Matthew 20:29 As they were leaving Yericho, a large crowd followed Yeshua. 30 Two blind men sitting by the side of the road heard that he was passing by and shouted, “Son of David! Have pity on us!” 31 The crowd scolded them and told them to be quiet, but they shouted all the louder, “Lord! Son of David! Have pity on us!” 32 Yeshua stopped, called them and said, “What do you want me to do for you?” 33 They said to him, “Lord, open our eyes.” 34 Filled with tenderness, Yeshua touched their eyes; and instantly they received their sight and followed him.
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Mark 10:46 They came to Yericho; and as Yeshua was leaving Yericho with his talmidim and a great crowd, a blind beggar, Bar-Timai (son of Timai), was sitting by the side of the road. 47 When he heard that it was Yeshua from Natzeret, he started shouting, “Yeshua! Son of David! Have pity on me!” 48 Many people scolded him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the louder, “Son of David! Have pity on me!” 49 Yeshua stopped and said, “Call him over!” They called to the blind man, “Courage! Get up! He’s calling for you!” 50 Throwing down his blanket, he jumped up and came over to Yeshua. 51 “What do you want me to do for you?” asked Yeshua. The blind man said to him, “Rabbi, let me be able to see again.” 52 Yeshua said to him, “Go! Your trust has healed you.” Instantly he received his sight and followed him on the road.
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Luke 18:35 As Yeshua approached Yericho, a blind man was sitting by the road, begging. 36 When he heard the crowd going past, he asked what it was all about; 37 and they told him, “Yeshua from Natzeret is passing by.” 38 He called out, “Yeshua! Son of David! Have pity on me!” 39 Those in front scolded him in order to get him to shut up, but he shouted all the louder, “Son of David! Have pity on me!” 40 Yeshua stopped and ordered the man to be brought to him. When he had come, Yeshua asked him, 41 “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man said, “Lord, let me be able to see.” 42 Yeshua said to him, “See again! your trust has healed you!” 43 Instantly he received his sight and began following him, glorifying God; and when all the people saw it, they too praised God.
“What do you want me to do for you?”
Seriously, right now, what do you want Him to do for you?
I remember when I was young thinking about what would happen if a genie came out of a bottle and granted me one wish. What would it be?
More wishes, of course. Because I have no idea what I really want. So why not get an endless supply of control. That way I can undo something that I thought I wanted but turns out it wasn’t really what I wanted. I could also get more stuff just in case I forgot about something. The sad part is that genies usually don't allow this one anyway so I need to keep thinking.
More money? Yeah, that’s up high on the list. If I had an endless supply of money then I can just buy everything that I would have wished for anyway. But what if Red Dawn (the original) becomes a reality and my money is useless in a Russian occupation. Dang it!
Power? Oh, now we’re getting somewhere. I can then control the Russians kind of like Rocky Balboa controlled Ivan Drago. Besides, if I have power then I tell people to buy me things and I can make laws that let me have as much money and stuff as I want. But what if I get sick and lose my power? This is getting frustrating.
Ok, I got it! Give me a potion that allows me to heal any disease I want. That way I can sell it to make all of the money I want, then use it to control other people whenever I need things my way. Everyone has someone close to them that’s sick so they’d do whatever I said, right? But what if someone came along and killed me in an instant so I couldn't drink my potion. Man, I can’t catch a break!
Hmm…ah, yes, I’d ask for eternal life! That would cover it all. Endless time to make all the money I want, I’ve been around so long I know how everything works so I can just manipulate my way into whatever I want, and I’m living forever so my health is in good order. No fear of death on any front.
Provision, Power, Comfort…all belong to me in full.
Do you see it? Do you see how my own reasoning and desires align perfectly with the temptation of Yeshua? All of these the Adversary used to tempt Yeshua in the wilderness. And He stood against it all. By doing so, He opened up eternal life -- for me.
He showed me that those things will come upon me and the world will convince me that it has the answers to all of my desires. Anything I could possibly want, the world has it. I could even have these things myself if…
The only thing I have to do is give up my eternal life for life abundantly on this side of the Last Day. Not life like I know it should be but life how I want it to be. And I’m horrible at knowing what I want.
We sacrifice so much in order to simply have. We know what we want and we do whatever is necessary to get it. But giving up your own life to get it? That doesn’t make any sense, right?
Movies galore use this theme of selling your soul to the devil to get something you want and it’s always a nefarious storyline. Even Hollywood knows this is dangerous and has no shame in telling you exactly what is happening. How sad is that?
Yes, I know Hollywood is under the control of the world. That’s why they are so successful. We lie in this odd wedge of knowing they are making up stories and yet letting it shape us every moment of every day. Why?
We love fantasy. Better still, we love fantasy that is close enough to being real -- for us. Portraying life as though it can be managed from beginning to end through a series of quirky (and sometimes dangerous) adventures.
How can we eat this up the way we do? Easy, we don’t really like our lives and we know there has to be boldness at some point in order for us to elevate to a new level. But we’re not bold. So we want to watch someone else do it and we’ll borrow the fulfillment from them.
But the story we follow has been written. Someone sat and thought through all of the steps that would ensure the outcome desired. Start at the end: find out what people want, see where they currently are, then create an adventurous map to get them there.
Now make one for comic book fans. Then for the lowly office worker. Then for the fast-paced New York City marketing director that has her car break down in America’s heartland. There is literally something for everybody.
The question I have is: Are all of our lives that similar?
Uh, yes. Somewhere down the line we all bought into a lie. And since the Adversary is too stupid (or too brilliant) to come up with anything else, he just uses it over and over again. He’s found the perfect tugging point and pulls delicately on it to get us to follow him wherever he wants us to go.
Where is that?
“Hell!”
Well, not really. In this Age he just wants to pull you off the path to life. Once you get comfortable there, he then turns you loose. Despite your own justification, you’re not an innocent little pawn in the chess match between God and the Devil.
What better way to get you off that path than to promise that you can have everything you want. The lure of that promise is so great we can’t even begin to turn away from it. We take the bait.
Fast-forward a few years and you look back to see that you haven’t really gotten where you thought you’d be. Real life has settled in. Now, this is real life based on that initial lie, not real life. We convince ourselves that our time is coming and we venture off to the movies to watch people like us. But only like us in the beginning. We know they are going to overcome and transform the lives of everyone around them for the better. Not only have you come out of the pit of being ordinary, but you brought others with you. Cue victory music.
The process most commonly portrayed is what they call the Hero’s Journey. A transformation from ordinary to extraordinary:
Almost every movie you sit down to watch follows this process to some degree. From comic book heroes to Hallmark movies, we love watching someone like us turn into someone like we want to be.
The turning point in every hero’s journey is when the lies and mistakes they’ve made culminate in a tragedy of some kind. It seems hopeless. Until they find that one piece of truth that sets them free. And once they get it, they are unstoppable. The music score changes and we know the destination is close. You can feel it in your heart the moment it all turns. The moment this unlikely hero is…born again.
It seems we all want to be born again. But not like Yeshua said we needed to be. We want to be delivered from the lies and despair in order to be the savior for others and gain glory for ourselves. Even the selfless hero gets all of the humble accolades as the closing credits run, right?
Why do we want so badly to be victorious? What is it we are truly seeking?
It’s almost as if we want an escape from this world because we realize it’s broken. Your everyday life is less than stellar and we want it to have meaning. Deep meaning.
Young people have no idea what this looks like. They have their entire lives in front of them and have infinite time to grow out of the ordinary and become amazing human beings. Why do they believe that? Because we lied to them and told them it was so:
“You can become anything you want”
“Put you mind to it and you can accomplish anything”
“My kid can do no wrong. How dare you accuse my perfect child of being anything but perfect!”
From an early age, the stage was set. Even if your parents didn’t fuel these lies, someone did. Teachers at school, other kids…but most likely TV and movies. (Of course, these days it is a reel of some kind that is showing them who they could be.)
So here we are. You were told you were a hero only to find out you aren’t. What next?
We hear the voice come and ask us a question:
“What do you want me to do for you?”
But here’s the rub. It isn’t Yeshua’s voice, it’s the voice of the Adversary. Go back to that hero's journey graphic above. Do you see that “helper” on the right side above the temptation and challenges? Yeah, that’s this moment.
We answer the Adversary and it begins our path through the challenges we so commonly call “life”.
We don’t need to spend a ton of time here because we are all living this right now. We are living with the fruit of our temptations and it is a very sour and bitter fruit, indeed.
But what if…what if someone came along when you were at your lowest and asked you the exact same question:
“What do you want me to do for you?”
How would your answer differ from the time before? I’d guess it would be chock full of wisdom in knowing that the thing you thought you wanted is not at all what you wanted. The important things in life are never addressed when our selfishness is driving the ship. That’s what we face in this hour of trial.
But we aren’t very smart, are we? Tragedy after tragedy, this ends up being our real life, huh? We can never seem to shake the cycle so we go back to that initial helper to help get us through. A life full of promises that never seem to materialize. So we go back again and again hoping for a different outcome.
But if…if…we reach the end of ourselves, we can break free from this cycle of death. You’ve followed the Adversary long enough and you have ended up completely blind. Groping for any scraps you can pull from the miserable life you’ve created. As you lie there, begging along the road, you hear the crowd rumbling. Yeshua is coming near. In your desperation, you cry out:
“Yeshua! Son of David! Have pity on me!”
Now you come face-to-face with the helper in the bottom right corner:
Yeshua stopped and said, “Call him over!” They called to the blind man, “Courage! Get up! He’s calling for you!”
He’s calling for you!
Proverbs 29:18 Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.
If I do not want to perish, if I want eternal life, I need to be able to see. The cloudy film over my eyes has grown so thick I can’t see anything at all -- and I want it gone.
“What do you want me to do for you?”
I WANT TO SEE!
I’m tired of the death cycle that keeps bringing me lower and lower. I’ve had enough of this begging. I want to be able to see! Please, please, please…open my eyes.
Bring me out of this darkness and into the light. Let me be born again!
Instantly he received his sight and followed him on the road.
This is where I belong. On the road, following Him. This is the transformation I want. It’s the atonement I need. Being restored to who he created me to be, not who I wanted to be.
The path of the hero’s journey is not reserved for the hero at all. It’s for the repentant and submissive only. It’s reserved for those that choose to humble themselves in their blindness and cry out to the Son of David.
Today is the day of death and rebirth so you can be fully transformed. Today is the day you become a real hero.
