When Life Stops You, Call Out to Jesus

Turn your Bibles to Mark chapter number 10. If you didn't know, Pastor and Mrs. Surface are away. Uh they'll be back this week. Uh but they're away for a uh celebration of life for Mr. Surface's brothers. So, if you would pray for them as they travel back this week uh for traveling mercies and for some rest time uh so they can come back to us and they'll be back here next Sunday. But Mark chapter number 10, it's so good to see everybody here. Uh, thank you for being here and being in your place. I'm excited to preach what the Lord has laid on my heart. Um, this is a passage that I I enjoy reading and it's a passage that has uh impacted me greatly.

But before I start, let me ask you this. Have you ever felt like life was passing you by? Like you were sitting still while everyone else seemed to be moving forward? Uh, this happened to me. Uh not too long ago, I was stuck, not physically, but emotionally and and spiritually. In my eyes, things seemed to be lacking. Um my ministry, my relationships, and on top of that, that same year, my uncle, who I love dearly, passed away. And by the end of that year, I just seemed like I was surviving. You always hear that quote, are you are you thriving or are you surviving? And I don't want to raise hands because I don't want to see who's thriving because I don't want to be jealous of you.

Um, but there are people who at the end of a year can be thriving and there are people who barely make it and are just surviving. And today we're going to look at someone who knew exactly what that felt like. Someone from the Bible. His name was Bardameus. He was a blind man. He was sitting on the side of the road and he was forgotten by most people. Uh he was probably by himself. But one encounter with Jesus changed everything. And that same Jesus that changed this man's life is the same Jesus that we worship today. And that's the Jesus that I'm going to present to you in this passage. It's a passage that Mark wrote.

And if you're here today and you do not have a relationship with God, then consider this Jesus walking by you. You'll get that once we read the passage. But if you're here today and you actually do know Jesus Christ as your savior and you're saved, then Jesus doesn't walk by you. He doesn't walk past you because the Bible says that he will never leave you nor forsake you. So he's actually with you. And so what we're going to do, we're going to go through each passage, each each verse, just make some comments and apply some truths from each each word. But as we open our Bibles to Mark chapter 10, we're going to begin in verse number 46.

I want you to think about this question. When life happens, will you call out to Jesus? When life happens, will you call out to Jesus? Let's pray and then we'll dive into our passage today. Father, we love you so much. We thank you for being so good. We thank you for your word that we have it that we can even study it and read all about you and read about the people that came before us and the people that interacted with your son Jesus Christ. We thank you, Father, for your word. As we dive into uh Mark's gospel, we ask Lord that you would speak to our hearts. Would you help us to learn something today that could change us and could impact us greatly?

Would you encourage us? Would you challenge us? Would you help us to fall deeper in love with you? In Jesus name we pray. Amen. So Mark chapter number 10. We'll begin reading in verse number 46. I'll read. You just follow along. The Bible says this. And they came to Jericho. And as he went out of Jericho with his disciples, just explain who it is that we're talking about. It's Jesus and his disciples. And a great number of people, blind Barameus, the son of Tmus, sat by the highway side begging. Let me give you guys the context of this passage. Um Jesus and his disciples, they are in Jericho and they're leaving Jericho and they're actually on their way to Jerusalem.

Uh Easter just passed and Jesus and his disciples are actually going towards Jerusalem where Jesus would die. So this is about two to three weeks before Jesus even gets to Jerusalem and the reason why we celebrate Easter to begin with. But this is the last miracle that Jesus the last recorded miracle that Jesus did before he went to Calvary. So um they're in Jericho and Jericho is about 15 miles northeast of Jerusalem. Uh Jericho was a a strategically located uh it was located along major trade uh routes and was a common stop for travelers going to and from uh Jerusalem. Uh it seems that we're just passing through.

You got to understand the disciples that are follow that are following Jesus in their minds Jesus is going to stay with them forever. They they think they found the man, they found the guy. He's going to be our ruler uh as the Old Testament said. And so the disciples in their eyes, they're just going through Jericho and they're going to go to Jerusalem and that's all that it's going to be. Um, and as we're about to leave, a blind beggar shouts out. So I want to introduce this beggar. Uh, his name is Bareus and his name actually means son of Tus. And that's very interesting that Mark would write Barardameus which means son of Tmus son of Tmus.

And the reason why is because Mark is writing to a Greek audience that Bararddameus is an Aramaic uh name. And so he wanted to make sure that the audience understood what his name meant. And it's very interesting. I was thinking as I was studying this uh that maybe as Mark was writing this, Bararddameus was probably still alive and Tus was also maybe still alive during that time. Um Mark wrote his gospel in around AD65 to 70. Um we know that Jesus was here on earth between AD30 to AD.33. So about 30 years has passed or so and we see that Mark is writing the gospel. So this is probably after Peter has passed already.

Mark is writing to this audience and just to give credibility he names his sources. He names his people. He says Barardeameus the son of Tmus. And the events here took place in AD30. But we don't know much about Bararddameus where he's from what caused his blindness. We just know his name. We know his dad's name as well. His dad's name is Tameus obviously from this text. But his name is Tmus. Um his condition he was blind. Uh he was on the highway side begging which meant that he was poor. Uh it also means I mean in this society the predominant means of of getting money or being well off is has to be physical labor.

And if you're blind you can't really do that. Um it's very hard for you to do that. Uh there were no government programs to help the poor. Uh he was probably by himself as we'll see just by his call out to Jesus later. Uh he was very much hopeless and we can see that just by reading into how he cries out to Jesus. Um physically he was disabled emotionally. He probably was drained. I mean could you imagine a blind man on the side of the road in a society that he can't make money. He has to rely on people emotionally how he's feeling and spiritually he was lost. But here's the point. Bardameus had a problem and something needed to change or something needed to happen.

And if I could connect this to us, if I could connect this to you, what is your name? And I know some of you here uh I know your some of your names. I'm really bad with names. So, if I forget your name for those first time guests, I apologize. You can butcher my name. I'll give you my name. You can butcher that, too. Uh, but what is your name? Uh, where do you come from? What is your story? Um, my name is Enener. And it's actually a combination name. Uh, it's supposed to it was supposed to be Ensaner. So, it's EN is for my mom's name, which is Ener. Um, SA was supposed to be my original name, but it's S now.

But SA stands for Saria. I named my granddaughter my my granddaughter my daughter Sinaria. My grandma's name was Sinaria. Okay, I'm not that old, but uh so I named my daughter Sinaria and then my last name is Narrow. So that's my grandpa's name. So it's Nener. That's that's my name. It's unique to you to me, not to you. Um but you have a name that's unique to you. Like some of you, I mean one of you, your name is Agatupu aka Tupu and you know him. Uh he's a great guy. He's a great man. Uh, my friend's name is Fernando, uh, aka Andy. Uh, Andy Dela Cruz, Pastor Andy. You know what's a really beautiful name?

Cassandra. I'm not saying that cuz I'm married to her. Um, but that is a really nice name. Cassandra is really nice. Then you have people that like to abbreviate like JJ or um, JD. If you're Micronesian, it's CJ or LJ. Um, so there's there's many names here, but your name is unique to you. And although not many people may know it, I want you to know that God actually does know it. That God knows your name. And then I want to ask, what is your condition? We know Barnameus's condition, but what is your condition? Are you tired? Are you lost? Do you even know what you're doing? I I'm guilty of that sometimes.

Are you stressed? Are you depressed? It's really hard to tell uh with some people because some of you have really nice smiles and you come here and you you smile nice, but just because you smile, some of you might actually be struggling and we can't tell. Maybe some of you are feeling lonely. Maybe some of you are going through depression. Maybe some of you are really put together at church, but when you go home, you're just falling apart. This is a side question, but why is it so hard that we struggle to be real at church? It's like we have to put on a show and come and say, "Oh, yeah, I'm good."

You just screamed at your kids two minutes before you step on property and then you come in and you're smiling. Why is it so hard for us to be real at church, a place where weak people continue to grow in in grace? What is your condition? And I don't know what your condition is, but I know that some of you for you something needs to happen. Something needs to change. Let's read the next verse. Verse number 47. The Bible says this. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, "Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me." Now, let let's introduce Jesus. Let's let's let's examine Jesus here.

The Bible tells us all about Jesus. He was born in Bethlehem. That's where we celebrate Christmas. Uh in Luke chapter number one and two is the Christmas story. And Jesus was born to a virgin uh mother named Mary. uh in at 12 years of age he was found amongst uh doctors. In Luke chapter 2, you can read the record of Jesus and Mary I mean of Joseph and Mary leaving where they were and then finding out 3 days later that their son was left behind. So they had to go back to Jerusalem only to find Jesus teaching doctors at 12 years of age. You can find that in Luke chapter number 2 46 and 47. The next time we see Jesus when was when he gets baptized by John the Baptist in the wilderness and this

is recorded in John chapter number one verse number 29-34 and then throughout the gospels we see Jesus performing miracles and preaching the kingdom the kingdom of God miracles like in uh John chapter number two was the very first one was the turning water into wine in John chapter 4 we see the healing of the official son in Mark chapter 2, we see the healing of the paralytic. In Mark chapter 3, we see the healing of the man with a withered hand. In Mark chapter 6, we see the famous miracle, which is the feeding of the 5,000. Uh it was actually about 20,000 that were present there. We see in Mark chapter uh John chapter number nine, we see the healing of the bl another blind man.

Uh we see in Matthew chapter number eight, the healing of the centurion servant. Um, in Mark chapter 5, we see the healing of the woman with the issue of blood. Um, and then we also see in Mark chapter number one, the healing of the demon-possessed man in the synagogue. Now, John actually summarizes because there's so many miracles that we can go to and go through and see who Jesus is and what power and what miracle he did. But John chapter number 20, if you would turn there in verse number 30, John 20 verse number 30, the Bible says this, "And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this bookuh talking about John.

But these are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God, and that believing you might have life through his name. So John is speaking of Jesus. This is Jesus. This is who Jesus is. He is the son of God. He is God. So Baremus is sitting on the highway side. He's just sitting on the side and he hears that Jesus is passing by and cries out to him, addressing him as Jesus, thou son of David. That's very interesting that this beggar, this blind beggar would understand more about Jesus than many of the people during his time. Not even the Pharisees understood him to be the son of David.

The phrase son of David is understood to be a messianic title. If you in the Old Testament, it just meant that one day a ruler would come and save Israel. I did a Jewish ministry during a summer of my when I was at Bible college and we were reaching out to um Jews and giving them the gospel according to the Old Testament. So we went to the Old Testament and explained what the gospel was and I did that for about a summer and there's the reality is that many of the Jews today are still looking for their Messiah because they do not believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. But blind Barnameus came to a realization that this must be the Messiah.

I'm really curious who shared scripture with Barardemus. I wonder if it was his parents that maybe taught him scripture and told him about the promised Messiah. And maybe as he's been hearing about this guy from Nazareth that had become famous, this man who does miracles and preaches his own sermons and maybe has as he's been sitting on the highway side day after day, he's heard from all the people that are walking by, maybe just eavesdropping and maybe as he recalls the truths of scripture that his parents told him, the connection was made in his mind. And fast forward to Mark chapter number 10.

As Jesus and his disciples are passing by, this blind man asked the crowd around him, "Why is there so much commotion? What's all that ruckus for?" And maybe somebody told him, "Don't you, it's Jesus of Nazareth." And and as he makes that connection, as he's as he understands and realizes that this might be the Messiah, because of everything that I learned and because of all the news of this famous guy that's that's that has been feeding thousands with just five loaves of bread and two fishes or this guy that is making the lepers their leprosy is gone. Or this guy that is making blind people walk.

for this guy that has been preaching his own gospel, the kingdom of God. As he makes that connection, he can't help but shout out, "Jesus, thou son of David." And and his response is amazing because he says, "Have mercy on me." The connection that's made here makes you understand that Bardameus understands his position. Yes, he's already hopeless and helpless because he can't do much, but he's finally realizing that all the truths of maybe the truths of scripture that he's learned, whoever taught him is found in Jesus Christ. And as he shouts out to Jesus, he cannot help but be humble because he understands that Barnameus cannot do anything for himself.

It has to be someone else that helps him. And he's chosen to give that right to Jesus Christ. But then this happens in verse number 48. And many charged him that he should hold his peace, but he cried the more a great deal. Thou son of David, have mercy on me. Luke said it this way in Luke chapter number 18. Uh his account said this in verse number 39. And they which were be and they which went before rebuked him that he should hold his peace, but he cried so much the more thou son of David, have mercy on me. I think it's very sad when Christians end up being the reason why people walk away from Jesus.

I know that there are hypocrites both in the church and outside of the church, but Christians are humans, too. And no one in this world is perfect. The Bible actually um teaches us that fact. But it's important for us Christians to check our hearts and our intentions as we deal with others. These people may not have been Christians. They're just people that are walking with Jesus because Jesus is famous. Jesus does miracles. I can get something from Jesus. And as they saw this guy that's blind, his name is Barameus. They probably don't even know his name. But as they saw this guy, he looks like a nuisance.

Jesus is famous. Don't bother Jesus. And the danger for us Christians is when somebody comes in and they look different and they don't look like Christians. Of course not. If they're not saved, they're not going to look like Christians. But if they look different, it's it's sad when we are the ones who are kicking them out of the church or we're the ones that are actually pushing them away from Christ. Now, that doesn't mean that we tolerate sin. That doesn't mean that we say, "Oh yeah, come in and do whatever sinful thing you do." What it means is we give every single person the opportunity to meet Christ.

We allow people to come hear the gospel and let that gospel change their lives because the reality is churches to not change people. Ohana Baptist Church cannot change you. You can come to church every single time the doors are open and you can sing songs and you can say nice things and you can dress nice, but if you're not saved, you are far from God. Because it is not the church that changes you. It is the gospel of Jesus Christ. And it is only Christ that can save people. And so it's very sad when we do not allow people to even hear that gospel. Now, ohana does really good with hospitality and praise the Lord for that.

Ohana, you guys have done such a great job, especially last week with our Easter service being hospitable and allowing the gospel of Christ to be able to be preached here, especially for those of you who served in the ministries and our children's ministries and the other areas of our church. Praise the Lord for you and thank you for for doing that. But when we meet people, let's not be judgmental and say, "Oh, this guy is not going to get saved." Do you see how many tattoo he has on his left hand? And we make things like that and just judge people according to how they look instead of giving God the opportunity to change their hearts and allow them to be able to conform to his own image.

In context of what the Bible is saying here, we need to allow everybody to have access to Jesus. But practically speaking speaking, we can't judge, we cannot be judgmental, especially with those entering our church doors. And so we get back to the story and the cry the the crowd tries to silence Barardeameus, but the but he persists in crying out to Jesus. In verse number 49, the Bible says this. And Jesus stood still and commanded him to be called. And they called the blind man, saying unto him, be of good comfort. Rise, he calleth thee. It's interesting. The same people that were rebuking him or now, oh, just kidding.

Come on. Come see Jesus. Like, we can be so fast like that. We when when the truth is out, then we conform to that truth. We need to conform to what the image of Christ is. So what we have to examine here is Jesus condition. So we've examined Barnameus his name. We've examined Barnameus his condition. Uh I've asked you your name and your condition and you know what that is and you know what is your name. But now we're going to examine Jesus condition. And Jesus just from this passage is very compassionate. Jesus is compassionate. Anyone in in position of leadership understands ho how important time is.

You cannot meet with everybody that you wish to meet with just because of your time, just because of your position. Your schedule is limited. But though Jesus is heading to the most difficult part of his ministry, he still stopped for Barnameus. He stops for Barnameus. And you might be here thinking, "God is too big of a God to care for someone so unworthy as I am." And you're so wrong because in Luke chapter number 19:10, the Bible says this, "For the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost." God cares about you. He loves you. Um he actually really really loves you. In first John uh John chapter number four, if you would turn to verse number nine, 1 John 4, verse number nine and 10, the Bible says this.

And this was manifested the love of God toward us because that God sent his only begotten son into the world that we might live through him here in his love not that we love God but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. God loves you so much that he sent his only begotten son Jesus Christ just so he could save us. So he's compassionate. Not only is he compassionate, he is accessible. You know what's amazing? What's really amazing about our God is we don't have to wait until Sunday to come and meet him. You can meet him throughout the week. Uh the Bible says this in Hebrews chapter number 4:1 16.

Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. So wherever you are, you can call on Jesus for help. You don't have to be like Barameus who's waiting at Jericho for an opportunity for someone to walk by just so he can realize that this is the Messiah and get saved from that person. But you can call on God. Yes, today but even throughout the week. Not only is he accessible, but he is also very powerful. Um, we see this just from reading Genesis. Genesis account of creation. We know that our God is the creator of our universe.

We see how vast our universe is. I mean, it's huge. You see how big Hawaii is? I mean, for those of you from the mainland, it's not that big, but to us locals, it's huge. Um just to drive 30 minutes in traffic is a long time for us. So come like if you understand how far that is. Our our island is big but our universe is bigger. And guess who created it? It's God. It's Jesus Christ. But not only not only is he powerful and he's the creator, he also saves. In Romans chapter number 5:8, the Bible says this. But God commended his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

And here's here's the good news. Ephesians chapter number 2 8 and 9 says this. For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. Now let's get back to Mark chapter number 10 verse number 50. The Bible says this, "And he casting away his garment rose and came to Jesus." Bible says uh the Bible here is speaking of Bararddameus as soon as Jesus is beckoning him to come to him. And I imagine as Bararddameus is hearing Jesus, how quickly he's getting up from the from the ground. And it says here that he he throws away his cloak just to show how dramatic it is that somebody that has been blind for a long time, who has been in depression, probably who has been emotionally stressed out, who has felt loneliness, how quickly he got up when he heard Jesus call him.

And he doesn't even care if he falls down again. Because if you're blind, you need assistance. And maybe the crowd around him because they they've chilled out, they've said, "Okay, Jesus is going to deal with him." They they're probably helping him up now. And so Barameus is getting up and he gets to Jesus as quickly as he can. In verse number 51, Bible says this, "And Jesus answered and said unto him, what wilt thou that I should do unto thee?" The blind man said unto him, Lord, that I might receive my sight. And what if Jesus asked you this question? What are you struggling with that you need Jesus' assistance?

Barnameus, he was blind and he really wanted to see again. And don't dismiss his request because this was a request of faith. No one, no human being can heal someone's eyesight. Not today. Not in times past. No body has the ability to make someone not see again if they're actually blind. No potion, no medicine. This was a bold request by Barnameus. To ask someone that I might receive my sight, to heal my sight is a very bold request. And that's why Jesus honored his request. In verse number 52, Bible says this. And Jesus said unto him, go thy way. Look at this. He said, "Thy faith had made thee whole."

And immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus in the way. Uh Luke said it this way in Luke chapter number 18 verse 42 and 40 uh 43. Luke said, "And Jesus said unto him, receive thy sight. Thy thy faith had saved thee." And immediately he received his sight and followed him glorifying God and all the people when they saw it gave praise unto God. Jesus didn't touch Barardemus. I don't know if you guys noticed that but he didn't even touch Bararddameus. He simply complimented his faith and said his faith made him whole. And that is something that only God can do. Because in this culture, in this context, in the time that Jesus was alive, nobody, no religious leader believed that Jesus Christ was actually God.

In fact, they wanted to kill him. That's why the next week, the following weeks, we see Jesus on Calvary because the Pharisees and the Sadducees, they they hated Jesus. The people that studied scripture that had the Old Testament scripture that was speaking of a coming Messiah, they didn't believe that this this Jesus was actually God. And yet Bardeameus who had simple faith believed that this was the Messiah and he put his faith in Jesus Christ and because of that he was healed. And you know what's really amazing? And we don't know if Barardeameus was blind since birth or how long he's been blind, but the very first thing Barnameus sees.

Guess who? It's Jesus. Baremus received his miracle and the first person he saw was Jesus. But I love how this story ends because it just doesn't just end with, okay, Baremous has this eyesight, he can go home, he can praise God. No, it doesn't end like that. Actually it says in verse number um 52 again it says and immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus in the way. Bardameus didn't just get a blessing and then he went home and be like okay I'm good. He received his blessing and he followed Jesus. And and the reason why that's very significant is because where Jesus is heading to is Jerusalem.

It's the cross. It's Calvary. And Barameus doesn't know that that's going to happen because he's just coming on. But that's where he's going. And I'm just speculating, but there were 120 people that were present in Acts chapter number one who were praying in the upper room. What if Barardeameus was there? We never hear about Barameus again after this instance, but we just know that he got saved. He praised God and he followed God. He followed Jesus. All we know is that he was a a real man with struggles beyond his abilities. Yet, he had Jesus there to be able to help him. The biggest yes he got healed physically but I think the the greatest thing that happened to Bardameus was spiritually he

was awakened he got saved and this isn't a message to say to give you false hope like if you keep praying that the disease that you've been praying about will go away God is good and he can do miracles but I want what I want to give you hope in is that regardless of what happens continue to follow God regardless of what what happens or how your life turns out. Continue to follow God because the greatest thing that you can receive and I think the greatest thing that um Barnameus received during this time was the peace of God. The peace of God was the greatest thing that that Barnameus ca came away with this whole incident with was having that peace with God and being right with God and having a relationship with God.

Barnameus was a lost soul until he met Jesus and put his faith in him and after that his life changed forever. And you might be here and you do not know Jesus Christ as your savior. You have never put your faith in Jesus Christ. But today is a great time to be able to start because if not, then I'll tell you the truth. According to the Bible, you're pretty much like Barnameus on the sidelines of life, watching the world pass. The only time that you can actually have your life move forward is when you put your faith in the one who created life, which is God. In Romans chapter number 3 23 and 24, the Bible says this, "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus."

Romans 6:23 says this, "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." And so, if you have been stuck in darkness, Jesus can change your life forever. If you're saved, I hope you're encouraged by the compassion of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because it's not just for people who are not saved, because a lot of Christians can still struggle like this where you have a relationship with God, but you're on the sidelines because you're your struggles are overcoming you, are overpowering you. My encouragement to you is to turn to Jesus and allow him to help you through that difficulty. And I hope you're challenged by the faith of Barnameus.