Trust and follow, even when you can’t see

Sermon for Quinquagesima

1 Corinthians 13:1-13  +  Luke 18:31-43

There’s a theme that runs through today’s Gospel: the theme of sight vs. blindness, seeing vs. not seeing. Sometimes blindness about the things of God is sinful and rebellious, like the blindness of the Pharisees, which was made worse, because they insisted that they could see. Jesus once told them, For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may be made blind.” Some of the Pharisees replied, “Are we blind also?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would have no sin; but now you say, ‘We can see.’ Therefore your sin remains. Rejecting Jesus as the Light of the world, as the Son of God, as the Christ to whom the Old Testament Scriptures had been pointing, as mankind’s only Savior, is the worst kind of blindness, and many, many people live each day in that blindness.

But that’s not the blindness before us in today’s Gospel. The Twelve Apostles had their own kind of blindness. They were about to enter Jerusalem for the Passover, for Holy Week. But before they did, Jesus wanted them to see exactly what was about to happen to Him. Behold (that is, Look! See!), we are going up to Jerusalem, and all the things that were written through the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be finished. For he will be delivered to the Gentiles, and he will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon. And they will scourge him and put him to death. And on the third day he will rise again.” Could it be stated any more clearly than that?

Jesus clearly reveals that His appearance, His suffering, death, and resurrection were the theme that ran under the entire Old Testament. It wasn’t just the story of creation and the history of the people of Israel. It was the story of God’s plan of salvation, His plan to rescue fallen mankind from sin, death, and the devil, by sending His only-begotten Son into the world to suffer for our sins, to die for our sins, and then to rise from the dead and to give life to all who would believe in Him. Everything had been pointing to this moment, and Jesus holds it up for His apostles to see.

But they understood none of these things; this saying was hidden from them, and they did not understand the things that were said. How is that possible?

Some of it can be attributed to the weakness, the innate dullness, of the sinful flesh that just doesn’t think clearly about the things of God. People still read the Old Testament and miss the focus on the coming Christ. And even if they see it pointing to Christ, they miss the main job of the Christ, which is not to set up a great society on earth, but, again, to be rejected by His own people, to suffer for our sins, to be killed for our sins, and to rise from the dead. And all of that, still not to set up a great society on earth, but to call sinners to repentance and faith in Him, to enable us to escape the judgment and destruction of this world and to enter with Him and all believers into the new and perfect creation. But few people see that clearly, even after it’s revealed to them.

For Jesus’ apostles, there was another reason they couldn’t understand what Jesus was telling them. It was hidden from them, Luke says. Hidden by whom? It seems that God Himself was hiding the full understanding from them at that moment. He would give them a full understanding of it after the fact. But for now, they had to go into Holy Week “blind,” as it were. The events of Holy Week couldn’t have happened the way they did—the way they needed to—if everyone saw the plan clearly ahead of time. Not only that, but if Jesus’ apostles, His closest friends, had understood what was about to take place, they could have sympathized with Him, comforted Him, gone through it with Him, in a sense. And that couldn’t be. Jesus had to suffer alone, without any moral support, without anyone who truly understood. He had to go through it alone, relying only on the support of His dear heavenly Father. Only afterward could the apostles look back at what Jesus had told them ahead of time. And then, the lights came on! He told us this would happen! The Scriptures foretold it, too. How could we be so dense? How could we be so blind?

I think you, as baptized believers in Christ, are familiar with this kind of blindness. You’ve been mercifully rescued from the blindness of unbelief. The Holy Spirit, through His Word, has opened your eyes to see the light of Christ, that He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. That no one comes to the Father except through Him. Does that mean you suddenly understand every prophecy of Scripture? I doubt it. Do you see clearly every detail of God’s plan for the Church until the end of the world, even as He has revealed it in Old Testament prophecies or in the Book of Revelation? I would say, no. There is a degree of blindness that we are meant to have; certain things are hidden from us, too.

So what to do? Trust! Trust in the same Jesus who willingly endured suffering and shame so that you might be saved. You’ve seen clearly His love for you in giving Himself for you. Now trust Him in the places where you still can’t see. Trust that He will take you by the hand and guide you through whatever darkness remains until you eventually see everything clearly. That’s what the apostles did. They kept following Jesus to Jerusalem, even though they were going in “blind.” And eventually, at the right time, they were allowed to see.

In the second part of today’s Gospel, we see something similar happening. As Jesus makes His way to Jerusalem, there’s a blind man on the side of the road, begging. St. Mark gives us his name: blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus. When he heard the noise of the procession and the excitement of the crowd, he asked someone what was going on. And they told him, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. And then this blind beggar cries out, not Jesus of Nazareth, but Jesus, Son of David! That was the common way of referring to the Messiah, to the Christ. A blind beggar was no Old Testament scholar. He was not among the wise and learned people of Israel. But his hearing must have been very good. More than that, the Holy Spirit must have worked powerfully through what he had heard about Jesus, enough for this blind man to see clearly that Jesus was not just a nice guy, not just a good teacher, not just “a” prophet sent from God, but the very promised Messiah for whom Israel—for whom mankind had been waiting for thousands of years.

Son of David, have mercy on me! he cried. He cried out several times, to the point that the people leading the procession rebuked him and told him to be quiet. They were having a glorious procession to Jerusalem. They had no care or concern for this beggar along the road. All they could think of was themselves, which revealed their own blindness—their blindness to Jesus’ true purpose, which wasn’t to have a glorious, undisturbed procession to Jerusalem, but to have mercy on the needy.

But the mercy the blind beggar was looking for wasn’t in the form of money or riches, as someone might expect. No, this blind beggar looked to Jesus for mercy that only He could provide. Jesus stops the procession and calls for the man to be brought to Him. And He asks him, What do you want me to do for you? Lord, that I may receive my sight! And Jesus readily grants his request, adding these well-known words: Your faith has saved you. That was true with regard to his eyesight, but it was also true with regard to his eternal soul. Faith in Jesus saves. And the one who believes in Jesus will seek help from Him, help with every need, both physical and spiritual, for this life and for the next. He won’t stop following Jesus once he gets something out of Him, just as blind Bartimaeus went on to follow Jesus to Jerusalem after he received his sight.

We learn here that the seeing of the eyes is not what’s important for our salvation. It’s the seeing of faith, which comes by hearing the Word. It’s keeping one’s eyes focused on Christ crucified and risen from the dead. It’s putting our trust in Him, no matter what we see with our eyes, no matter whether our eyes can see at all. And if you want to see something, to understand something that remains obscure, then ask the Lord for His mercy. Ask Him for the enlightenment of His Holy Spirit! And He will give you whatever sight you need.

Now, where there is faith in Christ, there is also following. That following of Jesus will be characterized by the cross. The believer’s life on earth will resemble the life of Christ on earth, which involved suffering and rejection and hatred on the part of many.

What else will that following involve? St. Paul paints that picture for us in today’s Epistle. Following Christ will involve love, love as Paul so beautifully and elegantly describes it in 1 Corinthians 13. It can’t be otherwise. Where there is genuine faith in Christ, there will also be love. It won’t be perfect in this world, but it will be the Christian’s goal to live each day in love and to repent for where love has been absent, as the Corinthian Christians themselves had to do after Paul revealed to them just how loveless they had been in many ways.

So throughout the coming Lenten season, keep your eyes focused on Christ: on His love, on His suffering for your sins, and on His victory for you over sin, death, and the devil. When you can’t see, then trust. And as you trust, remember to walk in love. Now may the Lord open our eyes to see the light of Christ and the love of Christ, and may He strengthen us to follow Him, even when we can’t see the way ahead. Amen.