Matthew 20:29-34

29 As Jesus and the disciples left the town of Jericho, a large crowd followed behind. 30 Two blind men were sitting beside the road. When they heard that Jesus was coming that way, they began shouting, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!” 31 “Be quiet!” the crowd yelled at them. But they only shouted louder, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!” 32 When Jesus heard them, he stopped and called, “What do you want me to do for you?” 33 “Lord,” they said, “we want to see!” 34 Jesus felt sorry for them and touched their eyes. Instantly they could see! Then they followed him.

Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem to be crucified when He met two blind beggars. It is important to remember that He had just finished talking to His disciples about servant hood, because two of them wanted prominent positions of power in His kingdom. The other disciples responded with anger and jealousy at James and John’s blatant grab for power and prominence. All of them had the wrong understanding of leadership, one in which the world measures leadership by how many people serve us. As they journey on together it is not long before the opportunity to serve others is placed before them. I love the contrast between these two moments, two beggars that plead only for mercy in contrast with two disciples that demand privileges. We would do well to observe that Jesus turns down the two disciples but he grants the request of the two beggars. The beggars’ condition is one of blindness, disability, desperation, pleading and need. They are rebuked by a crowd that tries to hush their cries for mercy. There is a sharp contrast between the attitude and actions of the crowd and Jesus. One wants to quiet the other to listen. When it comes to serving which camp am I in, the crowd or Jesus? What has to change for me to have a servant’s heart?

• Stop

Scripture says that Jesus stopped. He slowed down even though He was on his way to Jerusalem, he had a full and final week in front of Him. Jesus was a busy man with many demands made on Him, yet He still stopped. If I am going to serve it will requires that I slow down and even stop. Could it be that the great enemy of our spiritual life and service to God is hurry? He had a lot to do but he was not hurried, we don’t find Him running to keep an appointment. When it came to time Jesus always took the time to stay connected to His Father. I believe that that is why He always had time to love people in the midst of a busy schedule. As people, we will buy anything if it helps us save time, yet it is ironic that when we get hurried and feel we need to eliminate something from our life, the place we often start is our service to God. Is that really what we need to cut to slow our pace of life? There is a definite difference in the reactions of the crowd and Jesus. The crowd wanted to continue uninterrupted, motivated out of self-centeredness. Jesus stopped and regarded others as important, worthy of His time, the motivation, selflessness. Do you have time to serve God? What about other people?

• Open your eyes to see a bigger picture.

Why did Jesus put His own plans on hold when others were unwilling to do so? Because Jesus was willing to modeled the practice of putting others first even of it inconvenienced Him and His own crowd of followers.

Philippians 2:3-5

“Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.  Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had”

Blindness was common in ancient times and many of the blind did not have family that could or would take care of them. They’d station themselves on the outskirts of a city where travelers would be coming and going, because travelers would have something they needed, money. The question we need to ask is, who is sitting in the path that we travel? Do we see them or are we the ones that are blind? What is the source of your blindness is it business or a failure to see the big picture, a limited view of why you are here? Is it possible that the greatest danger is that we will become so distracted and rushed and preoccupied that we will skim through this life and never really live it?  Who was really blind that day? Physically the beggars were, but what about the crowd who failed to see what Jesus saw?

• Be compassionate

Compassion is an attitude towards a need that compels us to take action to meet that need; Jesus heals the two blind beggars. A truly compassionate heart finds it impossible to remain neutral when it sees a need. This story is a reminder that the first message we have to deliver to this lost world is simply this, “God cares.” So often this message is communicated loudest through acts of kindness verses speeches of words. Are you compassionate, do you take action to meet the need?

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• Touch the need

Touch is all around us in this world, the handshake, the pat on the back, the hug, holding hands, touch often communicates when the tongue cannot. Jesus could have just spoken, but He chose to touch them, to physically touch the need. After Jesus reaches out and touches them their need is met and their reaction is simply to follow Him, the one they can now see. When Jesus touched my life spiritually and I could see, I had the same response, simply to follow Him. If Jesus has touched your life, what will you do with your sight, what will you focus on? Can you see Jesus, will you follow Him or the crowd. What will you do with your sight; will you see others as Jesus did?

Galatians 6:9-10

9 So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up. 10 Therefore, whenever we have the opportunity, we should do good to everyone—especially to those in the family of faith.

 All of us grow weary, we wake up and realize that we are tired. Tired of giving, tired of doing, tired of serving, and that the joy of service is gone. It’s what we call burnout and the bible addresses it more than once. II Thessalonians 3:13 says, “Do not grow weary in doing good.” God knows that we are prone to weariness when it comes to serving because sometimes:

• There appears to be No observable results.

We live in a result oriented society, sports has given us a score board, even when we go fishing to relax we want to produce a stringer of fish and take a picture as proof. We like to measure our success in tangible ways, but the problem with our service to the Lord is that it isn’t always easy to measure. We may labor for years without knowing the results of our work. We grow weary because we believe that non-visible results mean no results. When God commissioned the prophet Isaiah in Isa 6:9, he told Isaiah to deliver God’s message to a people who would not hear and would not see. Jeremiah was also commissioned by God to deliver his message to the people who would ridicule and ignore him. They seemed to labored for God with no positive results, nothing to measure as seeming success.

• We face criticism

No matter what the worker in the Lord’s vineyard does, there is always someone who is ready to say, “We don’t do it that way,” or “We’ve never done it that way,” or “we never do THAT!” Serving is hard work and criticism takes what is hard and makes it seem impossible. When it grows dark we turn on a light so we can see but where there is light, there are bugs. It’s that way with serving, there will always be those pesky flies buzzing about.

• We lose sight of the Harvest.

It’s easy to take our eyes off the goal and get distracted, to grow impatient waiting for the harvest. Paul spoke about reaping a harvest “at the proper time.” Why? Because sometimes the harvest doesn’t come when we expect, or when we desire.  Sometimes the “harvest” takes months, years, even decades. Sometimes the harvest comes too late for us to see it, Moses died before entering the Promised Land. Sometimes the harvest just doesn’t come in this life and our reward is “Well done, good and faithful servant.” Sometimes we’re unaware of who we’ve influenced; and the fruit appears when we’re not around to see it.  We must have an eternal perspective if we are to keep on sowing good seeds.

•  We miss the harvest

Not only does the fruit sometimes appear at a time we don’t expect; sometimes it appears in a form we don’t expect. We’re expecting passion fruit and we got lemons. Sometimes the result of obedience is not an improvement in our circumstances, but a strengthening of our faith and a refining of our character.

Often from man’s perspective serving stinks! The bible reveals that most of God’s leaders had a rough time. What if Paul had not gone to Jerusalem and Rome, but stayed at Antioch? He could have started the Apostle Paul Seminary, wrote more books and trained more preachers. He could have lived a comfortable life, but Paul would not have been obedient to his call. As I read Philippians, written while Paul’s was in prison, I am struck by the number of times Paul mentions the word joy, eighteen I believe! We want to serve and we want to see the results of that service but we don’t want it to be difficult and we don’t want to have to wait. Yet Paul’s theology was molded in the fires of conflict and adversity as he served.

There is something to be said for those who do not give up easily, those who prevail through persistence. Joseph was a man who had a dream given to him by God that he shared with others, this lead to him being thrown into a pit, sold into slavery, put in prison, and finally a position of power in the palace. Joseph didn’t give up, he kept planting the seeds of good, serving those around him and after over 20 years the dream came true. When we come to that place of giving up we never intend to quit, we tell ourselves that we are just going to take a break for a while, but somehow we just never seem to get started up again.  I know you’re tired…you’re ready to give up… you’re discouraged…it doesn’t seem like God hears you…you can’t even seem to get a prayer through… and you sure don’t see a breakthrough… but quitting is not an option. Keep on serving by sowing, God will bring the harvest.