{"id":8866,"date":"2026-10-04T23:46:23","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T06:46:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/?p=8866"},"modified":"2026-10-20T00:51:26","modified_gmt":"2026-10-20T07:51:26","slug":"when-blind-eyes-begin-to-see-an-exposition-and-bible-study-of-luke-1831-43","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/2026\/10\/04\/when-blind-eyes-begin-to-see-an-exposition-and-bible-study-of-luke-1831-43\/","title":{"rendered":"WHEN BLIND EYES BEGIN TO SEE: An Exposition and Bible Study of Luke 18:31\u201343"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

The following is a summary of Zenjie’s sermon:<\/em><\/p>\n

When Blind Eyes Begin to See<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

A Summary of a Sermon on Luke 18:31\u201343<\/i><\/p>\n

Speaker: Zenjie Caneda<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2766 \u2726 \u2766<\/span><\/p>\n

Overview<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Filling in while both preaching pastors were away, Zenjie took up the closing two sections of Luke 18: Jesus\u2019 third prediction of His death (vv. 31\u201334) and the healing of a blind beggar near Jericho (vv. 35\u201343). The sermon holds the two together as a deliberate contrast. Days from His entry into Jerusalem, Jesus speaks plainly about the cross to disciples who cannot see it, then gives sight to a blind man who already sees enough to cry out for mercy.<\/p>\n

\u2766 \u2726 \u2766<\/span><\/p>\n

Part One: The Road to Jerusalem (Luke 18:31\u201334)<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

A Deliberate Journey<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Jesus took the Twelve aside and told them, for the third time, exactly what awaited Him: betrayal to the Gentiles, mockery, spitting, flogging, death, and resurrection on the third day. Zenjie stressed Jesus\u2019 resolve; His opening \u201cBehold\u201d<\/strong><\/em> signals no hesitation.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Jesus is not walking into an accident waiting to happen. He is deliberately going to Jerusalem to fulfill the plan of God to the very exact details.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u2014 Zenjie<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Why the Disciples Could Not Understand<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

The fault lay not in Jesus\u2019 clarity but in the disciples\u2019 expectations. Peter\u2019s rebuke at Caesarea Philippi, and Jesus\u2019 reply, \u201cGet behind me, Satan\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(Matthew 16:22\u201323), showed how impossible a suffering Messiah sounded to them. To Gentiles, a humiliated and executed God was foolishness; to Jews, crucifixion was a curse with no place in their messianic hope.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

They expected a coronation, not a crucifixion. They could only grasp Messiah, victory, and kingdom. But they could not put together Messiah and the cross.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u2014 Zenjie<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Part Two: The Cross in God\u2019s Sovereign Plan<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Primary and Secondary Causes<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Drawing on Acts 2:23, Zenjie contends that God is the primary cause of Christ\u2019s sufferings, while human beings are secondary causes who remain fully responsible for their wicked choices. The Jewish leaders and Roman soldiers were not consciously fulfilling Scripture, yet God accomplished His redemptive purpose through them. The Old Testament, including Daniel 9:26 and the sacrificial system studied in Hebrews, anticipated the cross.<\/p>\n

\n

We should never imagine that Jesus came offering a kingdom without a cross, and when people rejected Him, was forced to die instead.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u2014 Zenjie<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The Breadth of Christ\u2019s Suffering<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Christ\u2019s suffering, Zenjie said, cannot be reduced to physical pain. He was betrayed by one of His own (Psalm 41:9), abandoned by the Twelve (Zechariah 13:7), and forsaken by the Father (Matthew 27:46; Psalm 22:1). He bore public humiliation without retaliation (1 Peter 2:23), which he also contrasted with our innate demand for fairness, citing C. S. Lewis\u2019s Mere Christianity. The brutality of the scourging and crucifixion completed the picture, and dwelling on it only deepens his love for the Savior.<\/p>\n

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Part Three: Blind Disciples and True Greatness<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

After the second prediction, the disciples argued over who was greatest (Mark 9). After this third one, Mark 10:35\u201345 records James and John asking for seats at Jesus\u2019 right and left. Jesus\u2019 question to them, \u201cWhat do you want me to do for you?\u201d<\/strong><\/em>, anticipates the very question He will put to the blind man. Jesus spoke of suffering; they thought of status.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Jesus answered that worldly rulers lord it over others, but whoever would be great must be a servant, \u201cfor even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(Mark 10:45). Service done for our own glory, the speaker warned, is wood, hay, and stubble; Christian authority must follow Christ\u2019s pattern of truth, sacrifice, humility, and service (Philippians 2). James later became the first apostle martyred, and John endured exile.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Part Four: Bartimaeus by the Jericho Road (Luke 18:35\u201343)<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

The Setting<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Using a map, Zenjie traced Jesus\u2019 final journey from Galilee down the east side of the Jordan through Perea, bypassing Samaria, then crossing back toward Jericho. From Jericho, Jerusalem lies a 15\u201318 mile climb of more than 3,000 feet, which Passover crowds made together; Zenjie likened it to his own hike out of the Grand Canyon.<\/p>\n

A Blind Man Who Saw<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Mark names the beggar Bartimaeus. Whether born blind or blinded later, he was destitute and dependent on his hearing. Told that Jesus of Nazareth was passing, he cried, \u201cJesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!\u201d<\/strong><\/em> That title confessed Jesus as the promised heir of the Davidic covenant (2 Samuel 7). Rebuked by the crowd, he cried all the louder, knowing this might be his only chance.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Though physically blind, Bartimaeus saw enough to recognize the Messiah and plead for mercy.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u2014 Zenjie<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cWhat Do You Want Me to Do for You?\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Jesus stopped and asked a question whose answer He already knew. Zenjie marveled that the King of heaven would put Himself at a beggar\u2019s service. Bartimaeus asked to see, and Jesus\u2019 reply was strikingly understated: \u201cRecover your sight; your faith has made you well.\u201d<\/strong><\/em> Casting aside his cloak, likely his only possession (Mark 10:50), Bartimaeus went in an instant from rejected beggar to follower of Jesus, glorifying God as the crowd joined in praise.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Part Five: Two Requests, Two Kinds of Sight<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

The sermon set the two requests side by side. The disciples, who could see, still needed their eyes opened; pride and worldly ideas of greatness blinded them to the cross. The blind man already saw who Jesus was and asked only for mercy. As one of the final lessons before Passion Week, the passage teaches that the road to glory runs through the cross, and that following Christ means humility, service, self-denial, and faithfulness.<\/p>\n

\n

Jesus is not asking his disciples to walk the road he refuses to walk. He is already on his way.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u2014 Zenjie<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Conclusion<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Zenjie closed by reframing Jesus\u2019 question for the congregation. The deeper prayer is not \u201cWhat do I want Jesus to do for me?\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>but \u201cLord, open my eyes so that I may see you clearly, understand the way of the cross, and follow you faithfully.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The following is an AI Exposition and Supplemental Bible Study of Luke 18:31-43, as preached by
\nZenjie Caneda at East Valley International Church<\/strong><\/a>, October 4, 2026.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The Third Passion Prediction and the Blind Man at Jericho<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Then he took unto him the twelve, and said unto them, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished. For he shall be delivered unto the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated, and spitted on: and they shall scourge him, and put him to death: and the third day he shall rise again. And they understood none of these things: and this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken.<\/i><\/p>\n

And it came to pass, that as he was come nigh unto Jericho, a certain blind man sat by the way side begging: and hearing the multitude pass by, he asked what it meant. And they told him, that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by. And he cried, saying, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. 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. And Jesus stood, and commanded him to be brought unto him: and when he was come near, he asked him, saying, What wilt thou that I shall do unto thee? And he said, Lord, that I may receive my sight. And Jesus said unto him, Receive thy sight: thy faith hath saved thee. And immediately he received his sight, and followed him, glorifying God: and all the people, when they saw him, followed him, glorifying God.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u2014 Luke 18:31\u201343<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u25c6 \u25c6 \u25c6<\/span><\/p>\n

I. The Road That Goes Up<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Seven chapters earlier, Luke told us that when the time came for Jesus to be received up, He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem (9:51). Everything since has been that journey. And now, at Jericho, the journey is nearly over. Seventeen miles of wilderness road remain, climbing more than three thousand feet from the Jordan valley floor to the ridge of the holy city. There is a reason Luke writes \u201cwe go up to Jerusalem.\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>It is not a figure of speech borrowed from liturgy. It is topography.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Jericho is a resonant place to make a last stop. It is among the oldest inhabited cities on earth, the first city Israel took in the conquest, and the city Joshua put under a curse. Elisha healed its poisoned spring. Herod the Great built a winter palace there and died in it. Many priests lived in Jericho and walked this same road up to Jerusalem when their courses came due. And it was on this stretch of highway that our Lord had set a parable about a man beaten half to death, and about a priest and a Levite who passed by on the other side (10:30\u201332).<\/p>\n

Hold that detail. In a few verses the crowd will tell a blind beggar that Jesus of Nazareth is passing by<\/i>. It is the same road and very nearly the same words. The difference is that this time, the One passing by stops.<\/p>\n

What Luke places before us in these thirteen verses is a study in sight and blindness, and it is constructed as a deliberate irony. Twelve men with working eyes are about to be told, in the plainest language our Lord ever used, exactly what is going to happen in Jerusalem \u2014 and they will not understand a syllable of it. Then a man with no eyes at all will identify Jesus correctly on the strength of one overheard sentence. Luke sets these two scenes shoulder to shoulder and lets the contrast do the preaching. Physical sight, it turns out, has very little to do with the matter.<\/p>\n

This study completes a trilogy. In 18:1\u20138 the widow taught us how long to pray. In 18:9\u201314 the publican taught us how to come. Here a beggar teaches us what to ask for \u2014 and shows us that the whole chapter has been building a single argument about empty hands. The widow had no money, the publican no righteousness, the infants of verses 15\u201317 no achievements, and this man no sight. Set against them stand the Pharisee, who had everything, and the rich ruler of verses 18\u201323, who had everything and went away sorrowful. Luke 18 is one sustained chapter about the people who get in.<\/p>\n

II. The Script Already Written<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

\u201cBehold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished\u201d<\/strong><\/em> (18:31).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

This is the third and fullest of Luke\u2019s passion predictions. The first came at Caesarea Philippi, immediately after Peter\u2019s confession (9:22). The second followed the transfiguration, with the instruction to let these sayings sink into their ears (9:44). This one is the most detailed by far, and it is the only one in Luke that names the Gentiles as the instrument \u2014 a detail that would not have been lost on Theophilus, nor on Luke, the one Gentile author in the New Testament canon.<\/p>\n

But the governing word of the sentence is the verb. \u201cShall be accomplished\u201d<\/strong><\/em> renders telesth\u1e17setai<\/i>, from tele\u014d<\/i>, to bring to completion, to finish, to carry through to the intended end. It is the verb family that will surface again on the cross in the single word tetelestai<\/i>,<\/span> \u201cit is finished\u201d<\/strong><\/em> (John 19:30). Jesus is not describing a catastrophe that is about to befall Him. He is describing the completion of a document.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Consider what that means about how our Lord read His own Bible. He treats the prophets not as a collection of inspiring oracles but as a script with His name in it, and He treats His coming death as the performance of that script rather than its interruption. Look at the specific terms He uses in verses 32 and 33 \u2014 mocked, shamefully treated, spit upon, scourged. He is very nearly quoting Isaiah. The servant of Isaiah 50:6 gives his back to the smiters and his cheeks to those who pluck out the hair, and hides not his face from shame and spitting. Our Lord is not inventing a forecast. He is reading aloud from a page written seven hundred years earlier and informing the Twelve that He is about to walk onto it.<\/p>\n

This matters for how we read the crucifixion. If the cross is a tragedy that befell a good man, then Christianity is a story about a noble failure that God afterward salvaged. If the cross is the accomplishment of what the prophets wrote, then Calvary is not the place where the plan broke down. It is the place where the plan was executed. The resurrection in verse 33 is not the rescue of a scheme gone wrong; it is the third act of a script that always had three acts.<\/p>\n

III. Three Ways of Saying They Did Not Understand<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Then comes verse 34, and it is one of the most arresting sentences in the Gospels precisely because of its redundancy.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd they understood none of these things: and this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken.\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>Three clauses. Three separate statements of the same failure. Luke is not padding; he is pressing. He wants us to feel how total this is. They did not understand. The saying was hidden. They did not know what He was talking about.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

And notice the middle clause, because it does theological work the other two do not. \u201cThis saying was hid from them\u201d<\/strong><\/em> is a passive construction \u2014 and in Jewish idiom the passive voice is regularly used to veil the name of God, who is the unnamed agent. The saying did not simply fail to register. It was hidden<\/i>. Something was done to them, and Luke does not say by whom, which in this literature generally means the Almighty.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

This is a pattern Luke tracks with care across his Gospel:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • \n

    After the second prediction: they did not understand this saying, and it was hid from them, that they should not perceive it (9:45).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • \n

    Here, at the third: the triple statement of verse 34.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • \n

    On the Emmaus road after the resurrection: their eyes were held, that they should not know him (24:16).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • \n

    And then, at last, in the upper room: \u201cThen opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(24:45).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    The veil goes on by divine permission and comes off by divine action. Paul would later describe the identical phenomenon in his own people, saying that a veil lies upon the heart in the reading of the old covenant, and that it is taken away only in Christ (2 Corinthians 3:14\u201316).<\/p>\n

    The pastoral implication is bracing and ought to be stated plainly. These twelve men had every external advantage a human being could possess. They had walked with the incarnate Son of God for three years. They had watched Him raise the dead. They had the clearest, most explicit statement of the gospel ever delivered \u2014 delivered personally, in their own language, by the Savior Himself, with no parable to decode and no symbolism to unpack. And it meant nothing to them. Proximity is not perception. Information is not illumination. A person can sit under faithful preaching for forty years, able to recite the content accurately, and remain as blind as these men were on the Jericho road \u2014 until God opens the understanding.<\/p>\n

    Which should make us slower to despise the blindness of others and quicker to pray for our own.<\/p>\n

    IV. A Certain Blind Man Sat by the Way Side<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

    \u201cAnd it came to pass, that as he was come nigh unto Jericho, a certain blind man sat by the way side begging\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(18:35).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

    A word of scholarly honesty is required here, because this verse carries a well-known difficulty and the reader deserves to have it named rather than glossed. Mark places the healing as Jesus leaves<\/i> Jericho and gives us the man\u2019s name, Bartimaeus, son of Timaeus (Mark 10:46). Matthew also places it on the way out, and reports two<\/i> blind men (Matthew 20:29\u201334). Luke places it as Jesus approaches. Three accounts, three variations.<\/p>\n

    Several considerations deserve weight:<\/p>\n

      \n
    • \n

      There were, in fact, two Jerichos in the first century. The ancient tell of the Old Testament city stood roughly a mile from the new Jericho Herod the Great had built to the south, with his winter palace complex. A traveler could quite literally be leaving one Jericho while approaching the other, and the same moment could be described either way by witnesses standing in different places.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

    • \n

      The Greek verb Luke uses, engizein<\/i>, carries the general sense of drawing near or being in the vicinity, and does not by itself demand the sense of \u201cnot yet arrived.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

    • \n

      Matthew\u2019s two men and Mark\u2019s one are not in contradiction. To name one is not to deny the other, and Mark supplies the name of the spokesman \u2014 Bartimaeus was evidently known in the early church, which is why his name survives, and his companion\u2019s does not.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      It should also be said that if these three accounts had been harmonized by collusion, they would agree on the details that differ and would not trouble us at all. Variation of exactly this kind \u2014 agreement on the substance, divergence on the incidentals of vantage point \u2014 is the signature of independent testimony rather than of invention. Luke, who tells us in his preface that he investigated everything carefully from the first, is not likely to have been careless about the geography of a city he describes twice.<\/p>\n

      Now to the man himself. He is blind, which in that economy meant he could not work, and so he begs. He sits \u201cby the wayside\u201d<\/strong><\/em> \u2014 along the main pilgrim highway to Jerusalem, at Passover season, when the road would be thick with travelers and alms would be at their most plentiful. He has chosen his spot shrewdly. This is a man who has made the best arrangement available to him within a life that has offered him almost nothing. And he is, so far as anyone on that road is concerned, a piece of the scenery.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

      V. He Asked What It Meant<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

      \u201cAnd hearing the multitude pass by, he asked what it meant\u201d<\/strong><\/em> (18:36).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

      Here is the first thing about this man worth imitating. A sound reaches him that he cannot interpret \u2014 the noise of an unusually large crowd \u2014 and he does not let it pass. He inquires. A blind beggar on a Passover road had every reason to assume that whatever was happening had nothing to do with him; crowds had been passing him by his entire adult life. He asked anyway.<\/p>\n

      \u201cAnd they told him, that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(18:37). Note carefully how little information he is given. Nazar\u1e17nos<\/i> \u2014 a hometown. A geographical label and nothing more. It is the answer a stranger gives to a beggar when he does not particularly want to stop: the man\u2019s name and the village he came from. There is no theology in it, no title, no claim. The crowd hands him a fact and keeps walking.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

      And with that single thin sentence, this man does something that nobody in Luke\u2019s Gospel has yet done out loud.<\/p>\n

      VI. From Nazareth to David<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

      \u201cAnd he cried, saying, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(18:38).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

      He was told \u201cof Nazareth.\u201d<\/strong><\/em> He answered<\/span> \u201cSon of David.\u201d<\/strong><\/em> Nobody gave him that. He supplied it himself, and it is the first time in the Third Gospel that any human being addresses Jesus by that title aloud.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

      Understand what the title carries. Son of David<\/i> is not a courtesy or a compliment about ancestry. It is the throne-title of the promised Messiah, resting on the covenant God made with David in 2 Samuel 7, elaborated by Isaiah\u2019s shoot from the stump of Jesse (Isaiah 11:1), by Jeremiah\u2019s righteous Branch raised up unto David (Jeremiah 23:5), and by Ezekiel\u2019s promise of one shepherd, even my servant David (Ezekiel 34:23\u201324). To shout it on a public road during Passover week, within sight of Jerusalem, was not a pious murmur. It was a declaration \u2014 and a dangerous one.<\/p>\n

      Now trace the reasoning that got him there, because this blind man has done real theology sitting in the dust. Isaiah had written that when the age of redemption dawned, the eyes of the blind would be opened (Isaiah 35:5). Jesus had stood up in the synagogue at Nazareth and read from Isaiah 61 that He was anointed to preach the gospel to the poor and to proclaim recovering of sight to the blind (Luke 4:18). And when John the Baptist sent from prison to ask whether He was the one, our Lord\u2019s first item of evidence was that the blind receive their sight (Luke 7:22). Somewhere, somehow, news of this had reached a beggar on the Jericho road, and he had drawn the inference that the Twelve had not drawn from three years of instruction:<\/p>\n

        \n
      • \n

        The Messiah will open the eyes of the blind.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

      • \n

        This man opens the eyes of the blind.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

      • \n

        Therefore this man is the Messiah \u2014 and therefore He can open mine.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

        That is a syllogism, and it is correct, and it was assembled by a man who had never read a verse of Isaiah with his own eyes. He had to take it in by ear, from others, secondhand, and he did more with it than twelve eyewitnesses did with a personal briefing.<\/p>\n

        And then the petition: ele\u1e17son me<\/i>, have mercy on me. Hear it alongside the publican in the temple nine verses earlier, whose prayer was hilasth\u1e17ti moi<\/i>, be propitiated toward me. Two men, two cries, and between them not one claim, not one credential, not one argument from merit. Luke\u2019s chapter has a sound running through it, and this is it.<\/p>\n

        VII. The Rebuke and the Louder Cry<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

        \u201cAnd they which went before rebuked him, that he should hold his peace\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(18:39).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

        The verb is epetim\u014dn<\/i> \u2014 the same strong word used elsewhere in the Gospels for rebuking demons and silencing storms. This is not a polite request to lower his voice. The vanguard of the procession turns on the one man present who has correctly identified who is walking down that road, and tries to shut him up.<\/p>\n

        Why? Decency, probably. Decorum. A rabbi is moving toward Jerusalem in the company of his disciples and a crowd, and here is a beggar making a scene and shouting a politically combustible title in public. Someone always wants the embarrassing person to be quiet. And note that this is the second time in a single chapter that the people nearest Jesus have tried to regulate access to Him: in verse 15 the disciples rebuked those who were bringing infants, and our Lord had to overrule them. Twice in one chapter, the inner circle functions as a filter. It is worth asking, soberly, where the church still does this \u2014 which people we quietly signal should not be so loud, so needy, so conspicuous in their asking.<\/p>\n

        \u201cBut he cried so much the more\u201d<\/strong><\/em> (18:39). He escalates. The crowd\u2019s disapproval functions on him as fuel rather than as a brake, and he shouts the forbidden title again, louder.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

        Here the chapter folds back on itself in a way Luke surely intended. The parable in 18:1\u20138 was about a widow who would not stop coming to a judge who would not listen, told so that men ought always to pray and not to faint. Now, thirty verses later, Luke gives us the widow in the flesh. Same importunity. Same refusal to be managed. Same indifference to how it looks. The parable told us what persistence is; the beggar shows us what persistence costs and what it gets.<\/p>\n

        VIII. Jesus Stood Still<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

        \u201cAnd Jesus stood, and commanded him to be brought unto him\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(18:40).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

        Three words of narration, and they are worth a sermon on their own. He stopped. The Son of God, seventeen miles from Jerusalem, on the final approach of a journey He had set His face toward since chapter nine, walking deliberately into the hour for which He came into the world, with the whole weight of the prophets\u2019 script pressing on the next six days \u2014 stopped. For one blind man who would not be quiet.<\/p>\n

        And then the question, which is the strangest thing in the passage: \u201cWhat wilt thou that I shall do unto thee?\u201d<\/strong><\/em> (18:41).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

        It appears, on its face, absurd. The man is blind and begging; what on earth else would he want? Our Lord, who knew what was in man, did not need to be informed. So why ask? Several answers suggest themselves, and they are not mutually exclusive.<\/p>\n

          \n
        • \n

          It compels the man to turn a general cry for mercy into a specific petition. \u201cHave mercy on me\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>could mean a coin.<\/span> \u201cThat I may receive my sight\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>is a request only God can fill, and the man must say it out loud.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

        • \n

          It treats him as a person rather than a case. Nobody had asked this man what he wanted in years. He was a category on the roadside, a condition, an occasion for almsgiving. Jesus addresses him as a man with a will of his own.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

        • \n

          And it exposes the heart. Mark records our Lord asking the identical question, in almost identical words, to James and John shortly before this scene \u2014 and they asked for the two best seats in the kingdom (Mark 10:36\u201337). The same question put to the sighted and to the blind produced a request for status and a request for sight. There is a great deal of self-examination available in that comparison.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

          \u201cLord, that I may receive my sight.\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>He does not ask for alms, though alms were his livelihood, and a generous donation from a famous rabbi would have been a rational request. He asks for the thing that would end his profession. Faith is often precisely this: asking God for the thing that will cost you the arrangement you have made with your limitations.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

          IX. \u201cThy Faith Hath Saved Thee\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

          \u201cAnd Jesus said unto him, Receive thy sight: thy faith hath saved thee\u201d<\/strong><\/em> (18:42).<\/span><\/p>\n

          The Authorized Version is doing something careful here that many modern renderings obscure by printing \u201cmade you well.\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>The Greek is h\u1e17 pistis sou s\u1e17s\u014dken se<\/i>, from s\u014dz\u014d<\/i> \u2014 the standard New Testament verb for salvation. Luke certainly uses it of physical healing in places, and the context of restored eyesight is plain. But set this sentence where Luke has set it, nine verses after a tax collector went down to his house justified and thirty-four verses after the question \u201cshall he find faith on the earth?\u201d<\/strong><\/em>, and the word is carrying its full freight. This man received more than corneas. He went away with his eyes and his soul.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

          And there, at the roadside outside Jericho, Luke quietly answers the question his own chapter opened with. In verse 8 our Lord asked, \u201cNevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>He left the question hanging and did not answer. Now, thirty-five verses later, the Son of Man comes down a road \u2014 and finds faith on the earth. Not in the twelve men walking beside Him, whose understanding is at this moment sealed shut. Not in the crowd, who knew His address but not His office. In a blind beggar sitting in the dirt who had worked out from a single overheard sentence from someone who was passing by.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

          That is Luke\u2019s answer, and it is characteristic of him. The faith our Lord is looking for when He comes will not necessarily be found where the credentials are. It will be found wherever somebody is still calling out.<\/p>\n

          X. What He Saw First<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

          \u201cAnd immediately he received his sight, and followed him, glorifying God: and all the people, when they saw him, followed him, glorifying God\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>(18:43).<\/span><\/p>\n

          Think about what happened in that instant. The first image ever to register on this man\u2019s optic nerve was the face of Jesus Christ. Not the road, not the sky, not the colors he had only ever been told about. A face. And then he looked at what that face was walking toward.<\/p>\n

          Because the second thing he must have grasped, as he fell in with the procession, was where it was going. The verb in \u201cfollowed him\u201d<\/strong><\/em> is imperfect \u2014 \u0113kolouthei<\/i>, he kept following, he went on following. He did not receive his sight and go home to see his family, which no one could have blamed him for. He joined the column headed up the hill to Jerusalem. Within the week the man whose eyes he now owed would be mocked, spit upon, scourged, and killed, exactly as described in verses 32 and 33 to twelve men who could not take it in. This beggar, who had been blind an hour earlier, was walking toward it with his eyes open.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

          And the people followed too, glorifying God. The crowd that had tried to silence him ends the scene praising God because of him. Luke loves to end a healing this way, but here the detail has teeth: the man they shushed became the reason they worshiped.<\/p>\n

          So we leave the Jericho road with the irony fully drawn. Twelve men with sight, who could not see. A crowd with proximity, who could not perceive. And one man with no eyes, who saw first, saw correctly, and then saw literally \u2014 and used his new sight to follow a condemned man up a hill.<\/p>\n

          \u25c6 \u25c6 \u25c6<\/span><\/p>\n

          XI. For Study and Reflection<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

          Observation \u2014 What does the text actually say?<\/span><\/h3>\n
            \n
          • \n

            List every specific detail Jesus gives in verses 32\u201333 about what will happen in Jerusalem. How many of them are fulfilled in Luke 22\u201324?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

          • \n

            Verse 34 states the disciples\u2019 failure in three separate ways. Write out all three clauses. What does the middle one say that the other two do not?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

          • \n

            What exactly does the crowd tell the blind man in verse 37? What does he say in verse 38? What is the difference between the two?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

          • \n

            How many times does the blind man cry out, and what changes between the first cry and the second?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

          • \n

            What are the last two things the man does in verse 43, and in what order?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

            Interpretation \u2014 What does the text mean?<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
              \n
            • \n

              Read Luke 9:45, 18:34, 24:16 and 24:45 together. What is Luke tracking across his Gospel, and who is the unnamed agent in the passive verbs?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

            • \n

              Compare the specific words of Luke 18:32\u201333 with Isaiah 50:6. What does the overlap tell you about how Jesus read His own Bible?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

            • \n

              Why does Jesus ask a blind beggar what he wants? Compare Mark 10:36\u201337, where He puts the same question to James and John. What do the two answers reveal?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

            • \n

              In verse 42, the word translated \u201chath saved thee\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>is the ordinary New Testament word for salvation. Given where Luke has placed this story, how much weight should the word carry here?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

            • \n

              Read Luke 18:8 and then Luke 18:35\u201343. In what sense does the second passage answer the question raised by the first?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

            • \n

              Luke 18 contains a widow, a Pharisee, a tax collector, infants, a rich ruler, and a blind beggar. Sort them into two groups. What single thing distinguishes the groups?<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

              Application \u2014 What does the text require?<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
                \n
              • \n

                The disciples had more access to Jesus than anyone in history and understood nothing. What does that say about the sufficiency of your own church attendance, reading, and religious knowledge?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

              • \n

                The crowd tried to silence the one person asking correctly. Who in your congregation is too loud, too needy, or too conspicuous in their asking \u2014 and what have you done about it?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

              • \n

                The beggar asked for the one thing that would end the only livelihood he had. What are you not asking God for because the answer would cost you an arrangement you have made with your limitations?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

              • \n

                If Jesus asked you today, \u201cWhat wilt thou that I shall do unto thee?\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>\u2014 what would you actually say? Write it down. Then ask whether it is a request for status or a request for sight.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

              • \n

                The man received his sight and used it to follow Christ toward a cross. What have you done with what you have already been given?<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

                A closing caution for those who teach this passage. It is tempting to preach it as an exhortation to try harder at seeing \u2014 to be more like the beggar and less like the Twelve. But that reading misses the engine of the story. The man did not manufacture his sight; he asked for it, and it was given. The Twelve did not fail for want of effort; the saying was hidden from them until God opened their understanding. The appropriate response to this text is not resolve. It is petition. We do not squint our way into spiritual sight. We cry out for it from the roadside, and we keep crying when we are told to be quiet.<\/p>\n

                \u25c6 \u25c6 \u25c6<\/span><\/p>\n

                XII. Still Passing By<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

                Jericho has a long memory, and one of the things it remembers is men passing by. A priest came down that road once and passed by on the other side. A Levite did the same. It was the one man nobody expected who stopped.<\/p>\n

                On the day Luke describes, the crowd told a beggar that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, and they were, in a sense, right \u2014 He was on His way somewhere, on a schedule set before the foundation of the world, toward an appointment He had been walking to for seven chapters. Nothing in the universe had more claim on His attention than the six days in front of Him.<\/p>\n

                He stopped anyway. That is the whole gospel in a gesture. The Son of God, on His way to die, interrupting the march to Calvary for one man who had nothing to offer and would not stop shouting. And when He asked the man what he wanted, He was asking a question He already intended to answer.<\/p>\n

                The Twelve would get their eyes eventually. On the third day, and then on the Emmaus road, and then in the upper room, He would open their understanding and the veil would come off. But on this afternoon, outside Jericho, the only person on that road who could see anything at all was a blind man \u2014 and what he saw was that the Messiah had come, that He could be asked, and that He would answer.<\/p>\n

                Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me.<\/i> He is still passing by. He still stops.<\/p>\n

                \u25c6 \u25c6 \u25c6<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

                The following is a summary of Zenjie’s sermon: When Blind Eyes Begin to See A Summary of a Sermon on Luke 18:31\u201343 Speaker: Zenjie Caneda \u2766 \u2726 \u2766 Overview Filling in while both preaching pastors were away, Zenjie took up the closing two sections of Luke 18: Jesus\u2019 third prediction of His death (vv. 31\u201334)…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[46,172,57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christianity","category-e-v-i-c-study-notes","category-religion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8866"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8866\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9020,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8866\/revisions\/9020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}