Bartimaeus'
“tassel” was his cloak. Once Jesus healed him, Bartimaeus had to decide what identity to live
from. Would he live from the “right tassel” status and remain a victim
of his past, though he could now see, or would he live from
the “left tassel” status as a healed, saved child of
God Thankfully, as an example to us, Bartimaeus dropped his cloak behind
and chose to live out of the “left tassel” status.
Why
did Bartimaeus leave his cloak behind?
- He was not going to need it. He had great expectation from Jesus and life was about to become a lot different.
- It would only remind him of who and what he used to be, thus serving as a distraction, temptation or condemnation.
- Were he to bring it, it would get in his way and slow him down. He was about to follow Jesus. Bartimaeus knew intuitively that Jesus' followers pack light and don't carry baggage. Baggage might interfere with something that Jesus wanted him to do.
- If he didn't leave it behind, people might be confused as to what really happened to him. There would be a discrepancy between what he would say and how he lived. If he had been healed, if he had received his sight, if he had been changed and, as a result, become a follower of Jesus, then why did he still carry around paraphernalia from his old identity? In other words, why would someone who was no longer a beggar carry around a beggar's cloak?
Christian,
let me ask you: Have you left your cloak behind? Have you left behind the cloak from your former identity? The world in which you love is a sticky place. Have you picked up any “cloaks” since you became a believer in
Jesus?
In tomorrow's post, you will discover five common "cloaks" that Christians should leave behind.
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