Faith. What is it? Being sure of our hope. Convinced of what we can't see. By faith, we understand the world was set in order at God's command. By faith, Abel offered God a greater sacrifice than Cain. And for his faith, God commended him as righteous. By faith, Noah trusted God and constructed an ark for the deliverance of his family. By faith, Abraham was willing to sacrifice Isaac, his only son, believing God would still fulfill his promises. By faith, Moses chose to be mistreated with the people of God, rather than enjoy sin's fleeting pleasure. By faith, God's chosen nation crossed the Red Sea on dry ground and praised Him as it swallowed up the Egyptians. By faith, Rahab the prostitute escaped destruction because she welcomed the spies in peace. Time will fail me if I tell of Gideon, David, and the prophets. By faith, they administered justice, shut the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire. But others were imprisoned, murdered, and wandered in deserts, mountains, and openings in the earth. We are surrounded by this great cloud of witnesses. So get rid of every weight, of every sin, and run. Run with endurance the race set before us. Keep your eyes fixed on Jesus. He is the champion and guide of our faith. For promised joy, he endured the cross, thought nothing of its shame, and having risen again, has been handed his deserved glory at the right hand of the throne of God. Faith in Jesus Christ. That is the foundation of our faith. That is why we are here today. Today we're gonna be in the gospel of Mark chapter 10. So if you have your Bibles, would you please open with me to Mark 10? We're gonna start in verse 46 here in a moment. As we think about faith and what that means to us, and thank you, sir, we think about this idea of when faith becomes sight. It makes us think of our physical eyesight, first of all. According to estimates from the 2022 National Health Interview Survey, 50.18 million American adults age 18 and older reported experiencing some degree of vision loss. Of these, 3.89 million adults have a lot of trouble seeing, even when wearing glasses. and 340,000 cannot see at all. Cataracts and glaucoma affect millions of Americans. In fact, an estimated 50% of people with the disease of glaucoma are undiagnosed, estimated. Nearly 1.1 million Americans are legally blind. So this morning, as we think about sight, As we think about our physical sight, first of all, how is your eyesight and how important is it to you? We take our eyesight very seriously. In fact, we would consider it, I think, in most cases, priceless. If someone were to offer me even millions of dollars in exchange for my eyesight, it would be an easy answer, no thank you. But what about our spiritual sight? What about our spiritual heart site? How valuable is that? What's the price of that? It's often said that seeing is believing. In other words, in order to believe something, a person must see it or proof of it first. But the Bible indicates the reverse is actually true. Believing is seeing. comes before sight. Otherwise, as the writer of the Hebrews says, why do we call it faith? Today, we're going to meet a man whose spiritual sight eventually led to his physical sight. But the focus in the text is the eyes of his heart. And as we think about how a blind beggar is going to show us that spiritual sight or faith is our way to access God's power in our lives. Heavenly Father, thank you, Lord, for our eyesight. And I know many listening, even here, maybe are struggling with their physical eyesight. But Lord, we think this morning as we turn our minds to our spiritual sight, and we read in your word of accounts of healings and things as we're going to read this morning, I pray that our minds would not be pulled to the physical as much as the spiritual. Father, please remove the blind spots from our hearts. Please help us to see your word with fresh eyes. Help us to understand your truth and to see it clearly in the way that you intended us to see it. Oh Lord, please open our eyes and open our ears and open our hearts. And please let your spirit have his way in us today. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. We're going to start here in our passage in Mark 10. We have an outline. So if you're taking notes, number one will be the blind beggars cry. We're going to look at this verse by verse and just walk through these, these verses. and try to understand them and apply them to our lives. Number one, the blind beggars cry. We'll start in verse 46, Mark 10, 46. Now they came to Jericho, and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples in a great multitude, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the road begging. Of course, this is Jesus and his disciples being spoke of here. and they're traveling on their way to Jerusalem, and they come through Jericho, and as they're leaving Jericho, there was this man known as Blind Bartimaeus. His condition had become what he was known for. He wasn't just known as Bartimaeus, but Blind Bartimaeus. It was part of his identity. The name Bartimaeus literally means son of Timaeus. which means his father's name was Timaeus. Just like Jesus called Peter Simon bar Jonah, if you'll remember that, Simon son of Jonah. Well, this man was the son of Timaeus, so we're not even sure what his birth or given name was, but he was known as bar Timaeus, in fact, blind bar Timaeus. Also notice the position of this beggar, this blind beggar. He sat by where? The side of the road. He's off to the side. Bartimaeus was not able to move about freely, nor was he able to work for a living because of his condition of blindness. So there he sat by the side of the road, marginalized and helpless, begging for coins or food so that he could live. That was his daily routine. Get up, go to the side of the road, maybe somebody led him there, and sit down and begin to beg. He was a beggar. And as we examine this text, we need to understand that at some level, we need to see ourselves with the same needs that this man had. We need to see ourselves as spiritual beggars by the side of the road, needing someone, needing something greater than ourselves to rescue us from ourselves. Well, as we go to the next verse here, verse 47, Here he's sitting, and there's a crowd coming by, and he's asking questions. Who is it? What's happening? Somebody please tell me, because he couldn't see. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. Notice how Bartimaeus addressed Jesus, Son of David. This is so significant. There's so much to consider as we think about this title with which he addresses Jesus of Nazareth. It's significant for one reason because it's synonymous with calling him the Messiah. And if you have read through the Gospels, and we were on a series in Mark in our ABF class, you know that Jesus' identity as Messiah was something he kept quiet. if you'll remember, when he performed a healing, don't tell anyone it was me. When he described himself, finally revealed that identity of Messiah to his disciples, he said, you do not let it be known. The scholars call it the messianic secret. It was his way of covering his identity until the right time for it to be announced. But here we have Bartimaeus. He's heard, apparently he's heard all about this Jesus of Nazareth. And he has concluded, based on what he's heard, that this is the Messiah. The prophet said that the Messiah would come down through the line of David. And if we go back to 2 Samuel 7, we find the Davidic covenant, where God is speaking to David and telling him about one that would come. And that the throne would be established in David's line forever to all generations. Well, that passage culminates in verse 16. This is God speaking to David, and your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before you. Your throne shall be established forever. At some point in his life, Bartimaeus had heard and read or seen these prophecies. Perhaps his blindness wasn't from birth. Perhaps he had lived part of his life sighted and had seen this or read it, or perhaps he was blind but had heard it, had heard the teachings. He understood this man, he must be the son of David we've been waiting for. He's been hearing about all the things Jesus has been doing, including healing blind people. So he knew that was, I believe, a possibility by this time. He's been hearing what he's been teaching, and he's concluded that Jesus indeed is the true Messiah, the Son of David. He's come to that conclusion. What conclusion have you arrived at about the identity of Jesus Christ? Who is Jesus to you? To Bartimaeus, he was the Son of David. He was the Savior. He was the Messiah. What's so ironic is the religious leaders, the rabbis and the Pharisees and the priests were plotting to kill Jesus from very early on in his ministry, to destroy him. Yet this physically blind man was able to see the spiritual truth of Jesus' true identity. Next verse, 48. Then many warned him to be quiet. but he cried out all the more, son of David, have mercy on me. Sometimes the people around us expect us to act in certain ways. And sometimes the most difficult things to overcome are the expectations of others and the demands that others place upon us. Well, Bartimaeus did not let that stop him. He would not be deterred. He was determined to get to Jesus. He was determined to get to the truth. How about us today? Are we determined to pursue Christ like this? Sometimes we allow the pressure of this culture to stifle our search for Christ and the truth. And while it's easy to point a finger at the world, I would also say that cultural Christianity puts that kind of pressure on a believer that is trying to pursue Christ with all his heart. Cultural Christianity says, hey, let's all get together on Sundays and let's play the part and let's do our church thing, but then we live however we want the rest of the week. That's cultural Christianity, and it destroys churches from the inside out, because there's no real truth there. There's no real unity. And so these crowds, and if you've studied Mark, you know that Mark often, almost every time, depicts the crowds as problematic. The crowds are roadblocks. The crowds are those that bring a negative view to his ministry. So they warned him to be quiet. Perhaps they didn't think it was proper to call Jesus son of David. They maybe understood the messianic overtone and said, that's not right. You need to stop calling him that. Or perhaps they just saw Bartimaeus as a nuisance. and he was pressured to be silenced. Sometimes the cultural pressures need to be abandoned for something greater, our pursuit of Christ. Well, Bartimaeus would not be silenced. When pressured to quiet down, he grew louder. The phrase cry out is the same word used when Jesus came walking on the water to the disciples in the boat and they cried out in fear. It's the same word. It's the same intensity as that. It's a cry of intense longing and motivation. And we see a little picture of what canceled culture looked like in the first century. Bartimaeus was being hushed, being canceled because of his outspoken cries. Notice the repeated request, have mercy on me. The phrase, all the more, meant that it was over and over and over again. Son of David, have mercy on me. Son of David, have mercy on me. Son of David, have mercy on me. The only thing he could use was his voice. He couldn't get up and find him because he couldn't see where he was going. So he used what he had, his voice, to cry out over and over and over and over and over and over again. And notice his cry. Does he say, heal my blindness? Does he say, come heal me and give me my sight? He says, have mercy on me. Well, what is mercy and who needs it? Well, mercy is the repeal of deserved judgment, deserved punishment. It's a holding back of the consequences that one has earned rightfully because of wrongdoing or sin. This cry tells us that Bartimaeus saw himself as God saw him, as a man in need of God because of his sin, because of his position. He understood his position before God. He understood that he did not deserve mercy, yet he cries out for it. What a mindset to have. He understood that in order to be healed, In order for Jesus to heal him, Jesus would have to give him mercy. This is the humble heart in whom God takes pleasure. Do we understand our need for mercy? As Christians, we should understand it more than all else, because we've already understood that we are sinners. We've already understood that we deserve hell. We already understand that we don't deserve to make it through tonight. We understand we don't deserve our very next breath because of the depravity of our sin, but Jesus, Jesus can save. He's the answer. As Christians of all people, we understand we don't deserve anything. Yet God has given us his grace and his mercy poured out upon us through the love of Christ on the cross. Do we understand our need for mercy? Or do we come to God with our list of demands and ask him just to stamp his approval so we can move on with our plans? Oh, the humbleness of this man to cry out over and over, begging for mercy. May we be beggars for God's mercy, not because we don't think he'll give it, but because we see ourselves in the true light of who we really are. Yes, we are created in his image, and we are image bearers of God, and God loves us deeply but humility is called for. Humility. Let's look at number two, the kind healer's call. Look with me at verse 49. Mark 10, 49. So Jesus stood still and commanded him to be called. Then they called the blind man, saying to him, be of good cheer, rise, he is calling you. So first of all, we see Jesus' response to the beggar's cry. Jesus stood still. He paused on his journey because of the cries of a beggar. What a picture of God in the person of Christ as he perfectly reflects the love of the Father and the grace and the mercy of the Father to stop and to turn and to listen. What a beautiful picture of prayer when we cry out to the Lord. He's listening. He wants to hear from us. Many refuse to cry out like Bartimaeus did. Some excuse their refusal to cry out to God on the basis of a false view of themselves. And there's both extremes. Some think they are too good, and they are proudly self-sufficient. Others have concluded they are too far gone, and are proudly self-despising. You see, both extremes are pride. One thinks they're too good, one thinks they're too gone. Because pride is nothing more than a hyper-focus on the self. We focus on ourselves to the point where we decide what should and shouldn't be done and decide what God is capable of and what he's not. How foolish, how prideful. Yet God has declared his love by sending his son to die for all of us. What more does God need to do to show how much he loves you? He's already demonstrated his love to us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. He demonstrated, he showed it to us. Who are we to decide what God's limits are? God is offering salvation if you've not believed. He's offering the believer a relationship, a fellowship with him. When we truly cry out as Bartimaeus did, God stands still. In other words, he listens. You've got his attention. He will stand still and he will invite you in just as Christ did to this beggar. He invited him, didn't he? He invited him in. He commanded, actually, commanded that he be called. He extends the invitation. to Bartimaeus, and notice the crowds, how fickle they are. All of a sudden, well, be of good cheer. One minute it was, be quiet, you're a nuisance, stop saying anything. Next moment, well, come on down, he's inviting you. What a shallow understanding of Jesus' true identity. Again, what a contrast with who Bartimaeus believed Jesus to be versus the crowds. Verse 50, "...and throwing aside his garment, he rose and came to Jesus." Now this garment was likely his outer cloak that most people wore at this time. He had probably a tunic or something on underneath. This outer cloak was likely what he used sprawled out in front of him to collect the coins. and goods that people might place there so that he could gather it in and feel for what was there and try to gather it and keep it safe. It was also probably a pallet, a bed for him to rest on and something to wrap around himself on cool nights. And always before, he had no doubt used his sense of feel to find where that was and keep that close at hand, always within arm's reach. It was vital to his livelihood. He didn't want those coins bouncing on the stones and getting into the dirt. He wanted them where he could find them. His collection plate during the day and his blanket for warmth at night. But notice what he does with it. Cast it aside. What faith! What faith! Now some have argued this must be a picture of salvation when one casts off their old life to come to Christ. I would argue at this point Bartimaeus is already a believer. He's already called Jesus son of David. He already understood Jesus' identity. And he was ready for a fellowship relationship with him. He knew he could go back and find that garment again. He knew he could just return and find it. So he cast it aside. What a picture of faith. And also everyone wore cloaks. Believers and unbelievers alike. Don't think the cloak was sinful in any way. His faith was so sure that he was not concerned any longer about cloaks and begging and warmth and comfort. He was not concerned with the cares of this world. He understood who he was going to. He understood that the son of David had summoned him and nothing else mattered. Nothing else was going to matter anymore. He was going to see Jesus. He was going to see the son of David. He had begged for mercy and Jesus had stood still and called him and how he was going to see him. And that's all that mattered. How often do we get wrapped up in the cares and concerns of our lives and we forget that Jesus has summoned us. He's summoned you already, Christian, into a life of service to him. He's summoned you into a life of righteous living according to his word. He's summoned you to go and make disciples and to be a disciple. We have been summoned by Christ. What worldly things, not even always sinful things, Are we wrapped up in that distract us from going to Jesus? Peter and Andrew left their nets. James and John left their boat. Matthew left his tax booth behind. And here Bartimaeus throws aside his cloak. We think of that passage that was in the video, Hebrews 11. And we see it over and over again. Symbols of this casting aside to pursue something better. Whatever it is that's weighing you down is nothing compared to the glory of knowing Christ in a deeper way. Nothing we have compares to Christ, the incomparable Son of God. One example from that chapter of Hebrews 11 is a man named Moses. Hebrews 11, 24 through 26 say, by faith Moses, when he became of age, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt, for he looked to the reward. And though Bartimaeus had not yet been healed, he was looking to the reward. By faith, he wasn't allowing the cultural pressure to hold him back from pursuing Christ. He wasn't allowing his old way of life to hold him back from pursuing Christ. It was cast aside and he followed and looked to the reward. What might God be asking us to let go of so that his best can be done? Oh, we've got lots of good things. We've got lots of good things in our lives. But do we have the best? Do we have the very best? Are we pursuing Christ with all of our being and all of our energy and all of our focus or are we just constantly distracted by all these things that are less? We need to, like Bartimaeus, cast aside whatever is keeping us from a deeper relationship with Christ. Whatever it is, it will never measure up to Him, no matter how great it is, no matter what relationship, what pursuit of this life, Nothing measures up to Christ. Let's go on here, number three, our final point. The blind beggar's cure. The blind beggar's cure, verse 51. So Bartimaeus is now standing in front of Jesus. And notice Jesus' response. So Jesus answered and said to him, what do you want me to do for you? The blind man said to him, Rabboni, that I may receive my sight. At first Jesus questioned here. Might seem unnecessary or even illogical or irrational, Wasn't it obvious that Bartimaeus was blind? You can talk. Wasn't it obvious that he needed his sight restored? And besides that, wouldn't the all-knowing incarnate Son of God already know what Bartimaeus needed before he got there? So why ask the question? Some things come to mind. First of all, Jesus was allowing Bartimaeus to speak for himself as an individual person, and not just another problem for Jesus to take care of. Think of it if it had happened a different way. Bartimaeus comes up and Jesus just says, you're healed, and turns and walks away on his way to Jerusalem. Where's the relationship in that? Where's the connection, the personal touch in that? Jesus was not content to just do something to him. Jesus desired to connect with him in a personal way. And if everything that Jesus did and said is a reflection of the Father, which it is, then that is exactly how the Father wants to interact with us. We have a beautiful picture of prayer again here. Because when we pray, we ask for things, right? We bring our needs before the throne, and sometimes the question comes up, why bother if he knows all about it anyways? Because, why bother? Because that's our relationship. That's our connection to Father. If a child never asked their father for anything and there was no communication and there was never a conversation, there would be no relationship. It wouldn't be there. It would be treating God like this cosmic vending machine that we just go and we push what we want and out it comes and we go on our way. Anyone have close personal ties to a vending machine? Like, no thanks. No, that's not who God is. Jesus says, What do you want me to do for you? Let's talk about this. I wanna hear it from your lips. If you go back to the last chapter, we're not gonna go there, but it's the same question that Jesus asked when James and John came to him, if you remember. They came to him and they said, Master, we want you to give us what we're gonna ask. Like saying to Jesus, we're not gonna tell you what it is, will you just say yes, and then we'll tell you, and then you'll give it to us, like children do to parents sometimes. Just say yes, please say yes to what I'm gonna ask. Like, ooh, dangerous. And Jesus asked them that question, and of course they're asking for the right and left seats in the kingdom. That's something they didn't fully understand. And Jesus was not able to give them anyhow. He said it wasn't up to him to do that. It was for those it was prepared for. They were seeking power and honor and riches and success and prestige. Here, Bartimaeus seeks none of those things. He doesn't ask for great riches or power or prestige or honor or riches, only sight. Bartimaeus asked simply to see. Something most of us take for granted. Something normal. He asked for normalcy. I just want to live a normal life. And when we're sick, and we're struggling, or we're suffering under heavy trials, or our loved ones are suffering under heavy trials, it is not some great thing that we're coming to God with, it is normalcy that we seek. God, can we just have a normal day? Anyone ever pray that prayer? Just give me something normal. But then when we have normal, we just kind of live as though that's just how life has to be. What a challenge for us to be thankful for normal. Because it's often not there and when it's gone, it's hard. Also, there were many blind people in Israel. I tried to find statistics like I gave about America at the beginning, I couldn't find those. But we know that there were many because Jesus healed many blind people. But logically thinking, there were likely many blind people that Jesus didn't heal in Israel. Some may have never crossed paths with him, but others might have been too proud. for Jesus to work in their lives. So this question was a test of his pride. It was to understand and reveal to Bartimaeus his heart. Of course, Jesus already knew his heart, right? But it was to show Bartimaeus where he was and to make that heart-to-heart connection. There's no room for pride in our prayer life. And if we're caught in a trap of pride, our prayer life is going to suffer immensely. Because we're coming to God not as a blind beggar, but as a proud person. And we decided what we need, and he just needs to do it. God already knows your needs, granted that. But he desires to have the connection. He desires to ask the question. He desires to have the conversation with us. Just like a loving father watching their little one struggle with something, and they're just waiting for them to come and say, Dad, I need help with this. That's what God is doing with us. The loving father, he wants to hear from us. He wants us to talk to him. so that we build that relationship with him. It's a relationship-building process that he desires, and it's for our good and for his glory. We call it progressive sanctification, where we're gradually, over time, changing to be more and more and more like Jesus. And it's a lifelong process. We don't reach the end until we're glorified with him. And we're all at different places on that journey. But God wants us to continue to grow. And part of that growth process is learning to pray with humility and learning to be specific and learning to bring things to the Lord and lay them in His hands and ask Him for what we need. In faith, trusting that whatever the answer is, whether it's what we are asking for or something else, that it will be exactly what we need. Trusting in Him for the answer. Bartimaeus' response is especially significant. Rabboni, Rabboni. It's a similar term to rabbi, which means teacher, which we find all through scripture. A rabbi was a teacher, Jesus was a rabbi, so rabbi would have been appropriate, but Bartimaeus chooses Rabboni to address Jesus. In Jewish literature, This form, it is a form of the word rabbi, but this form is seldom used to refer to humanity. Instead, it was used frequently as a prayer to God and almost never used as an address. So the prayer to God would be, we ask our Rabboni. It wasn't Rabboni save us, as Bartimaeus did here. There's significance here. Rabboni tells us that this blind beggar understood spiritually, he could spiritually see who Jesus was. based on everything he had heard, he had concluded that he was the son of David, he had concluded that he was the Messiah, and he had concluded that he was God. Rabboni. Come to verse 52 now. What's the response of Christ? Then Jesus said to him, go your way, your faith has made you well. And immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus on the road. Now we come to the climax finally of the account. Jesus here honoring Bartimaeus' request and healing his blindness. And what was the deciding factor in Jesus doing that? It was his faith. Your faith has made you well. It was the faith of the blind man who could spiritually see who Jesus was and asked in faith for that healing and for that mercy. Bartimaeus' faith became sight. The deity of Jesus here once again on display. Just the simple words of command and really he didn't even say be healed per se, he just said has made you well. It's almost as if Jesus thought the healing and it instantly happened. Bartimaeus' faith became sight. It was by grace and by mercy. The mercy he had cried out for over and over and over again was given to him through his faith. that he was healed. Jesus told him to go your way. Go your way. You're free of blindness. You're going to be able to see the way now. You're not going to be led by anyone. You're going to go. You're not going to have to depend on others. You're going to go. You're going to go your way. You're free of your blindness. And Mark's trademark word immediately there describes the instantaneous healing that came as a result of Jesus' thoughts and words. When we choose to live by faith, God takes action in our lives. Sometimes it is immediate, as in the case of Bartimaeus here. Other times, God does not remove the circumstance. but he gives us the grace and he walks beside us through it. Some healing takes place in this life and some healing takes place in the next life, but the truth is the healing will come. And we must believe that by faith. And notice Bartimaeus' response to being healed. What did he do there at the end? He followed Jesus on the road. In the beginning, where was Bartimaeus? Beside the road. Sidelined, marginalized, an outcast, and now he's on the road, and he's following the one who healed him. as one of his disciples. No, he's not named with the 12 apostles, but he is named as a disciple here. That's what it means. A disciple is simply someone who follows Jesus. Bartimaeus became a disciple. He believed, he was healed, and he became a disciple. He chose to do that. He had freedom to go any which way, didn't he? Could have chosen to go back into Jericho. chosen to go to find loved ones or to start up a new life, but what does he choose to do? He chooses to follow Jesus. And the way he's described in verse 46, if you remember that little moniker, blind Bartimaeus. Some believe that might indicate that he was known to the early church who Mark was writing to. And he's now telling the story. You know that guy that we all call blind Bartimaeus? Yeah, but he's not blind. Let me tell you why. Let me tell you why. Bartimaeus' condition of blindness could be in any one of us. And I'm not talking about physical, I'm talking about spiritual. Did you know that we all have blind spots in our lives? We all have spiritual blind spots, areas in our lives that we're still struggling in. I know what mine are. As God works in your heart, he'll reveal yours. Areas that we're struggling in, things about ourselves and our hearts that sometimes we don't even realize until the Lord shows us that the enemy has set up a stronghold. If you're a believer today, When was the last time you cried out to Jesus, have mercy on me? When was the last time you sought for that mercy? We need it every single day. What is the blind spot for you, Christian? Don't allow your pride to keep you from receiving the healing you need in your life. And yes, Christians still need healing, soul healing, heart healing, spiritual healing, Well, I've got eternal life. I've put my faith in Christ. That's wonderful. But you're still here. God hasn't called you home, so you're here. So what does God want to do with you? And what is he working in your heart about? Don't allow pride to keep you from receiving the healing that's needed. Don't let the culture pressure you into stopping your pursuit of Christ. even if that culture is cultural Christianity and it's other believers that wanna hold you back. Don't allow that to happen. The Bible says that Satan blinds people to the truth. Couple more verses here and we'll be done. 2 Corinthians 4, 3, and 4 say this, but even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the God of this age has what? blinded, the mind is blinded, who do not believe lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. Maybe you're sitting in church for the hundredth time, the millionth time, the countless number of times you've been in church, you grew up in church maybe, or you've been coming regularly, but your mind has been blinded by the truth. The God of this age here is speaking of Satan. He's the God of this age. And he is very effective at blinding hearts to the truth of the gospel. And we can hear it over and over and over and over again, yet it doesn't penetrate. Why is that? Why do people not respond to the gospel? It's because their hearts have been blinded by our enemy. And so we've spoken to the believers, but what about unbelievers? Do you understand that you've sinned? That's a pretty easy one to agree to, because we look at the law and it kind of tells us, even a lie tells us that we've broken one of the commandments. And James says, if we've broken one, we're guilty of all. And so it's not hard to understand our guilt before God. It's not hard to understand that we're sinners. Something a little bit harder to understand is that the punishment, the wages of sin is death. And the truth is, as we stated earlier, not one of us deserves to even be alive today. We all deserve to be burning in the place called hell. That's what we believe. And I know that's not comforting, but it's true. The comfort is found in the good news. that Jesus came to earth and died on the cross for you, shedding his blood for you as the perfect, spotless, sinless lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. That's what Jesus did for you, you see? And why did he do that? So that if you believe in him, put your faith in him, he gives you the gift of eternal life. Maybe you've heard that for the hundredth time this morning. but the prayer is that the blinders would come off, the blindness would cease, and you would have spiritual sight to see the truth as the light of the gospel becomes unveiled in your heart. Have you believed in Christ? If not, let the light of the gospel penetrate that veil this morning. Open your eyes spiritually to the truth. One final verse, we quote this often, Ephesians 2, 8, and 9 says, for by grace you have been saved. Bartimaeus called out for mercy. Mercy and grace, not the same thing, but similar. Grace, God giving us what we don't deserve. By grace, you have been saved. And he says it that way because he's writing to Christians, this letter of Ephesians to Christians. Christians, you've been saved. Unbelievers, you can be saved. Through what? faith, not through works, which he addresses in a moment, and that not of yourselves, it's not of you, it is the gift of God. Not of works lest anyone should boast. No one will be in heaven saying, I got here on my own merit. I got here because I did good on earth. No, we'll all be saying, we're only here because of Jesus and what he did for us. And that gift is accessed by faith. Bartimaeus' healing was accessed by faith. Eternal life is accessed only by faith. If you've not put your trust in Christ, would you do that today? Believer, if you're struggling, if you're wrapped up in the cares of this world, would you throw them aside? Would you follow hard after Christ? Let's pray. Father, thank you, Lord, so much for this testimony of this man. This blind beggar, Lord, Everyone had written off. Everyone had put aside. Everyone tried to quiet. Lord, we need to see ourselves in that position this morning. I pray for us as believers that we would take to heart the challenge of casting aside what is ever besetting us in following heart after Christ. Be with that unbeliever, Lord. May the light of the gospel pierce the veil