Luke 18:11a

"What do you want me to do for you?"

Walking by the homeless street beggar standing with tattered coffee cup pointed straight at my eye-shot, I have little doubt what he wants from me. Dropping loose change or an occasional bill into the empty bin he smiles exposing his missing and rotting dark teeth, acknowledging I satisfied his expectation of me. All of this without exchanging a word between us. But did I give him what he wanted or what he needed?

Frequently pondering whether he's heavenly born or earthly bound, angel or mortal, I ask myself that same question over, and over, and over again. Origins of life really have little to do with the end in the end, for God desires a response of love in all my "providential appointments" (as so aptly coined by C. S. Lewis).

Why would an all-knowing Savior query the blind man about what he wanted from Him? After all, the "low-life" from Jericho without a mite had already repeatedly cried out for His mercy. (cf. Luke 18:38-39) Seems silly. Seems perfunctory. Seems placating. Seems demeaning. Seems platitudinous. One asks because one does not know. In this case the asking is knowing. Mercy equaled sight for the man without vision, but sight equaled something else for the Man with vision.

Healing, especially of the spiritual variety, is a two way street. As much as the Creator desires that all His subjects be saved, and it's certainly within His prerogative to do so (cf. I Timothy 2:4), He also desires something from us. He desires our desire. The wonder of healing cannot be a wonder if the sick doesn't know they're sick. Once known, the reality of its implications surface and a need to be restored is pursued.

Jesus wants me to want Him, and to also tell Him I want Him. To want Him is to need Him, and to need Him is to know there's a need. The bacteria of indwelling sin searches for its subject and attaches itself to its weakest cell. At that moment I become sick, whether I feel it or not. My health is always at risk; my need is constant.

"What do you want me to do for you?", Jesus asks. 'I want You give me what I need and not necessarily what I want. Part of what I need is the need to need, and to also see that need. Make me bankrupt so that all I desire is to desire You.'