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There’s a blind man sitting by the road outside Jericho in Luke 18, and the crowd wants him to be quiet—he’s an embarrassment, a distraction from something more important. He cries out anyway: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” Whatever it is that makes you feel like the person everyone else wants to go away, this passage is for you.
The following study questions are AI generated and may contain errors.
The blind man calls Jesus “Son of David”—recognizing Him as the promised Messiah—while the crowd around him sees only a nuisance. What kept the blind man’s faith clearer than those with physical sight? What blinds us to who Jesus really is, and how might we unintentionally silence others who are crying out to Him?
Jesus asks the blind man, “What do you want Me to do for you?”—a question that assumes we know what we need and are willing to ask. If Jesus asked you that question right now, what would you say? What keeps us from naming our deepest needs to Him?
The crowd tried to dismiss the blind man, but after witnessing the miracle, they gave praise to God. How does witnessing God’s work in someone else’s life change our own faith? Have you experienced that kind of shift?
The sermon stresses that God is not mad at you, even when you feel ashamed or like you’ve failed too many times. How does believing that God’s love is unchanging reshape the way you approach Him with sin, fear, or recurring struggle?
The healed man didn’t just receive his sight—he followed Jesus, glorifying God. What would it look like for you to move from crying out to actually following, in whatever area of your life you most need Him right now?
This transcript has been automatically generated and may contain errors.
Welcome everybody. It’s good to see everybody here in person and online—too many to count online, probably tons of people I don’t even know. Hope you got your naps in because it’s my turn this week; the party’s over.
We’ve been walking with Jesus through the Gospel of Luke. He’s asked us to be aware of His presence and aware of the excitement that He wants to bring, to trust in Him and to give our lives to Him, to draw near to Him, to recognize Him for who He truly is. I read something very interesting. I guess I was on Twitter, and it was very simple: “The Bible is a book of discipleship.”
The Bible is a book of discipleship, as much as it wants to give you information, it wants to tell you how to follow Jesus. Jesus is the center of it all, and He’s trying to show us, even by His very presence in the Gospels, how to follow Him. As we come to this text, we’ve been excited to meet Jesus. We’ve come to terms with the fact that we need faith to trust in Jesus, that all the things that He wants to do in us are through His power, and He’s going to show us some more things.
Let’s take a look. I don’t know if that’s accurate, verse 31, I think it’s 35. Okay. So, we’ll pick it up in verse 35. And what I’m going to do is I’m going to stop at verse 38 and then we’ll have a little conversation, and then we’ll go to 39 to 43, that’s the plan anyway. But you know how it is. We’ll get some Baptist air conditioning going, and that’s just how it goes.
So, let me just briefly read from God’s Word, and then I’ll pray.
As He drew near to Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. And hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what this meant. They told him, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. And he cried out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.”
Let’s pray.
Lord God, thank you for this Word, and thank you for drawing near to all sorts of people, even those who would be forgotten. But You don’t forget anyone. And You can rise up, You can make stones cry out to spread Your message. And You have humbled also those You wish to humble. Humble our hearts in gentleness, that we might receive what You have for us tonight through the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, come to us and be our teacher. We ask all this through Christ our Lord, Amen.
As we look at this text again, let’s go back to the beginning, the first few verses there. As He drew near to Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. So we know, as we look at this very first verse, it is not a mystery what this man has as a problem—he’s blind. It’s one of those things that jumps out at you. There are visible disabilities and there are invisible ones too, but this one’s very visible, just like mine, just like maybe some others. This man is blind, but is that the worst problem that he has? No.
Or, interestingly, if we think about this man, what if this man knows something that we don’t? Let’s keep reading.
And hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what this meant, because he could hear them, he couldn’t see them. They told him, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. And he cried out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.”
One thing that we see from this man is he knows who’s going by. He can’t see Him, but he knows. Think about, I don’t want to take us too far afield, but think about the passage in the Gospel of Mark when the woman who had been bleeding for 12 years said, “If I can only touch the hem of His garment, then I’ll be healed.” And in that place, they were crowding around, and Jesus was crazy enough to say, “Who touched me?” He was aware that somebody had reached out in faith. There was one person who reached out in faith to receive from Jesus. And He knew, and He made her come forward. And He said, “Go in peace, daughter, your faith has saved you.”
And so, this is who Jesus wants. He wants the people that have nothing, but if I just reach out a little, if I reach out in faith with all that I have left, and just whatever the metaphorical “touch the hem of his garment” is—whatever it is, whatever it takes to reach out and touch Jesus. And the key thing is, let Him touch us. Let Jesus touch us with whatever it is that’s holding us back. He wants to draw us closer and closer. He wants to save us not just one time, but for all times, for all the time that we spend here. We want to draw as near to Jesus as we can be. And we sang about being in His presence. How many times have we desired to be in His presence?
What we need are the spiritual eyes of this blind man. Notice that? The blind man is the one who said, “Son of David, have mercy on me.” Son of David, have mercy on me. Going all the way back to the promises that a son of David—and strictly speaking, a son of Solomon—would sit on the throne forever. And here’s this, for the rest of the crowd, he could have been a random guy. He’s a random guy, and he has the most theological knowledge and the most faith of anybody in this particular little picture of what’s going on.
And what did they try to do? They tried to make him go away. Why? Why? Even the disciples happened to think that maybe Jesus, their great teacher who was drawing people from all across the land to pay attention, had better things to do than heal a blind man. And even as we know that healing people is not the purpose of Jesus, when Jesus knows that it’s in the Father’s plan, He’s perfectly willing to stop and do that miracle. Because He knows faith when He sees it, and He sees it here.
Let’s read again.
And hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what this meant. They told him, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. And he cried out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” And Jesus stopped and commanded him to be brought to Him. And when he came near, He asked him, “What do you want Me to do for you?” He said, “Lord, let me recover my sight.” And Jesus said to him, “Recover your sight, your faith has made you well.” And immediately he recovered his sight and followed Him, glorifying God. And all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.
I think when this miracle was not for that guy, this miracle was for the rest of those people. Do you notice the end of the passage there? They saw this miracle and they glorified God. First, they wanted him to go away. He was crying out, he was following after them. And he’s not the only one who’s done it. They needed to see that this was the work of God. That God in the flesh didn’t have something more important to do. That God in the flesh, maybe what He was there to do that moment of that day was to heal that man in the power of God.
Sometimes the plans of God are great. And sometimes the plans of God are great but with a small little miracle for a small little person like you and me. You are not invisible to God. Your concerns, your worries, your fears, your sins, everything that makes up your life, the mountains that you’ve climbed, they’re not invisible to God. He sees everything, He knows everything, and God in the flesh wants to stretch out His hand and to touch you.
Will He take away every element of suffering? No, probably not. But if He’s near to you, you’ll know. You’ll know and you’ll have the strength to go forward.
This was a man who knew who Jesus was. He knew better than most people, because most people were trying to get Him to go away. He knew He was the Son of David. He knew He was the Promised One. And that’s why the sight was an easy gift for Jesus to give.
Notice how many places when we see Jesus do a miracle, there’ll be another note that He went to another town, and they didn’t have much faith, so Jesus couldn’t do any miracles there. Stop and think on that for a second. The all-powerful, limitless God who walked around in the flesh of Jesus could not, by some mystery, do a miracle because of their lack of faith. He could not do a miracle. Or at least, fair enough to say, it was not in the will of God to do a miracle for people who had no faith. It was not in the will of God to do an extraordinary miracle for those who had no faith.
But let’s turn it around. What kind of miracle does He want to do in your life because you have faith? What does He want to do for you? If He asked you, if He walked right up and asked you, “What do you want Me to do for you?” What would you say? What would you ask for? What is the thing that you’re afraid of? What is the thing that is the opposite of your trust? We talked about trusting in Him rather than trusting in ourselves. What’s that thing that’s holding you back from that trust? If He asked you right now, “What do you want from Me?”, what would you say? Could you give it over? Could you and would you? Would you take the grace of the Holy Spirit and do that? Please do that if He’s calling you.
They saw the miracle. The first part is the man who, strangely enough, has the better sight than anyone in the story. He’s blind, but he has the better sight. Notice how God does this all the time. He did it in John chapter 9. There was a blind man in that chapter too. And they said, “Aren’t you the man born blind?” And he goes, “Yeah.” And he goes, “Who made you see?” And he said, “I don’t know. But I was blind, and now I see.”
And they’re like, “Well, we got to find out about this guy.” They went and got his parents in John chapter 9. And they said, “Is this your son who was blind from birth?” And they go, “Yeah.” And they said, “Well, how did he receive his sight?” And they didn’t want to answer. They were a little bit afraid, remember? They said, “Well, he is of age. Ask him.”
And so he asked again. He said, “I told you. This guy, he put mud on my eyes, and He told me to wash in the river. And then I saw.” And then they said, “Well, that man’s a sinner.” And that guy said, “Well, I don’t know if he’s a sinner. But I just know that I was blind, and now I see.” And the argument ensued.
It wasn’t a very positive experience because they had it in for Jesus. Those leaders had it in for Jesus. And why? Because they weren’t ready to receive what Jesus had for them and everybody in the way that Jesus wanted to give it. He’s the Messiah, and He’s the King and the Lord. But recognize, and we say this every week, recognize He’s the Messiah and the King and the Lord that first had to be humiliated and die on a cross.
Yes, He’s the greatest that ever was. We have lots of goat discussions in sports. Greatest of all time. Who’s the greatest of all time? Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux, Alex Ovechkin. Who’s the greatest of all time? Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, LeBron James, Roger Federer. Pains me to say that. Novak Djokovic. Novak, who’s the greatest? Jesus really is the greatest.
But you know how He showed His greatness? He humbled Himself even to the point of death on a cross. And then He was exalted. That’s the great One that we follow.
They weren’t ready to receive Jesus in the way that Jesus wanted to be received.
Do you remember the old story of St. Lawrence? He was in Rome during one of the fierce persecutions by the Roman emperors back in the day. Some officials from the emperor said, “Go and bring us the treasures of the church.” So St. Lawrence gathered up all the poor people in Rome and got them into a big room. And he goes, “Here’s the treasures of the church.” They were like, “Ha, that’s funny. Well, we’re going to kill you.” And he’s like, “All right, whatever.” So they put him on a fire. They were literally grilling him to death. At one point, he laughed and said, “Turn me over. I’m done on this side.” That’s Jesus. Jesus can do that. Jesus is the Lord and the King of the poor and the destitute and those who have nothing, because the ones who are exalted are the ones who realize that they have nothing. Remember a couple of weeks ago when the tax collector was the one who went away justified because he knew that he had nothing.
Jesus tells us, let’s play a little Mad Libs. Jesus said, “Apart from me, you can do nothing.” Call it out. Yes, it’s audience participation. Yes, nothing. He doesn’t say, in fact, He doesn’t say, “Apart from me, you can do a few things.” He doesn’t say, “You could do things until you get to the end of the rope, and then you can call me.” He says, “Apart from me, you can do nothing,” which means we have to understand that nothing for what it is.
He doesn’t want to humiliate us. He wants us to be humble, to be ready to receive what He has for us. That’s why the wisest person in our Bible text today was the guy that can’t even see and the guy that everybody else wanted him to go away.
Just think, maybe sometimes you’ve been the person that everybody else wants to go away. But Jesus said, “If anyone comes to me, I will never drive him away. Never.” He will exalt you, and he will make you a son, and you will eat bread at the king’s table, and you will be exalted. Why? Because you received the one who was humiliated and then exalted. It was the Father’s will. That’s why it happened. He chooses the weak things of this world to shame the wise, the foolish things of the world to shame the strong, in another text. That’s who God is. He exalts the humble, and He humbles the exalted.
What do we need Him to do for us? What do we want Him to do for us? Again, let’s think about what we’re afraid of, the deepest, darkest places in our hearts. Maybe there’s a sin that we can’t let go of. That’s where Jesus wants to go. A struggle that we have repented of over and over and over. And you know what the accuser likes to do with that? He likes to tell us, “Oh, your faith is nothing. Your faith is pointless. See how you did that again and again? Even though he told you not to, you did it anyway. Look at how bad this is. Look how shameful you are.”
And Jesus said, “No. I died for him or her. Go away. I’ve beaten you once already. I’ll do it again if I had to.”
Jesus is drawing us near because He loves us. I want to look at one more little aspect of this sermon since the clock isn’t yelling at me yet. I’m not pulling a Tim quite yet.
Jesus was on His way to Jericho. Jericho was the place where the walls came down. Israel went around those walls for six days. And on the seventh day, they blew the trumpets. Jericho was also the place where the good Samaritan found the guy who’d been assaulted by robbers.
Think about the people from that other parable back earlier in Luke. We had a priest, and we had a Levite, the upper crust of society. It would be as if, I don’t know, Russell Moore was going by on the road and passed by. He wouldn’t pass by. I’m sure Russell would stop and help.
But somebody important, wearing a suit, coming from service, passing by the man who was assaulted by robbers, and the one who stops and helps is the half-breed, the no-name, the guy that nobody should talk to anyway. He goes to the innkeeper and says, “Whatever he owes, I’ll take care of it when I come back.”
We have lots of church father interpretations of that. I’ll just say, with all due respect, some of that is pretty wild. But at a bare minimum, the good Samaritan is Jesus. The good Samaritan is Jesus, and we’re the ones who were assaulted by robbers on the road because that is sin. That is the world that catches up to every human being if they don’t have help from God above.
As we are in our natural place, we’re on the way back from Jericho, and we’re going to get robbed. Then we’re going to be emptier than we were before—beat up, wounded, nearly on the point of death. That’s who ordinary folks are when they come in. This has to be a hospital for sinners because everybody is wounded and near death. Or, as you might have it, spiritually dead already. It’s God who makes us alive. We can’t make ourselves alive. It’s God who does that. Jesus is the one that rescued us, even though we were along the road and we had nothing.
So funny how that old parable about the Samaritan, who was a half-breed and a heretic, by the way. That’s why Jews and Samaritans don’t associate with each other. That’s what happened in the early part of that conversation with the woman at the well. It says Jews and Samaritans don’t associate. That woman was a Samaritan, and she had her five husbands. I mean, we make fun of the people on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette all the time. She’s The Bachelorette, man. She’d been through it. She met several dudes, and the one she was with now is not her husband. That’s what the Lord said. But Jesus draws her close.
Remember how the leaders—let’s go to another place, since I love to do Baptist air conditioning. Notice how, when Jesus was preparing for burial, and the lady came, and it was in Simon the Pharisee’s house, and some of these stories get smushed together, but Simon the Pharisee’s house. He said, “If you knew what kind of woman this is, you wouldn’t wash your feet with her hair.” Jesus is like, “I know what kind of woman she is. I know what kind of woman and man everybody is.” And like I said, every time I come here, He knows, and He’d die for you anyway. If you were the only one, He would still go to the cross for you. He knows.
Let me wrap it up this way. An old friend of mine, his name is Brent Harriman. He was an RUF minister for a long time, and he told me this story. I don’t remember where they were, I don’t remember what big city it was. But they found some prostitutes, and they found out that one of the prostitutes was having a birthday. They got together. They got a cake, and her friends came, and they enjoyed the cake. It was 3 in the morning, by the way. Somebody said to Brent a little later on—well, I don’t even know if it’s his original story—but they said, “Well, what church do you belong to?” And he said, “I belong to the church that throws birthday parties for prostitutes at 3 in the morning.”
We have to know that no matter what it is that we feel like is holding us back, Jesus knows that, and He’s not afraid of that. He’s never been afraid of that for any second, any moment of your life. You can turn to Him yet again or for the first time and give Him that. And as wretched as you think you are, you’re worse. He knows that, and He still doesn’t care because He loves you.
When we say that God is love, let me end this with a dogmatic theology point. When we say that God is love, and we say that God never changes, when you put those two things together, which people miss all the time, that means that God can’t do anything except love. He can’t do anything except will what is best for you, because that’s what love is.
He is nothing except His greatest attribute, which is love, and all His other attributes are summed up in that one. He never changes. Remember, we’re the ones who change. We’re the ones who change. God doesn’t change. So if you think that God is mad at you, you’re wrong because He can’t.
Now, the Holy Spirit can convict you and gently bring you back and cause you to repent and all that stuff, but that’s gentle. If you feel like dirt, that’s not God. God will never make you feel like dirt, even though literally you are. Go back to the beginning of the Bible. We’re dirt. We’re dust. He breathed life into Adam, and he was a living soul, a living being, however you want to translate that. We started off as dirt, and now we are princes and princesses in the house of the king because He decided that it was so, and it was so.
What do we say? Let me land this plane in three minutes.
Go to Jesus. Go to the cross because the blood of the cross is still fresh for you. His wounds are still fresh for you. His love is still fresh for you ever and always.
You hear it in lots of pop songs. “Oh, I’ll love you forever. You’re my only love.” And notice how all those people sing in those pop songs—they’re never married when they say that. Jesus, when He went to the cross and He made the church with His very own body and blood, He married us, and He will never leave us, and He will never forsake us because that is who He is.
He wants to share that everlasting communion of joy that is heaven with us, and it starts right now. That’s why the Holy Spirit is a guarantee of what He has given us. We can experience His faithfulness now. And I know you felt it, beloved. I know. I’ve seen it in your faces. I know you know, but if you’ve forgotten, remember again. I think the greatest thing we do is remember. We do this remembering every week. “Do this in remembrance of me.” That’s the cross. It’s just the cross.
Remember who you are, who God is, and who we will be when all things are set right.
Let’s pray.
Lord Jesus, You take a blind man and You exalt him. To love You and to trust You. Heal our hearts, we pray, from all those things that we fear, that we are ashamed of. And give us the strength to walk forward in Your ways and in Your will from now until the rest of our lives. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
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