel of John physical blindness stood as a powerful symbol for the terrible blindness of soul that all of us experience.
When the image of God grows fuzzy and our vision of grace and freedom dissipates these are the symptoms of an obscured vision plagued by our ego and its accompanying fears.
I don’t know anyone who isn’t battling with some version of fear and the accompanying anxiety laced questions. My personal fears and questions have been as poignant this year as I can ever remember. Especially in the days since Tuesday, November 8th I’ve been hearing and holding questions such as, “Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing? How could we have not seen this coming?” Typically followed by, “What else about myself, neighbor, and God am I not seeing?”
For a variety of reasons 2016 has been a year of recognizing that my vision isn’t nearly as sharp as I may have thought it was. I’ve found myself adopting the desperate prayer of the blind man, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”
In the story, Blind Bartimaeus sits there helplessly by the road outside of Jericho with his, “Anything Helps!” cardboard sign, begging for attention. The stinky disheveled character in this ancient story is a profound symbol for today's hopeless darkened-over state of soul blindness.
What does the blind beggar have to teach us right here right now?
When he’s alerted that Jesus of Nazareth is about to walk by he starts in with his loud cries. These restless shouts give voice to my disoriented groaning and desperation for an expanded vision of present day life.
The crowd around him hurls their shaming reprimands, which surely echo our own interior voices of shame, insult and insufficiency.
Undeterred, the blind beggar keeps on shouting.
He keeps shouting until finally Jesus calls out to him.
His next move is priceless.
He bursts into motion, exploding to his feet, throws his clothes on the ground, garments symbolizing the cloak of his old consciousness, worn-out patterns, doubts and fears that blinded his soul and he runs up to Jesus. Naked and empty of his insecure self-perceptions he prepares himself for a transition of consciousness.
His conscious is confronted by that question: “What do you want me to do for you?”
This is the timeless echo we hear after we’ve hit the wall of whatever limiting experience, we’ve cried our voice to a raspy whimper, and we enter into that still point of exhausted intimacy.
The question comes subtly yet firmly from deep within us undeniably inviting our transformation:
“What do you want me to do for you?”
Blind Bartimeaus’s response is so simple yet profoundly stands in for all of us spiritual seekers who desperately hope that there just might be a way to live outside the tyranny of our own self-centeredness.
“My teacher, I want to see.”
I want to see.
I want to see.
I want to see.
Beyond my ridiculous and paralyzing fears.
Beyond my egotistical desires for affection, esteem, and pleasure and into a broader and more expansive and creative consciousness.
I want to see.
Here at the conclusion of this dizzying 2016 I’m convinced that with that one simple, humble, nakedly honest plea the blind man is informing all of us of the one thing our soul most desires - eyes to see.
The geologist/theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin describes the need like this,
“God whom we try to apprehend by the groping of our lives – that self-same God is as pervasive and perceptible as the atmosphere in which we are bathed. He encompasses us on all sides, like the world itself. What prevents you, then from enfolding him in your arms? Only one thing: your inability to see him.”
Our inability to see… The fear-filled assumptions, the anxious expectations, the bitter resentments that cloud our vision from the One who resides within our true self asking that ongoing obscure question, “What do you want me to do for you?”
I’ve often said that the poor, the beggars, the dying ones I work among on the streets of Denver are the ones inviting me into something beyond myself. It should be no surprise then, that the same type of figure, an obnoxious blind beggar by the roadside outside of Jericho would gladly let me borrow his story and statement.
I want to see.
What saves the blind man is his deliberate shift from ego-dominance to soul surrender. This transformed consciousness springs him in motion to "follow Jesus down the road."
The poor, both within the ancient text as well as those among us now remind me that it’s our very limitations – our poverty – that reveals our truest desire and our surest path toward intimate union with Christ.
The beggar within me desires true sight more than his next breath.
So, here I am at the end of a dizzying 2016 and while I have no clue of what the future may hold I know the answer I’ll be offering to that eternal Christ question:
“What do you want me to do for you?”
Rabbi, I want to see.
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