All the Lonely People

Most of us at some point in life will experience loneliness, whether it's a short season or a chronic situation. How should the church respond to those who are lonely? Today on Truth for Life, we'll learn from Jesus' response to a blind and hopeless beggar named Bartimaeus. Alistair Begg is teaching from the Gospel of Mark chapter 10, starting with verse 46. When we take our Bibles and we read the Gospel records, we discover that Jesus was concerned for lonely people. And it's a very worthwhile exercise to take your Bible and to go through the Gospel records and to look for the times when Jesus encountered people as individuals, and often some of the most likely individuals, one of whom we're going to consider now. The story of this man called Bartimaeus.

What I'd like to do is to set it up as if we were shooting a film—that is, to not shoot it just with a wide-angled lens and take everything in, but rather to set up the camera angles as we would choose, setting them on the particular scene in a particular moment, and first of all, focusing primarily on the crowd. Mark tells us in verse 46 that there was a large crowd. Now, that's not an unusual phenomenon in the Gospels. There were crowds of people increasingly following in the wake of Jesus, none more so than after the feeding of the 5,000, when in John chapter 6, Jesus has to explain to them what the nature of following him is really all about. And they had been intrigued by these miracles, and they were interested in what was going on, and so there were crowds and crowds and crowds and crowds, of course, draw a crowd. Now they knew enough to answer the question that was posed by the blind man. It's recorded for us in Luke's Gospel, not in Mark's Gospel. In Luke chapter 18, in the parallel account, the man asks a question.

It's an important question, and I'm just going to read it. When he heard the crowd going by—he's a blind man, so he heard the crowd going by. That's why he didn't say he saw the crowd going by. He asked what was happening.

Hey, what's happening? Blind people are very sensitive to the other senses. And so it is that he would be aware of smells, and he would be aware of the movement of the people, and he would know that this was an unusual experience in Jericho, and so he cries out, unable to see. And they said, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.

Well, at least they got that right. Well, after all, no big surprise, they were in the crowd, and now he finds out. But with the angle on the crowd, notice this.

First of all, notice the rebuke that they gave. He says what's happening. They say Jesus is here. Soon as he hears Jesus is here, he begins to shout. Now, the interesting thing is, in Mark's Gospel, it would seem that Mark is showing us that both the disciples and the crowd were not doing really good when people expressed an interest in what was going on. For example, just a few verses earlier, you find that the disciples blow it badly, because here are the people bringing children to Jesus, and the disciples are saying, get these kids out of here.

We don't want them. Jesus says, hey, wait a minute. The little children, the kingdom begins with little children, belongs to such as these bring them here. So now it moves on a little bit more. Jesus explains where he's going and what his death will mean, and the crowd begins to follow in his wake. And here's a man by the side of the road, and he says, hey, Jesus, could you help me, Jesus? And the crowd is going, hey, shut up, man.

Chill out. We've got a parade going here. We've got a Jesus thing going. Don't we understand?

We have time for this. An amazing rebuke. Why? Presumably, they were so taken up with themselves. They were so taken up with what it meant to them to be in the group, that they had no place for anyone else in their group. Stop there for just a moment, would you? You ever been anywhere like that?

Have you ever worshiped in a church like that? So consumed with what we're doing in our group, and how we're enjoying our group, and all the plans for our group, that we don't have time for any blind men on the fringe shouting out for the help of Jesus. This is not the message this evening.

This is a passing note in comment. We may face the charged loved ones tonight in Western Christianity, of almost total preoccupation with who and what we are and what we want, and the church, by and large, is missing the cries of the blind men and women who are shouting out, help me, Jesus! Oh, not me.

Okay, maybe not you. What did Jesus tell us to do? He said we should go and make disciples of people. He didn't tell us to have Bible studies. Oh, he said if we abide in him and his words abide in us, we'll bring much fruit, so we should have Bible studies, but he didn't send us out to have Bible studies. He didn't send us out to elect people to Congress. The Scriptures make it clear that we should give authority to those who are in authority, that we should pray for kings and our rulers, that we should make sure that we do what is right in our society.

But that's not our mandate. The crowd here had messed it up. And here was a group of people, tight with Jesus, and their ears were closed to the cries of those whose needs were greatest. I want to tell you tonight that here in America we are a subculture. We are a sideline. We are an irrelevancy to the largest part of the quarter of a billion people that inherit these fair shores. Some of you have lived long enough to recognize this. In our town in Ohio, you cannot find but one evening service.

All the doors are closed, and all the lights are off. People say, Who cares? It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter? Is this the Lord's Day? Is this an opportunity for evangelism and for worship? I don't understand what it is when we've got this apparent great army in American Christianity. We've got to supposedly cajole them into getting to grips and getting serious about the opportunities of evangelism on the Lord's Day with the Lord's people.

We're kidding ourselves. If it took a quarter of a century to get to this point, just project it without a revival of the Spirit of God another ten or fifteen years. When some of you older folks who know the Bible and who know the convictions are taken home to glory, and a generation that never finished its vegetables, never finished its homework, is left to carry on the church of Jesus Christ, it's not a pretty prospect. The crowd was masterful at rebuke, and the crowd was masterful at missing the point. Listen. Be quiet, they said.

Be quiet. They made the mistake that the Pharisees made when Jesus had dinner at the house of Matthew. Let me quote to you what happened there. While Jesus—this is Matthew 9—while Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. Hey guys, we're going over to Matthew's house. There's a big deal going, the Jesus man, he's there. Get your friends, let's go. This was the Harley crowd, these were the bums, these were the bad guys. We're going over to Matthew's house, okay?

Right? These are all the kids you don't want in your youth group because they may marry your daughter. We're not having these long-haired freaks in here. After all, this is a church for goodness sake. We got Jesus, and we got our thing going, we got a band, orchestra, we got the whole thing.

Go. And there are many, many young people out there who are crying out, Jesus have mercy on me. They couldn't get within a hundred miles of Jesus Christ because the crowd has become masterful at rebuke and makes the same classic mistake in every generation. The spirit of the Pharisee is so rampant in many of our hearts that those who need him most can never meet him. And we need loved ones at a camp like this to come away and take stock of what is happening in our world. For we retreat with every passing day into our schools, into our homes, into our huddles, into our fellowships, into our citadels, and somehow or another there's been a missing link. Jesus said, Be salt and be light.

But if the salt loses its savor, you might as well chuck it out and trample it under your feet. And the Pharisees said to the disciples, Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners? On hearing this, Jesus said, It's not the healthy who need a doctor but the sick.

But go and learn what this means. I desire mercy, not sacrifice, for I have not come to call the righteous but sinners. And this was a lesson that the crowd was about to learn. The interesting thing here is if you look in Mark chapter 10, you will see that there is a story which precedes this of a young man that you would think was absolutely definite for inclusion in the army of Christ. He was a rich young man, he was concerned to know how he would inherit eternal life, and he was a well-put-together fellow. And he ran up to Jesus, which is a good start, and he fell on his knees, and he addressed him in a respectful way, and he said, Good Master, what must I do to inherit eternal life? The kind of young man that you would like to have come home for dinner. The kind of guy that could become a deacon in the average church, you know, with only two or three weeks. And Jesus says, Buzz off. Well, he didn't say buzz off, but I mean, he said essentially that. He says, You got a problem, buddy, and that is you're gonna have to go sell everything you have and give it to the poor. Then you come follow me.

And at that, the man's face fell, and he went away sorrowful. So we've got one very likely candidate who gets the boot, and now we've got another most unlikely person who's about to get the welcome. I love this, don't you?

I love it. I am tired of the world trying to tell me about my Jesus. Don't tell me that Jesus is bourgeois. Don't tell me that Jesus is an upper middle class mentality. We may have made him that, but he ain't that. The crowd were ready to do that.

They would exalt him as a king. They didn't want a dying savior. No more than we want one today. Are you with me? Let's turn the angle fast.

That's the crowd, masterful at rebuke, masterful at misunderstanding. What about the man? Well, look at this man. His name is Bartimaeus. That's like having a name McDonald, because Mac means son of Donald, Bar means son of Timaeus, Bartimaeus, McDonald, same kind of thing. That was his clan. He was the Timaeus clan, Bartimaeus. I want you to notice just three things.

I'll say them quickly. First of all, this man was in no doubt about his need. He was a blind man, and he was a beggar man. For his sustenance, he had to depend upon the generosity of others. Perhaps his family had left him, in which case he would be put in this position by his friends. Perhaps his family was using him, in which case they put him in that position.

It wasn't unusual if you had someone in your family who was impoverished in some mental or physical way, you would take them there and use them as a source of income. Secondly, he wasn't too proud to cry out. Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me.

Never saw Jesus. And the rebuke of the people in verse 48 only intensifies his cry. Hey, quiet, please, shh. Got the thing going here, you know.

We got the crowd, and we're moving on. But he shouted all the more, Son of David, have mercy on me. His cry, Son of David, was an acknowledgment of the fact of the Messiahship of Jesus. So this man must have had a background somewhere. He knew more than some who were in the crowd. He was in no doubt about his need, and he wasn't too proud to cry.

Let me tell you something. That is the only ultimate way a man or a woman ever comes to trust in Christ. First, we are in no doubt about our need.

And secondly, we are not too proud to cry. Some of us have never faced our need, and some of us have never cried for mercy. Therefore, although we attend church, maybe members, maybe sing in choirs and walk with our Christian family, we are no closer to heaven than the man who was stuck up the tree Zacchaeus himself. Have you ever faced your need?

Have you ever come to an end of yourself? I'm not asking you, have you ever decided that it would be a nice idea to, quote, have Jesus in your life? After all, if that's all that it means that I continue in the way I'm going, and I have Jesus in my life, yeah, I'll have that. I'd like that. That's fine.

I believe my parents have it, and so I think I should have it. And then these young people have no victory over sin. They've no interest in the Word of God. They've no desire for worship. They have to be cajoled into church. They never evangelize. They never tell their friends about Christ, and their parents say, oh, we're going to have to get them to a conference or something to try and get them warmed up.

The fact is they're unregenerate. They don't know Christ. They never faced their need. They never realized that they were dead men and dead women, and couldn't do a thing to make themselves alive. Bartimaeus is a classic picture to us of what it means to be without Christ. We are blind, and we are beggars.

We ain't got no hope. And so he shouted. When the Word came back from Jesus, you will notice, too, that while he was not unaware of his need and he wasn't too proud to cry, he was immediate in his response. And the action that is compressed into one little sentence is quite remarkable. In verse 50, throwing his cloak aside, he jumped to his feet and came to Jesus.

It just goes like that. Throwing his cloak aside, he jumped to his feet and came to Jesus. So let's just turn the camera angle on to Jesus and finish at the high point, as it were. Now the lens moves on to Jesus. Look at the question he asks in verse 51.

What do you want me to do for you? It's almost an unbelievable question, isn't it? I mean, here's a blind man. He's sitting by the side of the road. He begs every day. He starts to shout out for Jesus. Jesus said, What do you want me to do for you?

He knew what he wanted him to do for him, but he wanted to hear him ask. Jesus knows our needs. Jesus knows who we are. But he wants to hear us acknowledge our need, and his ear is ever open to our cry. He doesn't barnstorm into our lives.

The wooing of his Spirit works within our hearts, but eventually there comes a point where we hear his welcome voice as the hymn writer says, I hear thy welcome voice that calls me, Lord to thee, for cleansing in the precious blood that flowed on Calvary. What do you want me to do for you? But Jesus comes along the rows tonight and asks you the same question.

What do you want me to do for you? The response, as I say, was immediate. One minute the man was blind, totally blind.

The next minute he had unimpaired vision. That's the kind of change that Jesus brings about. We hear a lot today about healings and miracles and signs and wonders and everything else. There is nothing that happens today that comes close to the instantaneous, radical transformation that was brought about by the work of Jesus in his person and the work of the apostles that followed him. Does God heal? Yes. Is much that is proclaimed to be healing truly healing?

Probably not. But when you have a triumphalist approach to things, you've got to always have good stories. This is a miraculous transformation. A blind man can see in a moment. That's Jesus. What is one of the clearest pictures in the Bible that is given to us of what it means to be outside of Christ?

It means to be in the dark. The God of this age, says Paul, has blinded the eyes of men and women so that they cannot see. It's interesting in closing the part that Jesus gave to the people, isn't it?

The man cries out, they rebuke him, the man cries all the more, and Jesus says to them, call him. Interesting. Relevant?

I think so. How is the call going to go out to men and women? Through you? You're Christian tonight?

Who are you calling? Shared your faith lately? Heard a cry lately?

Stumbled over a blind beggar lately? Or are you and I just so stuck with the marching band and the crowd that we can't even hear these cries? And when we do, they annoy us. And we've hung around with this group for so long that we've decided that you have to be like this to be in this group.

And we've forgotten what we were like before ever we got invited in the group. Heaven's going to be full of people who discover two things. One, that they were great sinners, and that Christ was a great Savior. Let me say again in closing that the word that they then gave, Cheer up on your feet, he's calling you, is a great word to proclaim, is it not? With a story to tell to the nations that will turn their hearts to the right. Cheer up on your feet, Jesus is calling.

I want to say that to you tonight. And as a result of that, the man followed Jesus along the road, we're told. He praised God, and on account of his transformed life, others did the same. So, reducing it to two points of application, here it is. Point number one, in this auditorium this evening, there are blind people who have never faced the depth of their need and who have been too proud to cry for help. If that is you, Dad, if that is you, Son, if that is you, Mom, then I say to you tonight, Christ is calling you.

Point one of application. Point two of application, Mr. and Mrs. Christian, as we make our way down this thoroughfare here this evening and look out over this lake, I urge you to take time to examine your heart, to find if to any degree we might have been caught up in the action so deeply that our ears are no longer open to the cries of the blind beggars, Jesus of Nazareth, have mercy on me. Who will be the missionaries of the next generation? Who will give their lives for the cause of Christ? Missionary organizations cannot get people to serve the rest of their lives.

They'll go for six months or for two years. It's the generation that never finished anything. There's got to be some young men and some young women this evening who can say, I want to have my ears open to hear those cries, and I want to do what Jesus said. I want to call them.

Cheer up on your feet. He's calling you. You're listening to Truth for Life, that is Alistair Begg with the message he's titled, All the Lonely People. I hope you know that we value and appreciate you as a part of the Truth for Life family, and I hope you take advantage of the opportunity to request books we recommend at Truth for Life. We select these books to help you grow in your faith and learn more about God's Word. Today we're recommending a classic, a book that's been recently updated for easier reading. The book is titled, Divine Providence, a classic work for modern readers. When you read Divine Providence, you'll learn how God oversees the intricate events of our world to fulfill his will and his plan, and at the same time, how he sovereignly works in conjunction with human free will. It's a fascinating book. Ask for your copy of the book.

Again, it's titled, Divine Providence. When you make a donation today, you can give a one-time gift at truthforlife.org slash donate, or you can arrange to set up an automatic monthly donation when you visit truthforlife.org slash truthpartner. If you prefer, you can call us at 888-588-7884. And if you'd rather mail your donation along with your request for the book, write to Truth for Life at Post Office Box 398000, Cleveland, Ohio 44139. I'm Bob Lapine. You might think that a great spiritual triumph would be the spark for more spiritual victories, but the Bible tells about many people who experience a time of deep despair right after obvious spiritual progress. We'll hear one such story tomorrow. I hope you can join us. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.