He said Rabbi, that I might receive my sight. He said go your way, your faith has made you whole. And immediately he received his sight. He followed Jesus and the road. So you notice several things about this man and just typical of a blind person. The man is blind, can't see. It says that he's the son of - Bartimaeus is his name, which means the son of Timaeus, the son of the unclean man, so obviously his reputation was not very good. He sat by the highway - that means he's quite a passive person - a person who's sitting by the roadside's passive. Many people are passive. You don't go far in life being very passive. God wants you to have a spirit that's energised, eyes that have vision and a heart that can see what you're called to do and to stir your life up to count, not to just be passive.
I find all over New Zealand so many people are passive, spiritually passive, emotionally passive. He was sitting by the roadside and he was begging. He was dependent on other people to help him, dependent on others to come through for him, dependent on others to feed him, dependent on others for directions, dependent on others for guidance, dependence on others for correction and help. Listen, this man was not in good shape. He literally was not fulfilling the potential he's created for. He was not fulfilling his destiny. In fact he's falling far short of it. Instead of being up and having been productive with his life, he's leaning on others.
I wonder in your spiritual life if you are leaning and depending on other people, if you find that you have never built a life with God, a sense of God's presence and purpose around your life, and so you just lean on other's Christian life. You lean on the life of others to make your life sort of come alive a little bit. Sometimes people do that. They come to a meeting. They're relying on someone else to break through for them, someone else to engage God for them, someone else to hear God for them. This is not the life we're called to. We're called to be incredibly active and pro-active and drawing from God for ourselves.
This man was begging, dependent on others. Perhaps some of you are emotionally dependent, dependent on others to support you, come through for you. There's no reason why we can't get the help of others, but you don't want a lifestyle - this was a lifestyle like that. You imagine a lifestyle like that. You get up every day and someone has to help you find your place where you can sit and you can beg and ask people to come through for you. Think about that. It's a horrendous way to live your life. It's definitely not what God purposed. Then he heard about Jesus. This man heard about Jesus, this man who was blind and in darkness.
There are many ways blindness comes on people. There's a physical blindness of course. It's quite disturbing to look at when people have lost their eyes or their eyes have been damaged and they have no sight, it's quite disturbing to see. But there's other forms of blindness. If you have a look through the Bible there are many people who are blind. Think about them. Think about the people in the Bible described as being blind. I'll describe some blindness for you.
There was a man called Samson, a man of great destiny. He got distracted by compromise and ended up blind, lost his sight, lost his sense of purpose, lost his direction totally. That's what compromise will do for you. You need to know where you're going in life and what God's called you to do. If you stick on that and stay focussed on that and then you maintain your direction, your vision in life. This is what I'm called to do. This is what God wants me to do. He dilly dallied with women, got involved in relationships and he ended up losing his sight.