Memorial United Methodist Church

Our Social Location

It is good to start a sermon on Bartimaeus and healthcare by being honest about one’s own social location. My grandfather was a physician in New Britain, Connecticut who had a wing of a hospital named after him because he served immigrants in that community during the horrible flu epidemic of the second decade of the last century.

Our church is in the third most expensive city in the United States, White Plains, New York, behind New York City and Los Angeles, and just ahead of San Francisco, Honolulu, Miami, Chicago, Boston, Houston, and Washington D.C. Two years ago ours was the 89^th most expensive city, last year 31^st. (http://www.forbes.com/2009/10/07/most-expensive-cities-lifestyle-real-estate-america-top-ten_print.html). Our city, founded in the 1600s, is made up of diverse incomes and people with no income. You can find evidence of this by looking around our neighborhoods, driving past the places where day laborers gather each day hoping for some income for their families, talking to the staff of our schools, working in the Emergency Ecumenical Food Pantry, and spending time in the emergency room of our hospital.

When I came to this congregation in 1997, I had a preexisting heart condition, which meant I could not participate in the New York Annual Conference health and hospitalization program. The problem was solved by the conference paying the COBRA on my previous insurance for one year. I have cost the insurance program over $200,000 in 12 years, mostly because of quintuple heart by-pass surgery in 1999. My parents, were both employed when I was growing up and each had health and hospital insurance. We only bought new cars when one of them had surgery, as they “made” so much beyond their costs by collecting on both policies.

Bartimaeus and Jesus

Jesus has just had another conversation with his closest friends in which they did not understand what he was about. He keeps having these talks throughout the three years they traveled and ministered together. He had asked them what he (Jesus) could do for them. Two of them said they wanted to be Secretary of State and Vice President when he won the revolutionary battle and he became president of Palestine and threw off all Roman oppression. According the one of our members of the Sunday 8:30 a.m.service, Jesus could last be seen banging his head against a tree as he wondered whether these disciples would ever understand his vision for their non-violent, non-hierarchical movement which would result in the Kindom of God.

They were just leaving Jericho and Bartimaeus, a beggar without sight, sitting with the marginalzed of the city, shouted out to them. On could say he has a preexisting condition. He is referred to in this story as Bartimaeus, Son of Timaeus, which is a redundancy as “Bar” means “son of.” Why this redundancy? The whole name means “Son of honor.” So “Son of Honor, Son of Honor,” is a beggar, without sight and relegated to the margins of his society. Here is the irone – “Son of Honor, Son of Honor” is living on the margins. Bartimaeus shouts out, begging not for food but for inclusion. The crowd around Jesus tries to silence him. Even Jesus ignores him. Bartimaeus refuses to be silenced or ignored and he shouts out again. Jesus now hears him and asks for Bartimaeus to join him for a conversation. The crowd changes their point of view and encourages Bartimaeus to find his way to Jesus. Jesus asks him what he (Jesus) can do for him? Bartimaeus only wants to “see again.” Jesus tells him “your faith has made you well.” Bartimaeus regains his sight and joins Jesus, the decuples and the crowd on the journey to Jerusalem. Who gains sight in this story? Jesus does as he moves from ignoring a person on the margins to welcoming a relationship. The crowd does as they move from walking by on the other side to encouraging Bartimaeus in his quest for healing. One can only hope the disciples catch a glimpse of Jesus’ vision for a new community of kin. Bartimaeus does as he moves from the margins of Jericho to inclusion in this new movement.

Bartimaeus, by being outrageous, certainly not polite, refuses to be silenced, makes demands, and risks more rejection. He is an agent of change and healing. He reminds us of the widow who will not let the judge rest at midnight until she gets what is due to her. I do not limit Batimaeus’ receiving of sight to physical sight. To do so misses the main point of the story. Once again, Jesus is welcoming someone from the margins into his movement and everyone changes.

I worked in a team pastorate with a person who had received too much oxygen when she was a infant in an incubator. She was legally without sight, but certainly insightful. Many times in her life, she and many people in her life prayed for her to receive her sight. In the process they were missing so much of what she could see, about which those around her were blind. To individualize this story and only “see” one person gaining physical sight is to individualize a story of inclusive community. For too long, too many people with great faith and insight have been misled. They had been led to believe that if they only had more faith, or more people praying for them, they would be able to see again. In so many ways the ones teaching this perspective are the blind ones. Bartimaeus may have gained his physical sight or he may not have. There is ambiguity here about the nature of his sight reclamation. We know for sure, however, that he is no longer living on the margins, silenced by the crowds and a beggar.

Bartimaeus, healthcare and us

Early last week I put out on Face Book message that I was preaching on Bartimaeus and health care. I received a wide range of perspectives from Libertarians, wary of any government involvement, to single payer advocates, which I probably am. Recently, on reaching my 65^th birthday I was introduced at a Walkabout Clearwater Coffee house as newly eligible for a socialist single-payer health program, Medicare. There are people who know more about the insurance industry than most of us. There are people who have studied the present options before the congress more than most of us. There are people who have advocated more than most of us. So what is our “voice” on this matter? As a congregation we do not have a shared ideology on this, or much else for that matter. What do we agree on? I can’t shake the idea that 47,000 people die each year because they have not health care insurance. I am aware that I am privileged in that the church provides insurance for me and my family. I have been in the emergency room, as a pastor and as a patient, and I know the anger and worry of parents who have no insurance and a very sick child, who may die without care. I have seen children die for the lack of care that could come from population-wide health care. I know the day workers of our city have no health care. I know that many of the people who care for so many of our needs are without health care. I know that so many of the nannies and child care people of our city have no health care. I know that members of our congregation, who are child-care givers, have had to forgo or riskily postpone procedures they desperately need. I know families, young and old people, in our congregation and country, who cannot have the care they need and are playing roulette with their lives.

Like Bartimaeus, we can be angry about this situation. Unlike Bartimaeus most of us do not live on the margins, but live with privilege and entitlements. Like Barimatimeus we can refuse to be silenced about our calling to “choose life” and not resign ourselves or any others to death. We can be open to many positions and ideologies about health care. We cannot be faithful and not “see” that this is a moral issue. It is a life and death issue. We are not blind to this reality and we need to not pretend that we just cannot see a way to address healthcare. We cannot claim this is all too complex for us. Our task as friends of Jesus is make sure that people without adequate insurance, or no insurance are not forced to live on the margins, or die on the margins. Memorial, Bartimaeus began to shout out. We can be like Bartimaeus. We can keep or start shouting out.