Tag Archives: Gospel of Mark

A Holy Wednesday: The Day of Anointing

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According to the gospel we call Mark, today is the day Jesus is anointed by a woman.

To us, she has no name.

After Sunday’s dramatic rebuke of Rome, Monday’s trashing of the money-changers and dove-sellers, and Tuesday’s teaching at the Temple in which he humiliates and condemns the Temple leadership, Wednesday is a true down day. A true hump day. He doesn’t go into town. He stays out in the ‘burbs. Apparently chilling.

It is also the day of extravagance. This costly perfume, “wasted” on Jesus. Intuition tells me that people have a harder time hearing this gospel lesson than the three preceding chapters of radical, abrasive Jesus. Here, Jesus is taken for callous and wasteful. My heavens! And Rand’s disciples gleefully hear

For you always have the poor with you, and you can show kindness to them whenever you wish; but you will not always have me.

as an excuse to condemn the poor to their poverty.

But, like any Wednesday, Jesus’s mission shouldn’t be defined by this one day. In fact, this one day should be defined by his actions the rest of the week.

He enters Jerusalem humbly, but is abrasive and aggressive at the Temple. He sternly rebukes the system that impoverishes the poor and lines the pockets of the wealthy. He schools the Temple authorities for their hypocrisy and reveals it to the masses. He is cheered on Sunday by the crowds and jeered on Friday by the leaders. This day, this simple little Wednesday, the day before the Passover and the last moment with the disciples, his final meal before his execution, that day is the day of preparation. The day to get ready. Because tomorrow will be here before we know it.

English: Jesus casting out the money changers ...

English: Jesus casting out the money changers at the temple (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Tomorrow, the day of the dinner, the foot washing, the kiss, the betrayal, is when it all comes down.

Tonight, we wait. We ready ourselves. We bless one another. This is a holy Wednesday.

An Every Day Season

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a Homily for Proper 28B
Text: Mark 13:1-8

The origin of the Temple.

Let’s go back more than three thousand years. Long before Jesus takes His disciples to Jerusalem. Back when tribes fought with one another, a young shepherd boy became king. His brothers were bigger and stronger. This boy was a musician and sort of a mama’s boy. And yet, as king, David did what nobody ever had before. He united the 12 tribes and combined Israel and Judah into one kingdom. And in a remarkable demonstration of equality, moved the capital to the middle of the united territory, to a city called Jerusalem.

Maquete→Ideal reconstruction of the Temple of ...

Maquete→Ideal reconstruction of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem according to the description from the Bible. (This is not a reconstruction based on archaeological grounds). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

His son, the lone survivor of a bloody war for succession, built a great testament to this unity, giving not only a home to the divine presence, but a monument to the land given to this mighty people by their god. Solomon built the first Temple and the Hebrew people became a people that made a regular pilgrimage to the Temple to sacrifice animals on its altars to the glory of their god, named YHWH.

In building the Temple, Solomon transformed the religious character of the Hebrew people by changing the nature of their worship. The city became a holy city and the site became a holy site. The Temple came to define the worship of the Hebrew people.

Centuries pass and the people still worship at the Temple, but the kingdom has long since split. Shrinking unity, shrinking power. In their weakness, they are easily conquered, and the Babylonians sweep in in two waves and take half of the Hebrew people from their land (the land given to them by GOD) and their Temple (their very means of worship). Because of the importance of their land and their Temple as part of their religious and geopolitical identity, they are essentially divorced from GOD and kidnapped. It gets worse; in the conflict, the Babylonians destroy the Temple, essentially destroying their entire religious identity.

As the people were in exile for a generation, the religious scholars were all brought in one place and were determined to reshape the religious identity of their people. They gather the many stories told by the people and put them into writing, for the first time organizing them into not only discernible narratives, but into the books that would become the Torah: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. They began to see their faith as not dependent on the land or to a site of worship in the Temple, but through Scripture and practice. They began to formalize their faith into a religion.

Long after returning home, they rebuild the Temple, but it is imbued with a new spirit and a new religious tradition. It is no longer the only means of worship, but it is again the monument to worship. And when Jesus arrives in Jerusalem, it becomes the symbol of the Jewish leadership’s misplaced loyalty.

Why will the Temple be destroyed?

In proclaiming the inevitable doom of the Temple (it was destroyed forty years later), Jesus is trying to make a statement about the tradition.

Let’s go back a couple of days. It is Sunday of Holy Week, the day we celebrate as Palm Sunday, and Jesus rides a donkey or perhaps a small horse into Jerusalem, mocking the Roman expression of power. He peaks into the Temple and then leaves. They leave the city to go stay in the suburban town of Bethany.

They get up Monday morning and head back to Jerusalem. As they walk, they pass a fig tree. Jesus declares that He is hungry and commands the tree to give him figs, but it doesn’t. It isn’t the season for figs. And in what seems like a completely irrational display, Jesus condemns the tree and moves on to the city. They head to the Temple and it is there that Jesus drives the bankers and the merchants out. On their way back to Bethany, they pass by the fig tree and it is shriveled and dead.

Tuesday morning they go back to the city to visit the Temple one last time. There, Jesus teaches a giant crowd of people during the Temple’s busiest week. Like going to the mall on the Saturday before Christmas. The place must be packed. And he proceeds to humiliate and condemn the Temple leadership in those familiar lessons, including the one about the coin (give to Caesar what is Caesar’s) and the Great Commandment (love God and your neighbor). Then on the way out, they talk about the Temple.

Looking at this whole arc and what the Temple means to the Jewish people, we can see where Jesus seems to be going. On Sunday, he condemns Roman power and arrogance. On Monday, he condemns the Temple’s economic systems. On Tuesday, he condemns the Temple’s leadership for its hypocrisy. And on Tuesday evening, he condemns the Temple itself for what it has become. The real clue to this is how Jesus interacts with the fig tree.

The Fig Tree.

What seems irrational to us in Jesus getting angry at the fig tree is that it is, well…a tree. It didn’t make a bad choice. It didn’t choose to not give Jesus any figs. It wasn’t the season for figs! Besides, if Jesus has superpowers, why didn’t he make the tree produce figs?

That isn’t how it works.

The problem with the tree is that it gives figs only when it wants to, not when it needs to. It isn’t prepared to feed the hungry when the hungry are hungry. Jesus then goes and condemns the structures and the people and then the Temple itself because they take advantage of the weak and only help them when it is convenient. The Temple only produces figs when it is “time” to do so. But Jesus is showing them that GOD wants the Temple to produce based on need, not on “season”. Think of it this way: Jesus only cares about demand, not the Temple’s supply.

Out of season.

This stuff about the Temple can seem a bit distant. So does the way Jesus condemns the Jewish leadership. It is easy to rope this story off and turn it into a history exhibit. To tell ourselves that this isn’t about us. About our church. About our faith or traditions. Many Christians have used this text to condemn Judaism and call Christianity its successor. But we are no more innocent of this problem than they. Of giving only “in season” when we are able and willing, rather than when it is asked for or needed.

St. Paul’s is a very generous congregation and our successful stewardship campaign proves that. But Jesus is compelling us to be generous in a different way: not our giving when it is convenient for us, but to give when invited—and out of the other’s need.

In the end, what Jesus offered the world in his ministry, his death, and his rising again isn’t a new religion, but a new way of understanding our relationship with GOD. A god that wants us operating out of generosity and not selfishness; out of hunger, not satisfaction; out of love, not pity.

And to be free of temples and monuments and our human shackles of ego and power and certainty; to dance in a new garden of delight, below a new tree, full of hope, joy, and fascination at the wonders of the new world GOD is creating.

What’s In a Name?

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a Homily for Proper 25B

Text: Mark 10:46-52

A Healing Story

Jesus heals people. At this point this seems like old news. Remember several chapters ago when Jesus healed the man of leprosy? Jesus urges the man to tell no one and instead, the blabbermouth runs into town and tells everybody about Jesus. It seems so long ago now. Routine. A blind begger is given his sight. Just another story of healing. No urging to tell no one. Maybe Jesus has given up on that idea. It wasn’t a secret anybody could keep, anyway. No blabbing to everyone in town. To us, this story might seem pretty mundane.

We could be excused then if we just jumped to that powerful line toward the end. Jesus urges the man “Go; your faith has made you well.” Many are going to hear this morning about faith and about the rewards of faith. Many other people are going to hear that Jesus isn’t the healer; GOD is. That this is just like the woman that touched Jesus’s cloak. Many preachers will preach about GOD’s healing, restorative power.

I am not. That’s not what I’m preaching today. Because this isn’t any old healing. This isn’t just a story of redemption. This is the capstone of the journey. This is the end of the line. And this is the moment in which we anticipate how everything will be revealed.

Not Such a Simple Story

We must hold in our minds for a moment that we have read through three straight chapters of Jesus talking about discipleship, turning his attention to Jerusalem, and preparing for his death. He has warned his followers of what is to come and they have failed to understand Him. He described a worldview that they are to use to replace the dominant worldview; to start not just a paradigm shift, but a paradigm overhaul.

Our own response to these chapters was to have our assumptions challenged. We have heard difficult things about how we treat children and minorities, divorce, and wealth. This has been a really tough sequence. So we might be tempted to read this morning’s gospel story as a respite: a simple healing story like all of the others.

This is no simple healing story.

There are many reasons why, but we need to speak of only one. This blind begger has a name. Let’s let that sink in.

He isn’t The Blind Begger. He is Bartimaeus. Bartimaeus is a blind begger. The recipients of Jesus’s healing ministry aren’t named in any of the gospels. The only other is Lazarus, who was already one of Jesus’s buddies. So this man is the only one who is healed and is named in the text.

What’s In a Name?

There’s an obvious reason he is named. He becomes a disciple. While others are focusing on Jesus’s statement at the end of this morning’s text, the important sentence is the one immediately after that, which concludes chapter 10:

Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.

The man had lost his ability to see the world and Jesus helped him retrieve it. But more importantly, the man sprang up from the ground, threw off his cloak and in that moment got in line behind Jesus.

Greater than his physical blindness was his spiritual blindness.

Bartimaeus is named because he’s a disciple. Therefore being a disciple is way more important to this story than the healing or the faith. It was all in the action. It was in his declaration that Jesus is the Son of David, in the shedding of his garments, in his leaping to his feet, and especially, in the act of getting behind Jesus and following Him. That day the new walls of Jericho fell down.

We Are St. Paul’s

We receive this story because to the early church becoming a disciple is more important than receiving GOD’s redemption or the healing touch of Jesus. Perhaps because we are all freely given such miraculous grace; that this is the part that is on us. What is different for us today is in Bartimaeus’ participation in the Jesus event; in his response to Jesus. That our response to Jesus is more important than what He has done for us. That we shed our cloaks, spring up, and embrace our own calling to this world.

The good news is that we already are. We are already hearing the call to discipleship. We are already hearing the call to generous giving and faithful devotion. We have ministries at home and abroad we are beginning to tackle with fresh eyes and a renewed spirit. We are embracing the challenges before us. In all of this, St. Paul’s is embracing its future powerfully.

Many of us are taking up new expressions of our discipleship; baking bread for the Bishop’s visit next week; heading up our fundraising effort for Nets for Life; meeting to worship in new ways.

We must not forget, however, that our journey with Jesus inevitably leads to Jerusalem; that death is around the corner. That we, for all of that grace given to us, will die. But through death, we find new life. For all our struggles and all that we have going for us, we are assured of a future, even when our present is over. Jesus invites us to follow Him through it all.

I am sure that we are so called. Because we have a name.

The Thunder Blunder (Eating Scripture)

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Eating Mark 10: 35-45

This whole arc in Mark has been about discipleship; about following Jesus where He is going. Which is Jerusalem and death. And then resurrection.

After Jesus foretells His death for the third time, we have this third epic fail. And it is a doozy.

Unfortunately for us, even though we recognize half of the problem, we aren’t likely to even notice the other half. Perhaps the more important half. The half Jesus is more interested in. The half that deals with what kind of leaders these disciples are.

Eating Scripture is a short video series in which we explore the juicy and the crunchy in this week’s gospel in four minutes or fewer.

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Two Questions About Jesus

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a Homily for Proper 19B

Text: Mark 8:27-38

Jesus has it rough

You have got to feel for Jesus. It was so long ago that he was baptized by John in the Jordan and he took up GOD’s call. So long since he gathered His disciples two-by-two. He has been teaching them so very long and they just never seem to get it! It must be frustrating.

As they walk, Jesus asks them a simple enough question: “who do people say that I am?” So simple, in fact, it comes off like a poll question. They no doubt mistake it for something so innocent. We would. The subtext they hear is this: “You’re around people when I’m not. Give me the straight stuff. What are people saying about me?” He certainly knows what they will tell him: that he’s the holy man many expected to visit them from the grave: John the Baptizer or Elijah or that he’s a new prophet. Predictable responses. No surprise there.

So Jesus asks them the question: “who do you say that I am?” Peter no doubt jumps up and down with his hand stretched as high as it will go aping “Ooh ooh! I know! You’re the messiah!” The words so eager to come out of his lips. No doubt they know that Jesus is doing something and that He’s a big deal. The disciples have certainly talked about this among themselves. Who wouldn’t? And since I’m embellishing this story a little, it certainly would end with the face palm as Jesus says “Doh!” The word bubble floating near Jesus’s head saying “have they learned nothing?”

answering the wrong question

We often hear Peter as getting the answer correct, as if Jesus is testing them so straightforwardly and as if “messiah” would be the correct answer to that hypothetical question. But I don’t think so. The question isn’t “Who am I?” it was “who do you say that I am?” It sounds more like “what do you tell people about me?” And if Peter is calling Jesus the messiah, he certainly doesn’t understand what kind of messiah Jesus is. Imagine you are there and Jesus asks you what you’ve been telling people about Him and you say “I tell them that you’re a rebel crusader!” or “you’re a king to replace the earthly one!” or “you’re a military commander not allied with the Roman army!” because any of these will get the real point across. When we call Jesus a messiah, we are calling Him the revolutionary that transforms the world through sacrifice, not violence; it is ironic. But Peter doesn’t know that.

So when Jesus continues and announces for the first time what is going to happen, Peter is on the side of Satan. He thinks he’s doing the right thing for the movement. But Jesus, knowing what this moment means and what has to happen shouts at Peter “Dude! Stop being Satan!” Jesus tells Peter to get back in line because he isn’t listening. He isn’t listening because he still doesn’t get it, or more appropriately, doesn’t want to get it. To get it would mean facing the fact that the outcome of their work won’t match their ambitions for it. The Empire is still going to be there and Jesus is going to be dead. Peter doesn’t see how that is winning. Peter doesn’t like what Jesus is saying. The disciples want something that isn’t theirs to possess: power. But Jesus is teaching them that power isn’t won or stolen. It only comes through sacrifice.

the turning point

We don’t like to hear that word: sacrifice. Because we’re just as caught up in that wanting to keep our lives, so we lose them thing. Every generation wants a crusader Christ to force His will upon the world. But that isn’t how it happens. That isn’t the kind of Messiah Jesus is.

This gospel story is a true turning point in the gospel we know as Mark. Everything up to this point has been teaching. Everything after it is The Way. One way we might imagine it is like training for the Olympics. All of the training and practices give us the skills necessary to compete. We employ them in the qualifying matches and heats. If we make it through, we get to London, where the real test is. For the disciples, the games are in Jerusalem. And they’ve practiced and trained and it is now time for the qualifiers.

My sense is that we downplay what an important moment this is in the text, because Jesus is, predicting for the first time, 1) His death, 2) where they are going, and 3) what will happen when they get there. And he tells them that they need to make a new sacrifice. They gave up their jobs and families to follow Him; now they must give up their very lives. This is big stuff. And we treat it as if Jesus isn’t asking anything of us except to be nice and polite and don’t drink too much alcohol and quit smoking. What part of “losing your life for [Jesus's] sake” do we fail to comprehend?

sacrificial giving

None of us likes to talk about sacrifice. Particularly when we feel as if we already are sacrificing something. Sacrifice is a tough pill to swallow. But it is the one Jesus offers us. Sacrifice isn’t about pain; it isn’t masochism. Sacrifice is a discipline of reorientation. Our lives require pruning, in which the dead limbs are removed so that we can grow better.

I was in a simplicity workshop in which we were each given a handout with 35 or so values. We were told to narrow the list first to 10, then to 5 so that we might determine what is most valuable. The exercise was extruciating. I read over the list of the thirtysome and decided to first cross out the obvious clunkers. I was still left with 24. Narrowing it down to 10 was awful. I swam around 13 or so for several minutes before I realized I needed to just get ruthless. But now I had to get rid of 5 of my most cherished values. What was left was essential: GOD, spouse, kids, mission, justice. It meant that I care for that stuff first.

GOD is calling on us to prune our discipleship; our sense of being Christian. To let go of all the stuff that gets in the way. To reorient our faith toward Jesus and love. To face the hard challenges in front of us with generosity and devotion to GOD, not to our self-preservation. That we best serve GOD in the way that GOD wants, not in the ways of this adulterous and sinful generation. That we seek the Way and embody the Dream with all that we have and with all that we can do and with all that we are.

May we find the face of Jesus by answering His question of us. May we face the challenge of pruning our priorities. And may we be so changed that we can’t help but transform the world around us. Amen.

Also see my video response to this text

Of the soil

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a Homily for Proper 18B

Text: Mark 7:24-37

Is Jesus a Racist?

The central figures of this pericope are Jesus and the Psyrophenician Woman. This woman comes to Jesus to heal her daughter who is possessed by a demon. The last time Jesus was over here, he dispelled a host of demons. Our lectionary skipped over the story, but it would have come up a couple of months ago, back in Mark 5. Remember when the disciples were crossing over and there was the big storm and Jesus was asleep in the back of the boat? When they got to the other side, they met a man who was living in a crypt—like a homeless man living in the graveyard, only the bodies aren’t 6 feet under. The demon the man was possessed by calls itself Legion, for it is actually a whole bunch of demons. It reminds me of the Borg. The demon asks if they could leave the man’s body and go into a bunch of pigs, and Jesus gives it the go-ahead. Then the pigs are driven off of a cliff.

The people who see this event go tell other people and they tell Jesus to leave, scram! They were afraid of Him. Clearly, news has spread since then, and this woman has come to Jesus looking for help for her daughter’s own demon-possession. He must be good at this stuff.

When Jesus receives the request, He does something shocking. He not only says no to her request, He insults her, comparing her to a dog. We often skip over this fact because we want to talk about how this woman fights for her faith. We want this story to be about faith and perseverance. These are our favorite topics as Christians. faith and perseverance. But Jesus isn’t just demonstrating an uncharacteristically hard heart here to test her faith. It doesn’t read like one of His usual tests. He insults her. And not just a simple insult, but a racist one. He refers to His followers (who were Jewish) as children and she (who is a gentile) is a dog. He isn’t just making a personal insult, but a racially-separating one. This doesn’t sound like any old test. This sounds like the gospel-writer wants us to think that at the beginning of this story, Jesus is a racist and separatist.

What Happens If Jesus is a Racist?

One of the troubles I have with much of the traditional way we talk about Jesus is that it doesn’t always jive with the gospel. When we say in our oldest Eucharistic Prayer that Jesus “lived as one of us, yet without sin” we are setting ourselves up. Because we hear those words and we imagine a truly perfect person—filtered through our local cultural norms. So we imagine Jesus is white. His long beard and brown hair make Him look a bit hippyish, but maybe he keeps it trimmed, shampooed and blowdried. His outfit and disposition gives off the holyman on the mountain vibe. And we imagine ourselves climbing up to visit Him to ask about the meaning of life and he’ll tell some simple refrain that is vaguely familiar, but slightly skewed to make us all go “Oooooohhh! I get it!” Because Jesus isn’t just a holyman, but an answerman. He knows everything and cannot possibly make a mistake.

So when we are given a glimpse of Jesus that isn’t perfect; that isn’t charitable or kind; that isn’t about keeping that perfect relationship with GOD and the people; we get nervous. We skip it or explain it away. When we do that, we miss what might be revealed by Jesus’s own mistake. We might learn what Jesus learned.

Jesus Learns to Throw Open the Doors

This week, I see in the text a transformation. A powerful one. Not in the healing of a little girl, but in the transformation of Jesus. It is no coincidence that this story takes place nearly halfway through the gospel and shortly before the moment Jesus changes directions. It naturally builds off of all that has taken place before it: with the crowds chasing after him, arguing with how Jesus understands what GOD is doing in the world, the disciples getting more and more of what Jesus has planned, and the admonishment of following Him simply to see more miracles, rather than to walk the Way of GOD.

Up to this point, Jesus has been a devout Jew who is reinterpreting GOD’s Laws more broadly than to what people were accustomed. Remember last week, how He dealt with the Pharisees concerning their love of tradition more than their love of GOD’s Laws? Now this woman comes to Jesus and challenges Him on his traditional understanding of who makes up the children of GOD. Jesus’s very theology is thrown into question. This isn’t simply a question of behavior or being nice. This is a challenge to one of the bedrock notions of Judaism: that GOD is building up a specific people for a specific purpose and Jesus would naturally be focused that way. He was raised that way. Besides that, He might have a chip on His shoulder from the last visit. And yet, this woman uses Jesus’s own theology of generosity and His own image that we are to behave like children to discredit the old way. She argues that children know something we don’t about generosity for they give food to anybody and anything. When Jesus hears his own argument coming back to him from this stranger: the other: he is changed. He doesn’t only change His mind, but He changes His theology, His of understanding of GOD and GOD’s work. The woman’s child is made well and then Jesus goes about healing other Gentiles. He no longer reserves help to His people. His people are generous to all of GOD’s people.

Throwing Open Our Doors

This image of Jesus being changed by a Gentile is a powerful example for us. How Jesus listens to her, is moved by her, and is changed from that moment at a foundational place is important. Because our mission in this community isn’t a static one. Neither should we be settled into who our generosity is for. Our generosity is for all of GOD’s people: no matter your color, your ethnicity, your sex, your gender, your orientation, your ability, your age, your interests, your behavior, your economic status, your physical health, your mental health, your education, your upbringing, your anything. The barriers to GOD’s generosity are gone and the barriers to our generosity must get gone.

Jesus threw open those doors to include everybody in the beloved community of creation, despite what Scripture said, because that is what Scripture says to do! That is how we are called to live the Way of Christ: generously and vibrantly. This is our work. This is our stewardship. This is our living the Great Commandment. We give generously and sacrificially of ourselves to listen and be moved by the people, not just in our community, but in every community. We are attached to all of creation, we were brought up from the soil to do this thing: change the world. To change the world, we must succumb to our being changed by the world. We aren’t only from the soil, but we are of the soil. We work the soil. We return to the soil. We are the soil. Jesus changed; so can we.

Check out these other cool readings

Eating Scripture: Even the Dogs Get Scraps

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Today I’m kicking off a weekly video series called “Eating Scripture” in which I attempt to break apart this week’s gospel in about 4 minutes or fewer to pass out the juiciest and crunchiest bits for each of us to chew on over the weekend.

This week, we dive into the text (Mark 7:24-37) which contains a deeply challenging concept for the modernist evangelical Christian, and for many of us that were taught that Jesus is right and always good, and without sin. And yet, it appears that Jesus is not only judgey, but racist! So what do we do with that?

What we do is figure out what we’re going to preach. And I don’t only mean the people who are invited into pulpits this Sunday, but in their homes and their personal lives. What are we all going to preach about this text?

If you like this, or want more, visit Carl Gregg’s post on The Hardest Question this week. And for a must read case for the racist Jesus in this text, visit the brilliant David Henson’s blog. He never fails to get me thinking.

Lastly, the name for this series comes from one of my favorite poems by Mark Strand, “Eating Poetry“. Which, when applied to Scripture is just cool.

Eating Poetry

Ink runs from the corners of my mouth.
There is no happiness like mine.
I have been eating poetry.

The librarian does not believe what she sees.
Her eyes are sad
and she walks with her hands in her dress.

The poems are gone.
The light is dim.
The dogs are on the basement stairs and coming up.

Their eyeballs roll,
their blond legs burn like brush.
The poor librarian begins to stamp her feet and weep.

She does not understand.
When I get on my knees and lick her hand,
she screams.

I am a new man,
I snarl at her and bark,
I romp with joy in the bookish dark.

Let the good stuff out

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a Homily for Proper 17B

Text: Mark 7:1-23

Those Dirty Hands

You may have noticed that I read the whole gospel pericope, not the shortened version in the lectionary. The primary reason is because the full story makes more sense than the edited version. The second reason is because what was removed is the part in which Jesus explains why He condemns the Pharisees. And as much as we look to be Jesus’s disciples, we must not be afraid to recognize ourselves in those Pharisees.

The big issue in the text is that the disciples gathered around Jesus and started to eat food without washing up. The Pharisees see this and take their outrage to Jesus. This is total triangulation. The Pharisees’ beef is with the disciples, but instead of going to them, they go to Jesus. They hope to get Jesus to change the disciples’ behavior. Hence, the triangle. They are angry, so they direct their anger at Jesus. Apparently for “allowing” it to happen. It is so much like that familiar tail of the neighbor complaining to Mom and Dad about their boy who hits his ball into said neighbor’s backyard. “What’s wrong with your parenting/teaching?” the neighbor projects. They move issue from the ball to the parent.

Jesus turns the tables on them by pointing out how much more important tradition is to them than pleasing GOD and fulfilling the Law. And worse, he argues that they break the Law to preserve tradition. His example is the commandment to Honor your father and mother. The Pharisees, he argues, make it all about GOD, therefore rejecting the honor they are to give to fathers and mothers; other flesh-and-blood people. Honor that is supposed to go to people, they give only to GOD. So Jesus is arguing that they are breaking a commandment. Therefore, when it comes to purity laws, it isn’t the stuff that gets on a person that makes him or her impure, it is what comes out of them, specifically from their hearts. He’s saying what you believe and how you act on that belief: that’s where the evil is.

Just in case we don’t catch how scripturally appropriate, but radical Jesus is being here, note in verse 19 it says parenthetically “(Thus he declared all foods clean.)” Is he suggesting we no longer follow Levitical laws condemning shellfish and pork, too?

The Evil in Our Hearts

The hardship for us is that we may be tempted to overlook our own Pharisaical nature: the ways we’re just like those Pharisees. How our tradition means more to us than following Jesus. One of the common jokes about Episcopalians is that you ask virtually any Christian what is meant by “the Good Book” and they’ll say The Bible. You ask a group of Episcopalians and they’ll say “The Book of Common Prayer!” And actually mean it!

We wade into some pretty dangerous waters when we place the trappings of church: our clothing, our pulpits, our stained glass, our pews, and yes, our Prayer Book, over GOD’s presence with us, what we are being taught now, not just yesterday, and what the Spirit is calling us to do.

I can’t help but see my church in this gospel today. I love my church. I love this church, which remember is not the building, but the people gathered in community to worship GOD. I love St. Paul’s. But man, we like tradition.

Kester Brewin suggests that if Amtrak were in the transportation business, they’d have built airplanes. I’d extend that metaphor to say if Delta were in the transportation business today, they’d be building high-speed rail. Brewin makes this point to turn the spotlight on our churches: we have a specific business and we are called to fulfill it; but is that business reconciling the world, or simply gathering weekly for worship? Churches and traditions get stuck. We’re called to be the blessed community, actively reconciling the world and bringing the Kingdom closer. That’s our business. And yet we argue about types of candles on the altar, whether or not we were notified about some event in the community, and how long our meetings run. We need to continuously learn how to be that community GOD has called us to be.

This is why Jesus argues to them that the evil is within us, not something that ruins us from without. Think of all of those television preachers that rail against the evils of the world and we must defend ourselves against their corrupting influence: in other words, the evil cooties. Instead Jesus has us examine our hearts to find the problem.

What do you think we’ll find there?

Letting the Good Stuff Out

Hope…I hope. Love. Compassion. Goodness. We weren’t created to be a vessel for evil. We were created for good. On the 6th day GOD declared that creation was very good. That doesn’t mean that we don’t have our moments. It doesn’t mean that we won’t be challenged by what’s going on around us. And it isn’t another opportunity to beat ourselves and one another up for not being perfect. But, it is a vision of the world that isn’t superstitious or abusive or a world in which human understandings of purity, order, and justice are elevated above GOD’s. And that includes those human understandings we attribute to GOD. Those laws in Leviticus that we have no trouble cherry-picking already, for example. Or blue laws in which we think GOD cares one second whether or not we shop at Target on Sunday (and for the record, the Sabbath is Saturday). That stuff isn’t GOD’s. It’s ours.

In some ways, it is really useful for us that this all comes up over something so mundane and unspiritual to us as washing hands. Because we might be tempted to avoid Jesus’s argument. To be peacemakers trying to get Jesus to just get His people to wash their hands, so as not to upset anybody. That’s how we do things normally, isn’t it? But Jesus all but says “the only evil here is you.” The keepers of the faith. The scholars. The devoted ones. The committed. These are the people Jesus calls out, and it sounds a lot like us.

Because we are being called out for our missing of GOD’s point, Jesus sends us in the right direction: to embrace what GOD has instructed: Love GOD and one another. Be the blessed community. Proclaim the gospel to all nations. Feed the hungry, cure the sick, clothe the naked. Change unjust structures in our world. That is our work. Jesus has given us permission to break those Laws we’ve created for GOD that aren’t really GOD’s so that we might actually walk the way Jesus has taught us—to live the true Laws GOD has given us. Laws about love, support for the weak, and building the community. Let’s get to work.

Eating Again, Together

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a Homily for Proper 8B
Text: Mark 5:21-43

The Physical Presence

From the moment Jesus pulled the fishermen from the sea to follow him, to learn to fish anew, we have been following along. We have witnessed healings and exorcisms, teachings and miracles. Each movement an opportunity to learn about Jesus and to test our faith. They crossed the sea by boat and the wind unleashed its fury. They finish their journey, facing their fears, and return, crossing back to their side. It is here, that they meet Jairus.

Jairus, a synagogue leader drops to his knees at Jesus’s feet and begs Jesus to come with him. His daughter is dying, and if only Jesus would put his hands on her, He could heal her. But Jesus takes him along elsewhere.

A crowd gathers around them, pressing in on them. And a woman, suffering pain for the last 12 years approaches them. She believes that by simply touching Jesus’s clothing she can be healed. So she reaches out and touches his cloak. Jesus, noticing something has happened inside of Him, looks for her, asking who touched Him. The woman comes forward, telling Jesus what she did and why. He tells her that it is her faith that has made her well.

They return to Jairus’s house too late. Reports from inside claim that the 12 year-old has died. But Jesus says those claims are wrong, that she is already healed. Jesus leads Jairus, his wife, and three disciples to the bedside of the girl, and Jesus takes her hand and whispers in her ear to “get up!” And she does.

The Physical and the Mysterious

Raising of the Daughter of Jairus

Raising of the Daughter of Jairus (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is a stunning story of healing. And we are tempted to see this as just another miracle story. Further proof of Jesus’s divinity. Or some other thing. We are tempted to ignore its most challenging elements.

The pericope is filled with physical elements. And we know Jesus as a physical healer. And yet, the woman is healed by touching Jesus’s clothes herself and the girl is healed without Jesus anywhere near her.

Those of us with scientific minds want to figure out how and when this happens—when does the magic happen. If it isn’t in Jesus’s hands, then what? Maybe he has magic healing powers in his mind—like a form of ESP. Or is it in his life force itself, that it might decrease from Him and increase for others.

Those of us who embrace the mysterious are likely to ignore the trouble, striking it up to another mystery; we go along happily ignoring the clues that reveal more of the Great Mystery. Clues that help us understand what is going on here and may help others better know that Mystery.

Rejoining Community

What the evangelist we know as Mark does is to pair these two together, a 12 year-old girl who is dying and a woman suffering for 12 years from a condition most likely similar to Endometriosis. Their stories inform each other, so we read them together. And with them both, he sets up this difficult paradox. Jairus takes Jesus for a faith healer, that can touch his daughter and heal her. Or perhaps bring the Spirit down to do the job. And he asks Jesus to do this. But Jesus wants to show that it isn’t because of touch, but it happens with touch.

The woman is healed by her proximity to Jesus and faith that that is enough. The girl is healed by her father’s proximity to Jesus and faith.

The telling line for us, is the last one. We get the familiar refrain in Mark’s gospel of “telling no one,” but we also have a clause we are likely to mistake for a throw-away line: “[Jesus] told them to give her something to eat.” For Jesus, food is the radical source of equality. In GOD’s Kingdom, no body wins bread or earns bread, but all are given bread. And we all eat our fill. It is also a great unifier and source of intimacy and gathering together.

What Jesus does with this woman and this girl is bring them back to the community. They are given a new life. The girl is brought back into community by being physically brought back from the brink and rejoins the community by eating. The woman was pushed out of community by her persistent state of ritual impurity and increasing poverty. Jesus restores her ability to rejoin community and removes the community’s excuse for excluding her.

Gathering Community

Jesus makes this yet another profound teaching about faith and community. This woman and this father, whose faith make them profoundly sympathetic to Jesus; but they also serve to demonstrate the essential connections to community.

Our power is not found in magic hands of healing, in those that have special gifts, or in expectations of miracles. Our power is found in our faith and in our radical sense of community. And St. Paul’s thrives on embodying that mission. Our patron, Paul, wrote about that radical sense of equality this morning. About fair balance between one another: about abundance meeting need.

We are compelled to make radical community together and proceed out of those doors and make radical community with others, breaking bread, reconciling with the hurt, and sharing the generous love of Christ with everyone and anyone.

With Our Lives, Together

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a Homily for Proper 6B  -  Text: Mark 4:26-34

Two Teachings

Some here have noticed that I ask questions. I like to tell the group there are no right answers. That this is not question and answer time, but question and response time. That I’m not looking for something specific, but I want to hear your response. Sometimes people don’t believe me. They think I have a secret answer that I’m looking for. That’s not entirely true. But there are concepts I’m thinking of.

Of course we know asking questions is a teaching tool. I’m inviting the other to synthesize what we’re talking about. To connect and articulate the subject matter. This is one of Jesus’s favorite methods of teaching. Another is used here. The parable. In fact this story is as much about how Jesus teaches as what.

In it, Jesus uses the parable to talk about the Kingdom of GOD. He uses a second parable. Then he uses many more. Our pericope ends with

With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples. (vv. 33-34)

What an incredibly loaded sentence! This reveals that the crowd got a bunch of parables (stories) and the disciples received special, additional instruction. Taken with last week’s story of Jesus and the disciples trapped—creating those inside with Jesus and those outside and far from Jesus—we get the same troubling question asked a different way. Last week it was

Do you want to be inside or out?

And this week it is

Do you want to be with the crowd of followers or with the disciples?

Which Teaching is For Us?

English: Jesus and Nicodemus

The crowd is full of casual listeners who hear amazing stories, see miraculous things. They follow the Magic Man from a distance, anonymously. Not far removed from Nicodemus who comes to Jesus at night. They hear Jesus’s story of seeds and growth and hear only about seeds and growth.

The disciples, on the other hand, have committed themselves and become the public face of Jesus. He is known far and wide, not only for His work, but for the work they do. They have left family behind to follow a radical, prophetic preacher. Their personal cost is high. They hear Jesus’s story of seeds and growth, take their experience of doing God’s work with Jesus, and He gives them additional, discrete instructions.

Notice, of course, that our Scripture leads us to be the crowd, disconnected from the secret teaching, left only with the parables. We don’t have to be. We can choose the more challenging path.

Throughout Mark’s gospel, we see the people wrestling with the parables and having a really hard time with them. Sometimes the text clues us in to what Jesus has in mind. But sometimes, like today, it doesn’t. We might, like the crowd, hear Jesus speak of seeds and growth and think that is all that is there.

Messing up Field of Dreams

Cover of "Field of Dreams (Widescreen Two...

Cover via Amazon

We do that often in Churchland. One way is in how we have misremembered the famous quote from the old film, Field of Dreams to seemingly misapply its purpose. We share with one another this idea about the seed growing, the farmer going to sleep, and having the plant grow without us, and we apply it to that improperly quoted statement

“build it and they will come.”

Suddenly we expect that our job is to build programs and random people will materialize. During my short time as a youth minister, I used to joke that people expected that my presence would spawn teenagers like a paramecium—that they would just seem to split off from me and suddenly there would be another! And then another! Woo hoo! I’m budding!

This characterization of the movie is directly opposite of what it is actually about and what we need. The quote is actually

“If you build it, he will come.”

And of course, the voice whispering this to Kevin Costner means his father. This is where we get things so wrong. It isn’t about the size of the program, it is about the relationship with a parent that feels distant—the one we long to depend on, but don’t know how to bring closer.

There is a reason that we refer to GOD as Father. Not because GOD is a man. Not because of any masculine stereotypes, really. We call GOD our Father or Mother because of relationship, intimacy. The sense of connection we feel with our parents and the sense of loss when they are gone or absent from our lives links us to our same feelings of intimacy with our creator. We are reminded of all the times we are picked up from our skinned knees and the times in which learning to do the right thing brings tears to our eyes. And in these images, we see parents and GOD.

It’s the Intimacy, Stupid!

That Field of Dreams quote actually does describe our needs, because our focus is on bringing our Creator closer, and bringing the Kingdom of GOD closer. We are called to build, but it isn’t for glory, and it isn’t to build another Tower of Babel, that we might achieve godhood. We do it so that we might be with GOD. And that we do what GOD actually does ask us to do: to bring the Kingdom closer.

For most of the gospel of Mark, we, like the crowd, only get the parables from Scripture, because the teaching has to come to us directly from Jesus: from witnessing the Christ in others, in our prayer life, in our corporate worship, and in our attempts to build that heavenly ball field.

Field of Dreams -- Barrington (IL) May 2011

Field of Dreams — Barrington (IL) May 2011 (Photo credit: Ron Cogswell)

We are invited in, to be a disciple of Jesus, so that we can better know GOD. Rather  than watch others, like a spectator, and wonder what all of the fuss is about, we can choose to learn the truth from Jesus; when we stop watching church happen and start making it happen ourselves, with our lives, together.


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