Scripture: Mark 9:38-50
A common quote from Henry Ford is that you can have a car of any color as long as it is black. This was at the dawn of the automotive age, there were several automakers at the time, but the Ford Motor Company was beginning gain the greater market share because of the utilization of the assembly line. This is why black was the color, because it was quicker, easier, and cheaper to produce one color. Other companies had other ideas some offered a wide variety of colors. Who was wrong and who was right? If you wanted a more affordable vehicle then you would consider the Ford, if you wanted to make a statement then you would pay a bit more. There is not a right or wrong answer when it comes to a vehicle, only opinions and preferences. Some of us have a preference to only buy a vehicle from a company owned and operated in America, to support our economy; the truth is most cars driven in the United States has been assembled in the US. So most cars are providing jobs for Americans. Again it all comes down to preference.
Preference and opinion are involved in nearly every aspect of our life. Everything from our vehicles, our jobs, our clothing, and our political party, even the worship community we attend is based on preference and opinion. Everyone has reasons for having their opinions; some of these opinions are even well researched and systematically applied. Some of our opinions are deeply held, but in most cases they are only opinions. Sometimes we forget that.
Strong opinions are part of the American way. We take pride in our opinions, maybe a bit too much pride. Strong opinions are not exclusively American. It is part of the human condition, the part that sought to gain the knowledge of Good and Evil, the part that chose to abandon and hide from our Creator because we wanted to be the masters of our own destiny.
Jesus’ disciples, the people that have come to be known as saints, were not immune from this aspect of humanity. John, the person mentioned at the beginning of this passage, was known by a couple of other terms: the disciple whom Jesus loved, and a son of thunder. Take a moment just to consider those names. As the disciple whom Jesus loved, John was one of the closest friends of Jesus. He was in that inner circle, with Peter and James. John was the one chosen to see the end of the age, not because he was smarter but loved. John got the message that Jesus came to give better than the others and Jesus loved him for that, many commentators actually call him the disciple of love because John primarily focused on God’s love in his Gospel and letters. This deep friendship and understanding was also coupled with great passion.
The son of thunder is the second term associated with John. He and his brother James were filled with passion. They came from a bold and passionate family. Their own mother was so bold that she went to Jesus demanding that her boys would sit on the right and left side of Jesus when the kingdom was established, or to sit in the seats of the most honored advisors. This passage in Mark, gives us a glimpse of the passion of John. He was a purest; he followed Jesus with the strength of a bulldog. He bit down on the gospel of the kingdom and he was not going to let go. And he would protect his teacher’s honor with fierce jealousy.
There were a select few that were chosen to be a talmid of Jesus. A talmid is a student of a rabbi, one specifically chosen to learn and carry the teaching of the rabbi to the next generation. In a contemporary sense a talmid would be one of the few people selected to a specialized department in an Ivy League University. They would be the hand chosen assistance to the department head, to learn from the most important teacher offered in the area. John was chosen and he was proud of it. John was being taught by the teacher he believed to be sent by God, the one who was going to lift the nation of Israel out from under the thumb of Rome into its rightful place as the Light of nations. No one was going to disrespect his teacher or his position in the teachers group.
John is offended that there is someone out there casting out demons in Jesus’ name. He is offended not because a good deed is being done, but because this person had the nerve of doing this deed under the authority of his rabbi, without his permission. Jesus was not the only person that could cast out demons, he was not the only person that could prompt healing in lives, to be honest everything that Jesus said and did was already written and in practice throughout the religious community. There were well established methods and ceremonies used to bring about healings and exorcisms. The difference is that Jesus seemed to be able to do these things without the normal pomp. He did this by His own authority, and his followers were able to do the same things as their teacher, by invoking His name, the NAME Of JESUS.
These feats were done in public. It was common for Jesus to provide relief to someone in bondage with a crowd around Him, and then he’d tell them to keep quite. As if you could keep something like that quiet. People observed these activities by Jesus and by his disciples, through these observations they too picked up on the strength and power in the name of Jesus. John saw this happening and he was not happy about it, because they did not walk with Jesus, they did not know the proper methods that Jesus himself used. They were not students of the teacher in a formal sense. John was upset because they were doing what he was doing and his pride was affected.
We get passionate also. We begin to think that our way of thinking is the only correct way. We have invested our time and energy in learning what we know. We have a heritage from which opinions have been handed down. The ancient churches claim apostolic succession, meaning they can trace their roots directly from an apostle, one of those directly taught by Jesus, or by from one of the closest disciples of these men. The Catholic Church claims that the apostle that headed their church was Peter. The Armenian Church claims to be headed by Bartholomew, the church in India trace their roots to Thomas. Each ancient church has an apostolic head. Yet here even before the church began there were already non-apostolic expressions of faith, and the apostles were protesting this.
Jesus responds to the thunderous declaration of John by saying, “Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us.”
Do not stop him… whoever is not against us is for us. Jesus has called us to expand the kingdom of God. We are to do this by feeding the hungry, caring for the sick and the fatherless, befriending the friendless, loving our enemies, helping the poor, the widows, and the orphans. Do not stop those that are doing these things because if they are not against us they are for us. That means that even though we may not like the way that they do things they are on our side.
We question why the world is falling away from Christ; maybe it is because those that bear His name have failed to carry the mission. For those of us conservatives who are upset that the government is giving away money to feed the hungry, I want to ask why are we upset? Are we upset because they are doing our job for us, or are we upset because we have failed? For those of us that are more liberal, why are we upset? Is it because we have failed to do these things in the name of Christ and have done them in our name or the name of our nation instead?
We have opinions, but we need to remember what is most important. It is not about Rome, Israel, America, Canada, Ireland, or Russia it is about God. It is not about Friends, Catholics, Baptists, Mennonites, or Adventists its about God. It is not about Jew or Gentile, slave or free but life with God. That life comes through a name. It is not about Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, or Green it is about the kingdom not of this world. It is not about progress or conservation, or industrialism or environmentalism but about redemption. Those that are not against us are for us is what Jesus said, do not stop it. God will redeem, God will save, God will find a way to bring forth his kingdom with our without us. God saves that is the name that is the mission. That is the light of the world and the word of God. The name Jesus, or more accurately Joshua means God is salvation.
Our mission is not to make our own name great but to bring the little ones, into the kingdom of God. Our mission is not to save the world but to help the one that is close at hand. We often times get caught up in the fight of who is right, which is the right church, or the right theology. But the heart of the matter is that God is beyond our understanding but what
Scripture: Mark 9:30-37
There are many confused people all around us. They are searching for something, anything really that might make them feel accepted, loved, wanted, and needed. The songs we just listened to were released by a band a couple of years ago, Mumford and Sons, they speak of the hunger and the emptiness found in the world. They recognize a darkness that seems to be enveloping their communities, and the world around them. A darkness that seems to have many faces: poverty, war, and environmental decline.
This is an emptiness that has been around since man first walked out of the God’s Garden. Yet there is something that keeps urging them to look back and search for something that they may have known but forgotten, even generations back. This void of the soul is spoken of throughout scriptures in many terms, things like the hardening of the heart. Theologians speak of it in other terms, one spoke of it as being the God shaped vacuum. Mystics spoke of it in more imaginative terms like the cloud of unknowing or the dark night’s journey.
There is darkness in the world that seeks to consume every aspect of humanity. No one is truly safe from its effects. It seeks to shade the light in its shadow sucking life into its black hole of despair.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
This passage from the first chapter of John speaks of this war between the darkness and the light. It alludes to the darkness corrupting and sucking life out of the world but the light holding its ground. John wrote this gospel after several years of walking with and remembering his life with his Lord. But even he as a great saint, an apostle sent out by Jesus Himself to carry on the ministry He started did not always or even fully understands what life with God meant.
He as a young man walked with Jesus during Jesus’ ministry. He was with Jesus during this trip mentioned by John Mark in his Gospel called Mark. Jesus was teaching them as they traveled through Galilee to Capernaum. I can imagine it would be like a discussion in the car that many of us have had with our friends, coworkers, and children. There was a spontaneous conversation about the deeper things of life. During this particular discussion Jesus tried to explain how the light would over come the darkness.
“The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.” Just imagine for a moment if you were there during that discussion. You were walking along the dusty road with rocks slipping into your sandals. You had hopes that finally the king had come and would drive away the Orc-ish Romans, the darkness plaguing the nation set apart to be the light of nations. Now the one that you thought was king was telling you straight up that he was going to be killed. What does that mean? How would that affect your future? Would it happen before or after he rose to power and delivered the nation?
They were asking questions in their minds that each of us would have asked. You yourself probably wondered about a few more that you would have asked. Then he spoke about rising again? Was this whole discussion metaphorical or was Jesus speaking of literal death and resurrection?
Mark goes on to say that they did not understand what Jesus was saying and they were afraid to ask him about it. Fear is darkness. Darkness was right there among the disciples trying to corrupt the closet friends to the light.
Well they walked on and the disciples probably fell back a bit because they did not know what to talk to the teacher about, and they picked up a different subject matter. I imagine that this second private discussion was spun off of the discussion of Jesus’ pending death, so they were trying to determine where in the line of succession they would fall. Corruption is seeping deeper into the lives of the disciples as they begin to plot their alliances and playing their political clout.
They arrive at their destination, and Jesus asks them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” Again there was silence. How could they tell the king that they were arguing about who would take His place, because in nearly every revolutionary order plotting the overthrow of an empire that would be an act of treason against the cause. It shows weakness and they knew it.
Jesus does not push the issue instead He looks out among those in the camp and He sees a child among the followers. So he calls the disciples over to Him and they go to this child. Jesus takes the kid into His arms and begins to teach using whatever is around to illustrate the point. And He says, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all. Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”
A child, a common child one of probably a few dozen that was hanging around that camp taught these respectable adults what it meant to be a true follower of the king. We can learn much from this illustration about what it means to be a leader. A child is in the process of learning about the world around them. Their eyes are wide open looking at every aspect of their environment. They see things differently. A child observes a mother getting pleasure from receiving a gift of flowers, so the child runs out to pick every dandelion in the yard so that they can bring her joy. They may even include other weeds that most of us adults would dig up or spay with an herbicide. A child asks questions and they are full of wonder. They will walk all day exploring if we would let them, just to find out what is over beyond what they can see from the door. Many of the greatest scientists of the world had child like abilities to wonder and desire to explore.
Jesus is saying that if you want to be first in the kingdom, the number one thing is to welcome the children. What that means is not only having a church full of kids, but to interact with the kids. To walk with them as they explore, to invest our time and energy teaching them and assisting them as they learn the boundaries of their own abilities. If we want to be true effective citizens of the kingdom we need to bring the sense of wonder back into our culture. And to be effective leaders we should be willing to do what ever we can to walk with people as they learn and explore aspects of life.
To bring back the sense of wonder is a difficult thing. With the corruption darkness brings, there is also a squelching of wonder. Poverty kills a child before they have a chance in many ways. A hungry child sits because they lack the energy to explore. Many children live in a poverty of affection; their parents are so busy trying to feed them that the child fails to develop senses of love and belonging. These children are starved for attention in any way possible and seek it out in the darkness that begins to suck the life out of them. We are seeing the product of the attention starved generations.
Those attention-starved people of the western world are the ones that have the greatest spiritual hunger, but they do not realize it. They fill their lives with so much junk they look like their lives are perfect but reality is that they are malnourished. Their lives are filled with spiritual junk food. Their empty soul is being filled with quick empty calories, which turns into apathy and obesity.
Our culture is a picture of unhealthy spirituality. We must change the direction, and to do that means that all followers of Christ must begin to interact with the world. Our greatest need is not money but time. If the followers of Christ would take the time to teach people to manage their money and time so that they could then invest love in their families we can begin to change our communities. If we as followers of Christ would change our lifestyles just a bit and invite someone else to eat with them when they go out they can possibly spark a spontaneous conversation that may change the direction of someone’s life.
If we were to examine our own lives we could see where the darkness is creeping into our lives, and into our communities. The interesting thing about darkness is that it leaves when light is present. As we enter this time of open worship let us shine the light of Christ into our own lives. Let us allow Him to show us ever so gently where our own arguments and politicking has allowed the darkness of our adversary to gain a foothold and cause our testimonies to fail and cause spiritual malnutrition in our lives. We cannot share what we do not have.
James the brother of Jesus says that we do not have because we do not ask, or we ask for the wrong reason. And if we draw closer to God that He will come closer to us. We do not need to fear God, he is the source of light and life. He is the vine that feeds the branches of our lives. And He is the friend that walks with us down our own dusty roads. Let us now seek Christ and let Him lead us down that road.
Scripture: Mark 7:24-37
Every so often at work we have to go through a period of time to retrain. During this time every one of the employees must sit, listen to a lecture, and answer questions. During this time every employee groans because once a year they have to redo everything, and at the same time get all the work they are required to do finished.
If you work for a company or have ever worked for a corporation you have probably had to do something like this. But there is one course that seems to really irritate many, the training on harassment. It is not that employees want to harass people or be harassed, but the irritation comes because after this you feel as if you cannot even speak to anyone without the potential of losing your job, or facing prosecution.
Harassment, diversity, and political correctness have been hot topics over the past few years. In most case these topics should be approached with great caution. We do not want to cause unnecessary harm to those around us. The problem is that it is nearly impossible to create an environment that is totally free from all forms of harassment or political incorrectness. It is possible to create an environment that is manageable thought. The difference between an environment trying to be free from all harassment and a manageable environment is balance. A harassment free environment is a place that can become just as hostile as one with little concern for political correctness. I have actually been in this sort of environment, one where everyone sits in total silence while eating lunch because they are afraid of being reported to management for harassment.
I am saying this not because I support an environment of harassment but because to create a manageable requires time and open communication. There must be a place that people feel free to speak without great threat. There must also be a space of time for people to adjust to a new way of thinking.
Jesus lived in a time and place that was full of racism, nationalism, patriotism, and religious bigotry. If we feel that these issues are bad today you would be surprised at how bad these issues were in ancient times. Even in the religious community, the community that we base our Christian ethic on was one of the most discriminating groups in the ancient world. Just think for a moment the greatest temple in the ancient world was built to honor the Hebrew God. Its beauty and greatness was spoken of by not only by Hebrews, but also the Romans. It was considered one of the greatest buildings in the entire known world. As a house of worship there was not a rival, yet it was a place reserved for only one group of people. Only the Jews could enter into this place of worship, if you were not Jewish, you could only marvel at its greatness from the outside and imagine what the beauty was on the interior. To distill this down to the most basic elements the temple was a house of racism. It is hard for me to even say that because history has treated the Hebrew culture very harshly. Religion, the religion that focused on the one true God was racist. Or was it?
In ancient Israel the racism was so dense that many would completely avoid certain areas of geography because the people that lived there were not of pure ethnic ancestry. It was not the fault of the Samaritans that their ancestors intermarried with the invaders of the past. They believed and worshiped the same God as those in Jerusalem, but they did not do it the same way. So not only were they discriminated over their race, but also religion.
There were other areas avoided. Three great ancient empires defeated Israel before they returned to their land. The Assyrians defeated the northern kingdom; the Babylonians defeated the southern kingdom. Some were taken to Babylon while others were left in the area. Many of those left behind were the ancestors of the Samaritans, while those taken into exile became what we know as the Jews, but the third empire then over threw the Babylonians and now they were under the rule of the Persians. It was the Persians that allowed the Jews to return to their land. The Jews rebuilt the temple and the walls of Jerusalem. The Samaritans worshiped in another area, and they still worship there today. Then even the great Persian Empire fell to the Greeks lead by Alexander the Great.
This fourth empire, the one that colonized Israel after they returned to their land, set up cities throughout the conquered lands, and in these cities they taught the Hellenistic worldviews. The Hellenistic people would move into these cities, and now Greeks live among the Jews. Tyre is one of these areas. Jesus goes to this city. He tries to go in secret but word gets out. If you can imagine this would be pretty big news. The religious community was exclusive. Adherers to this religion did not mix socially with the outsiders, and a rabbi to visit their city was nearly unheard of. Jesus faced this culture. This culture was weighed heavily by discriminating ideas, yet in the center of all of this was one woman who was unconcerned with what was politically correct, the only thing on her mind was the wellbeing of her daughter.
Jesus and this woman lived in the center of a culture war. They spoke, acted, and lived in solidarity with the world around them. The woman takes a chance and enters into this room to the presence of Jesus, surrounded by people that hate her. They hated her because of her ethnic background, her religious background, and her gender. What does she actually expect? She falls down at the feet of this great rabbi, the rabbi that taught about God in a way different than the others. The rabbi that could cast out demons and heal various diseases. To this woman there was an opportunity, to release her daughter from bondage. She braves the ridicule of the culture, because the goal was more important than anything else. And she asks a question.
Imagine the scene before we continue. Imagine every group of people that rubs you the wrong way. Imagine those individuals covered in tattoos, people with piercing, the single mother with children of mixed ethnicity, or maybe someone holding hands with someone of the same gender. Imagine these people openly, what are you seeing? Are you seeing a person or a stereotype? Are you willing to speak with this person respecting them as they are? I ask this because this is what everyone in this room with Jesus is going through. This woman challenges every aspect of their religion as she comes into the room, and they must deal with their prejudices.
She is there on Jesus’ feet begging for him to heal her daughter. Jesus knows the tension weighing down in the environment, but his response is somewhat disturbing. “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” After two thousand years we may not notice how politically incorrect this statement is. Not only is he calling her and her family and culture dogs he is stating to her that the Jewish culture is better. It is a statement that is hostile, harassment in any way that you look at it. Yet it is open and manageable. The culture is what it is. Neither group can artificially or force change. So Jesus speaks into the current culture, He does not judge, condemn, or support any aspect of that culture but he meets them all where they are. It is at that point that one can start to change the culture. Meeting and speaking to the community where they currently are, teaching them the truth and starting them on a journey into the Light of God.
I am reminded of the vision of Isaiah when he saw of the glory of God and says, “I am undone, I am a man of unclean lips from a people of unclean lips.” Jesus left His place in heaven, to live among mankind. He came to bring reconciliation between God and Mankind. To reconcile, to bring real lasting peace among enemies you must first enter into a conversation, in honesty and respect, accepting them for who they currently are and encouraging growth. Jesus came to bring the kingdom of God, to spread the influence and reign of God throughout humanity. Jesus is sitting in this room of prejudiced people on both sides and says, “you don’t take the food from kids and give it to the dogs.” Jesus is saying in this statement, that redemption comes through the Jewish people. They were the people through which God was revealed. They by default would be the first in line, for no other reason than that they were waiting.
God is not only for the people of Israel. When the nation first came into the Promised Land an inn owner named Rehab was accepted into the community because she believed in the God of the Hebrews. A Moabite named Ruth was accepted into the community saying that her mother-in-law’s people would be her people and their God her God. Even the great lawgiver, Moses, married not one but two non-Hebrew women. It is odd that I mention women and not men, but in the Hebrew tradition true Jewish heritage is based not on the father but the mother. It is the mother that carries the child and gives birth, and before paternity tests were invented the mother was the only parent that could be proven without doubt. So in each of these cases the children resulting from these marriages should not have been accepted as pure, yet they were. God in the Old Testament was a God for all people.
The woman and all present knew of this history. Even the Pharisees taught that Gentiles could become part of the community. The woman replies to Jesus, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” She knew that through the imperfect eyes of humanity she would never be seen as equal, but she hoped that God would provide grace. Both spoke in parable, in a figurative way using common language and visualizations to express their faith. We have all seen dogs or other pets eat the things that are dropped from the table, it is the same food as on the table. She spoke great theological knowledge in an almost flippant way. The grace of God, the bread of life is the same food that nourishes all people, if it is found on the table or down in the dirt. Jesus, I am sure enjoyed this meeting of wits. And in this conversation both spoke to the heart of prejudice. To God all people are equal; there are not slaves nor free, Jews or Greeks, men or women. Though we may have prejudices God does not. Though we may see dogs not worthy of God’s grace, God sees something totally different.
I speak of prejudice, harassment, racism, and bigotry, among other really dark words that remind us of our darker history as humans. I speak of these because Christ came to set us free from all bondage. If we do not see the humanity of another we are living in bondage, and when we judge and condemn we may actually keep others from experiencing the grace of God.
Paul says, “Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived? Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers – none of these will inherit the kingdom of God. And this is what some of you used to be. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.”
This is who we were. This is the lifestyle that each of us struggles to walk away from on our journeys to God. We may be a few steps closer but we are not totally free from the threat of bondage. The only way to be free is to build peace with God and mankind. Those we imagined just a few moments ago are broken and hurting people loved by God, people for whom Christ died for to provide the way of salvation. They hunger and thirst for many things both physical and spiritual. The forces of the world, the flesh, and the devil bind them and they are in need of someone to point them to their redeemer.
As we enter into this time of open worship I ask us each to consider what we would do if someone like this woman came into our meeting. Would we help them along the journey of faith in Christ or would we toss them out to the dogs? It is a hard question but one we must answer if we truly want to be a community Loving God, Embracing the Holy Spirit, and Living Christ’s Love with others.