“And Jesus stopped and said, Call him. And they called the blind man, telling him, Take courage! Get up! He is calling you. And throwing off his outer garment, he leaped up and came to Jesus.” Mark 10:49-50 (Amplified)
Jesus was on His way to the final showdown with the religious authorities that would culminate in His crucifixion. He had an appointment with destiny and this would no doubt have weighed heavily on His mind. He had just concluded His visit to Jericho and was on His way out when a very insistent and loud voice caught His attention. It was Bartimaeus the blind beggar. The day had started as usual and Bartimaeus took up his usual position begging for alms. Then he heard a commotion, asked what it was about and realised that the famed Jesus of Nazareth was not only in town, but was actually passing close by. He there and then resolved to seize this once in a lifetime opportunity of Jesus’ presence to seek for healing. Hence, Bartimaeus started calling on Jesus to have mercy on him. When it seemed as if his voice was not loud enough to attract Jesus’ attention, he significantly pumped up the volume. However, his determined raucous quickly incurred the wrath of other people who had come to see Jesus. They responded to his noise nuisance with caustic comments such as “Shut up beggar. You are giving me a headache, turn down your noise”. Another said, “Who is this miscreant causing a commotion?” Shut your mouth or I will shut it for you.” This is proof that the faith that will succeed in attracting God’s attention might also attract caustic comments as the devil subtly takes advantage of other people’s ignorance to try to intimidate and thus rob us of the potency of our faith.
The characteristic of faith is not only that it has a voice, but that it speaks consistently as well as coherently. Satan’s top strategy in denying us the object of our faith is to stop us from articulating our beliefs in the hope of aborting our hope. He knows that faith that can’t or won’t speak will sooner rather than later wilt and die. So, when you choose to confess or speak healing in line with God’s word while going through a bout of sickness, the devil will do his best to convince you that you are making a nuisance of yourself. He will call you deluded and bring ‘reasonable’ people across your path who would look condescendingly at you because you chose to live by faith rather than by sight. If you are going to achieve a faith breakthrough and attract God’s anointing to your life, you have to do what Bartimaeus did – he shouted out the more. He defiantly refused intimidation and pressed into God until he received the response he wanted and received the call he was expecting. So if your situation beggars belief, then it is time to adopt that beggar’s belief as you maintain your confession of faith.
Desperate, determined and dependent people hardly ever take notice of what people are saying around them because they are just too focused on receiving answers to their desires from God. However, once Bartimaeus succeeded in gaining Jesus’ attention, the table quickly turned. The same people who moments earlier were castigating him for disturbing their peace now led him to Jesus. So, don’t allow other people to abort your destiny. Take the path of faith and your faith shall make you whole. He wouldn’t even need to do much because you would have provided the necessary ingredients He requires to concoct a miracle. So, press in and press on. He will definitely answer.
Prayer:
Father, help me to stay focused on you so that Satan will not succeed in distracting me from you or abort my faith objective. Amen.