John continues to explore what God was up to with Jesus. One way of answering that is that Jesus is like God and God is like Jesus – what does that do to your thinking about the life of faith.
Job invites us to hold lightly all that we think we know about God and to find comfort in the uncertainty. And then to live in hope.
Reminds me of Mark 1:15 – let your mind be blown
Bartimaeus comes at end of central section turns the story towards Jerusalem and highlights disciples’ blindness
Their minds have not been blown yet, they have not been re-oriented by Jesus and are still trying to use their old formulas to understand what is going on
On contrast Bartimaeus not only has his physical sight restored, but acts as true disciple, leaving all he had of any worth to follow Jesus up to Jerusalem and the cross
- What do these stories offer us in these uncertain and troubling times?
- In what ways are we like the disciples, or even Job’s unhelpful friends, locked into old ways of thinking and unable to see what Jesus is on about?
- What does it mean for us to be like Bartimaeus, true disciples, today?
- What are we being invited to leave behind,
- and where might we follow Jesus to?
The notes for this sermon can be found here.