Sermon: Three Words

First Presbyterian Church

February 25, 2024, Lent 2C

Mark 8:27-38

 

Three Words

 

 

The Revised Common Lectionary offers as its Gospel reading for today only the last eight verses of what we just read, leaving out Peter's great success at naming Jesus as the Messiah, the Anointed One. It was my choice (along with many other preachers) to reinstate the four verses at the beginning, partly because they are critical for understanding and interpreting the eight verses that follow, and frankly also because as badly as Peter comes off in those eight verses, it only seems fair to allow him his moment of glory, so to speak, especially since those are few and far between for him in this gospel.

It also helps this sermon to fulfill one of the long-held traditions of Protestant preaching: being presentable in three parts, good Trinitarian reference that suggests. In this case, one can fulfill that three-part quality by taking note of three specific words, spread roughly evenly throughout the text, that are key to understanding just what is going on in this reading. Furthermore, these three words frequently fall prey to misunderstanding, as their meanings have changed significantly since Mark first wrote them into his account of the life of Jesus. 

The first word is the one that Peter came up with: "messiah". 

If you ask a modern Christian what that word means, the answer might be something like "well, Jesus, of course." One could even argue that Peter's declaration marked the beginning of naming Jesus specifically with that description. Where things get challenging here is in sorting out exactly what Peter meant by calling Jesus "messiah." 

It's worth noting, though, that Jesus does not apply that term to himself, at least not in Mark's gospel until his very last night before the crucifixion. In most cases Jesus refers to himself as "Son of Man," as in both verses 31 and 38 of this reading. Interestingly, that reference - "Son of Man" - places an emphasis, as you might guess, on the mortality, and therefore the humanity of Jesus, which is a different emphasis indeed than is found in the word "messiah." 

Additionally, another part of the challenge is that the expectation of a messiah, an anointed one sent by God, wasn't necessarily a long-standing tradition in Judaism; in fact, one doesn't find the world itself in the Old Testament in most translations. As a result, the word got appropriated in some interesting ways and had some interesting meanings attached to it. By the time Peter was speaking that word, it had (in the minds of many though not all) taken on a meaning specific to this time: a political and/or military leader who would deliver the land from its hated Roman Empire occupiers. (As you might guess, this wouldn't be the last time the term "Messiah" got associated with such a figure.)

We can't be certain what was on Peter's mind when he made his claim about Jesus; we don't know if he was expecting Jesus to be a "military messiah" or not. We can be certain, though, he wasn't expecting Jesus to respond with the second of three words of emphasis here: "Satan." 

For those of a certain generation, that word is now mostly associated with a recurring sketch on Saturday Night Live some decades ago, in which Dana Carvey, dressed as a matronly woman known most simply as the Church Lady, got to exclaim that name at least once, when wondering if his guest had succumbed to temptation at the hands of said character. Even today, one is at least as likely if not more so to hear that figure named the Devil. While the name shows up plenty in the New Testament, again, it's not so prominent in Hebrew scripture. Perhaps its most prominent appearance is in the book of Job, where (in its original Hebrew form ha'satan) the word designates the one who comes before God to argue for the testing of Job. 

Note that Hebrew designation; ha'satan would be more literally tranlated as "the accuser" or "the adversary"; before it was a name, it was a description, and perhaps to grasp the full significance of Jesus's charge against Peter, we need to focus less on the character we associate with he word and pay more attention to what that word meant to those who spoke and heard it. In short, Jesus is accusing Peter - this fellow who had been numbered among his disciples since the beginning - of being an adversary. Jesus is calling Peter an enemy. 

The thing is, he's right.

Again let us remember that mission statement verse from back in chapter 1: "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news." That's why Jesus was here on this earth. That was the whole point. Anyone who would oppose that is the adversary. No matter how much they have the right answers to the questions, no matter how close they've been or how long they've been with Jesus or any other thing that might be true about them, to oppose Jesus's word and work was to put oneself in opposition to Jesus. No other way about it. Jesus had already faced The Adversary back in the wilderness, and he had dealt with plenty of demons by this time. None of them had stood in the way of Jesus's work, and Peter wasn't going to either.

That brings us to one more word that we might need to reconsider in this context: "cross," as in Jesus's command in verse 34: "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me." I don't think anyone tries to deny the truth of this verse, at least not overtly, but there are some voices that try to numb us to its power. 

I'd guess that at some point we've all probably used a phrase like "well, that's my cross to bear" in reference to some obstacle or impediment we might face in our daily lives. Right now, I could speak of this ongoing bout of vertigo or something like it as "my cross to bear," as I might have spoken of any number of other health issues over the last decade-plus. One does not want to minimize the challenges we face on a daily basis, but one does not want to confuse them with the "cross" Jesus bore in his ministry on earth. There was the physical cross, and then there was the cross that brought him to bear the physical cross. 

That cross was the cross of living as if the Beatitudes were really to reflect how we see others; living our ives to treat "the least of these" as he describes in Matthew 25 as we would treat Jesus; giving our ministry and our mission and our time to meet the needs of those who live invisibly among us, not getting by, not being valued or loved, being invisible and easily stepped over or stepped upon without our being troubled one bit.

See, if we do that, "the Empire" won't like it. Whether it be the Roman Empire or the British Empire or whatever corporate empire one might choose to speak of, the only one we're supposed to serve in their view is that empire, and caring for poor or the meek or the hungry or the sorrowful interferes with that empire doing what it wants to do with us. And that empire, whichever one rules in our world, won't stand for it.

So if we truly take up that cross, denying ourselves, and follow Jesus in spirit and in truth, there will be suffering. And if Peter couldn't follow, Jesus wasn't going to let him stand in the way.

Peter wasn't through bungling things in front of Jesus. The transfiguration story (which we heard two weeks ago but actually comes in the chapter after this one) shows that Peter hadn't gotten it yet, and the events of Holy Week suggest that even then, Peter was trying to avoid Jesus meeting that fate. By the time of the book of Acts, though, something has finally gotten through to Peter; after all of his bungling and clumsiness of word and deed, he emerges as the vocal and spiritual leader of the early church in Jerusalem after Jesus's resurrection and ascension. 

I suppose, after considering these three words, we might want to ponder three questions:

1) do we really know what it means to call Jesus "Messiah"?

2) are we ever guilty of making ourselves an adversary to Jesus?

3) do we really know what means to take up our cross and follow Jesus?

For the challenge, Thanks be to God. Amen.

 

Hymns (from Glory to God: The Presbyterian Hymnal unless otherwise indicated): #439, O My Soul, Bless Your Redeemer; #---When Jesus told his followers; #718, Take Up Your Cross, the Savior Said

Sermon: Waters and Wilderness (and Wild Beasts)

First Presbyterian Church

February 18, 2024, Lent 1B

Mark 1:9-15

 

Waters and Wilderness (and Wild Beasts)

 

 

For some, this reading for the first Sunday of Lent, from Mark's gospel, is a disappointment. "Where are the actual temptations?" they might ask. "Where's any temptation at all?" Part of the qualm is that, where Matthew and Luke have extensive temptation accounts, each with three specific tests named and played out - not just the temptations themselves (yes, including the temptation to turn stones to bread), but Jesus's answers to them - "man does not live by bread alone..." for example. While Matthew's account expands through eleven verses and Luke's covers thirteen, Mark's temptation account only takes two.

In fact, today's reading is somewhat padded by material that's already been covered in the lectionary. Verses 9-11 came up on the Sunday on which we marked the Baptism of the Lord, and verses 14-15 appeared on the Third Sunday after Epiphany. Those two meager verses about the temptation are indeed our only "new" material for this first Sunday of Lent.

However, one can also point out that this combination of verses is new, and it may have something to teach us. These verses also clue us in on how Mark is presenting this Jesus character in ways that resonate deeply with the religious tradition they know. 

First we return to the Jordan River, where John, who typically baptized for the repentance of sin, baptized Jesus, who (as our faith reminds us) didn't sin. In another gospel this becomes a point of contention, as John protests the roles should be the other way 'round, but Jesus convinces him to do it anyway, and the baptism happens. Mark's account skips all that but adds some drama to what Jesus sees as he comes up from the water - memorably describing the heavens as "torn apart" before the dove-like Spirit descends on Jesus. 

Waters have a pretty interesting track record in Hebrew scripture, beginning somewhat mysteriously at the very beginning of Genesis. As early as the second verse darkness covers "the deep" and a wind from God blows over those waters, which are still later separated and eventually the oceans are formed. Early in Exodus we see a mother hiding her newborn son in a basket and setting it loose in the waters to keep a Pharaoh's soldiers from killing him; he is found and taken in by an Egyptian princess, but eventually Moses becomes the one who leads the Hebrew people out of Egypt. Those Hebrew people pass through both the Red Sea and the Jordan River en route to the promised land. Even the prophet Jonah spends a little time underwater, thanks to the efforts of a great fish, before being deposited at Nineveh to do the work God had called him to do.

Those are just a few examples. It's not a surprise that water, and immersion in it, becomes a part of an important religious practice, but the act of being immersed and then raised up works out pretty well as foretelling the ultimate earthly fate of this fellow that John was called upon to baptize. 

Before Jesus has even had a chance to dry off after the baptism, he is "compelled" into the wilderness. Matthew and Luke (and this verse in the NIV) offer words like "led," but nothing so gentle here; the NRSV offers "the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness" (emphasis mine). And no, we don't get any kind of account on how Jesus is "tested," which itself is a different interpretation than "tempted"; it suggests that one's strength or skill or faithfulness is being specifically tried, instead of one being lured or enticed into some sort of sin. 

Testing in the wilderness is, again, not new. The Hebrew people faced plenty of it on their way to the promised land, and they didn't always pass those tests. The prophet Elijah faced his times of trial in the wilderness, and David had to go on the run from Saul before becoming King himself. Again, the wilderness, like the water, have a history in the history of the Hebrew people, but there are new things here too.

Take those angels, who were present to minister to Jesus. That's not something you find in those Old Testament stories. That again adds something new to this story even if it starts out looking or sounding familiar. 

And then there are those wild beasts.

Yes, I know, the NIV uses the technically correct translation "wild animals." But let's be honest: "wild beasts" as found in the NRSV and other translations, just sounds cooler. 

While it might seem an obvious thing to expect wild animals in the wilderness, it's not the kind of thing that typically comes up in those accounts in Hebrew scripture. Also, for all the attention-getting quality of the inclusion of the "wild beasts," there isn't any particular indication that these wild animals actually did anything; no suggestion that Jesus had to wrestle with them or any such thing. The verse simply says "he was with the wild animals."

This might be something to think about. It was noted above that wild animals weren't typical of those earlier stories, but they aren't totally absent. There is the story of Daniel, who ends up in that den of lions but comes out unharmed. On one of Elijah's times in the wild, ravens actually came to bring food to him. 

What if, instead of being a part of the threat and peril of the wilderness, the "wild beasts" were really there to, well, be with Jesus. What if what we're seeing here, instead of a threat to Jesus along with all of Satan's testing, is the "wild beasts" - indeed, creation itself - recognizing their Creator, the one who in the prologue of John's gospel was "in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being"? If we take this possibility, it really does set Mark's temptation story apart from those in Matthew and Luke. No less that creation itself was at Jesus's side in his time of testing. Later in this chapter we see that unclean spirits know exactly who Jesus is, with plenty of fear; maybe the creatures of the wilderness know who Jesus is as well.

And speaking of those unclean spirits or demons; while Mark doesn't specifically say anything about how this testing came out, the way those demons react to Jesus later in the chapter suggest Jesus passed those tests just fine.

So, we've had "three w's" - water, wilderness, wild beasts - in this account so far. Verses 14-15 give us one more "w": witness. When this testing is done Jesus is out proclaiming. He goes back to Galilee and begins to bear witness. It's really the theme of Mark's gospel, his "topic sentence," his "mission statement": 

The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is near; repent, and believe in the good news.

 

There it is: Jesus's message in a nutshell, and not at all a bad theme to hold in mind throughout this season of Lent. We get the "repent" message plenty in this season, with all of the emphasis on penitence and reflection, but maybe we would be well served to hold on to that "believe" part of Jesus's proclamation as well; to know that the time is fulfilled, or at hand, and the kingdom of God has drawn near to us. In Jesus, repentance is never a hopeless act, not with the reign of God at hand. 

So make that part of your Lenten discipline; repent, with hope in God's sovereignty. Like those wild beasts, recognize the Creator with us. See the Spirit descending like a dove. Know that even - no, especially - in this season of Lent, God is with us. 

Believe in the good news.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

 

Hymns (from Glory to God: The Presbyterian Hymnal unless otherwise noted): #166, Lord, Who Throughout These Forty Days; #---, When Jesus came from Nazareth; #410, God is Calling through the Whisper

Sermon: With Glory

First Presbyterian Church

February 11, 2024, Transfiguration B

Mark 9:2-9

 

With Glory

 

It’s one of those days, liturgically speaking.

One of those days that isn’t quite a major event in the liturgical calendar.  It’s certainly not on the level of Christmas or Good Friday or Easter, not even quite on the level of, say, Pentecost or Epiphany. It’s there, and it must mean something, but explaining or understanding just what it means isn’t easy at all.  

The Transfiguration of the Lord – there’s an unwieldy name for you – marks in the liturgical calendar the final Sunday before Lent starts. Its subject is that peculiar incident we’ve heard from Mark’s Gospel, in which Jesus takes a few of his disciples up a mountain and something happens that is rather difficult to describe.  

“Transfiguration” itself is an unusual word at best. Dictionary.com defines being “transfigured” as “to change in outward form or appearance; transform,” with a secondary definition of “to change as to glorify or exalt,” a definition which is largely based on its usage to describe this event.  

In fact we really don’t use this word very often outside of this story. We’re more likely to use a word like “transformation,” “transmogrification,” or maybe “metamorphosis,” which is actually close to the word used in the Greek text. Of course, popular culture can affect how we understand any of these words. The toys and movies about those robots that change into other kinds of machines can easily pop into people's minds when they hear or see the word “transformer,” and the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes used the word “transmogrifier” for Calvin’s fanciful machine for changing himself into someone else (that word became so uniquely associated with that comic strip that to this day, readers still think “transmogrify” was a made-up word, though it is quite real).

All of these words carry some implication that a person or thing changes appearance, but not necessarily changing in substance or person. The Transformer robot can still be called Optimus Prime even when it looks like a truck. Calvin is still Calvin even if he’s “transmogrified” into a tiger or frog or whatever his imagination comes up with.

What happens in today’s gospel is not exactly like that.  

Mark’s early readers would have realized that something was up the moment that Mark mentioned that Jesus and the three disciples were going up a mountain. Anyone who know their Hebrew Scriptures would have remembered that interesting things happen on mountains.  

One of the first such examples would have been Moses and his trips up Mount Sinai to receive the law from the Lord.  In Exodus 34, when Moses came down from the mountain after receiving the re-dictated Ten Commandments, his face was glowing, after God his Moses in a cleft in the rock and allowed divine glory to pass by Moses.  

Another, similar mountain encounter with the glory of God is recorded in 2 Kings, when the fugitive prophet Elijah encounters the glory of God not in fire or earthquake or whirlwind, but in the “sheer silence” that followed. Mountains are often – not always, but often – places where holy and mysterious things happen, and not just in the Hebrew/Jewish tradition. Mark’s readers would have likely taken the hint, and expected something unusual to happen. And in Mark’s usual no-nonsense, no-frills, no-time-wasted fashion, that expectation is rewarded.

Our author quickly tells readers that Jesus began to … change. To be transfigured, as translators have usually chosen to translate μεταμορφὠθη (metamorphothe), the Greek word found here. As Mark then describes the event, Jesus changes, but the change that Mark describes seems to be mostly about light; “his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them” (v. 3). This would also remind Mark’s listeners about those previous mountaintop experiences, with Moses’s face ending up glowing and Elijah glimpsing the dazzling glory of God.

And then, as if any more clues were needed, we get those very figures themselves appearing in this scene. Elijah and Moses appeared next to Jesus, talking with him – now there’s a conversation you wish somebody had been able to record!  

By this time Mark’s readers must have felt as if they were being hit over the head with the obvious; this man Jesus is of God. Mark told us way back at the beginning of the gospel that this was the “son of God” (1:1), and the scene before the three disciples seems to us (who after all have the benefit of Mark’s narration and storytelling to clue us in) to be a magnificent and irrefutable demonstration of the glory of God manifested in Jesus. This would seem to be as much proof as anybody could need, right? This man is from God, right?  The son of God?

You know how there always seems to be one person, no matter the situation, who always seems to say the wrong thing at the wrong time? No matter how beautiful, how glorious, how transcendent the moment, they manage to chime in with something that’s just wrongheaded or ugly or maybe just … off? In the gospels, Peter is a good bet to be that guy. In all of the gospels he manages to be that rare combination of (1) always willing to speak, and (2) not necessarily the sharpest knife in the drawer. In this case, these two traits combined to cause Peter to blurt out a suggestion that, for all his good intentions, ruined the moment. It was as if a resplendently beautiful bride took a pratfall halfway down the aisle.

To be fair, Peter’s suggestion about building three “dwellings” (also translatable as “tents” or “booths”) wasn’t totally out-of-nowhere. One of the possible interpretations of Jewish tradition at that time was that the “Feast of Booths,” a regularly-observed event, would be the time when God would intervene in Israel’s fortunes and usher in a new age. Peter seems to have jumped to the conclusion that the appearance of Elijah and Moses with their teacher was just this sign that God’s new age was arriving. Peter, though, was forgetting about the very things this teacher Jesus had been telling them, unpleasant things about suffering and death. Perhaps he wanted to forget them, or hoped that this intervention would make them unnecessary. Whatever it was, Peter’s blurted-out suggestion, probably babbled in a moment of bafflement and uncertainty, was just … off. 

To make that clear, a cloud descended over the mountain, and when it lifted Elijah and Moses were gone and Jesus stood alone before the disciples, with a stern warning from above to “Listen to him!”

It was a moment of revelation, in a way. The Transformers and Transmogrifiers that came up earlier were about concealment. Even the very packaging on that Transformers toy described them as “Robots In Disguise.”  This, on the other hand, wasn’t a disguise. Just the opposite; for those few transcendent, dazzling moments, the disciples caught just a glimpse of Jesus as he really is, in all the divine glory that is his.  

It had to be hard for the disciples not to wonder as they headed down the mountain, particularly when Jesus started going on about their not telling anybody about what they saw, why they couldn’t see this all the time, or at least more often.

Why is it that we can’t see this glory always? Why do we have to live in the dark and grey of the world, down in the valley instead of living in that glory up on the mountain? To put it directly, too many people have not seen that light, or have cowered in fear from it, or run from it; and this is exactly why we are called out to bear witness to the light of God that we have seen, the revelation we have known in Jesus, the indwelling of God that we know through the Holy Spirit. If others do not see the light, it is our job to bear witness to it. This is why we don’t get to stay on the mountain. There are too many in the valley or on the plain, in the city or out in the countryside, from whom the light is veiled, and our calling is to bear witness, to let that light that is within us shine through us.  

It’s not our light, of course. It is the light of God’s glory, the light that illumined Jesus on the mountain, dazzling and intense and brilliant. It is that glory, that transcendence that points us towards hope, knowing that the Jesus transfigured on the mountain goes before us, intercedes for us, suffers and rejoices with us in our sufferings and rejoicings.  

For this we rejoice. The Transfiguration, strange as it may be, is a moment of hope, maybe one last reminder before the penitence and reflection of Lent that we are not abandoned, we are not forsaken, we are not alone. To borrow from John’s gospel, the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it.

For light, for transfiguration, for glory revealed, Thanks be to God.  Amen.

 

 

Hymns (from Glory to God: The Presbyterian Hymnal); #13, The Mighty God with Power Speaks; #11, Source and Sovereign, Rock and Cloud; #156, Sing of God Made Manifest

 

Sermon: With Healing

First Presbyterian Church

February 4, 2024, Epiphany 5B

Mark 1:29-39

 

With Healing

 

What does it take to draw a crowd these days? I mean a serious crowd, throngs of people.

We'll see one such answer a week from today, of course. Thousands of people crammed into a stadium, thousands more pouring into Las Vegas, and millions around this country and others watching via television, for a football game. The numbers are pretty impressive. Nothing like a World Cup Soccer final, mind you, but pretty impressive.  

Who remembers, though, that back in the 90s that game was the object of a particularly daring and successful stroke of counterprogramming designed to draw off at least some of those crowds for a special, live episode of the sketch comedy program In Living Color? Timed to begin at the end of the first half and end in time for viewers to get back to the game, the counterprogramming stunt was successful enough to draw about 22 million viewers away from the Super Bowl halftime show, which that year featured singer Gloria Estefan and figure skaters Dorothy Hamill and Brian Boitano. 

Well, the NFL was going to have none of that. For the next year’s halftime show the league booked no less than Michael Jackson, only the biggest performer on the planet at the time. The pre-emptive strike worked, and in the twenty intervening years the halftime show has become a spectacle that equals if not dwarfs the game itself. Between the halftime show and the increasingly expensive and popular commercials that air during the game, it can become easy to forget there’s actually a game going on.

What such a story reminds us is that crowds are fickle. You can attract crowds, to be sure, but once they are pulled in, how do you keep their attention? 

One gets the idea that Jesus knew this, when one sees how today’s gospel reading turns out. When last we left our story, Jesus had just amazed the synagogue crowds with his teaching, with an exorcism thrown in as well. This got tongues wagging, as we were left with the statement that “At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee” (v. 28).  

So for a follow-up to this smashing introduction to the people of Galilee, Jesus goes to … the house of Simon. Maybe everybody needed a rest. It still seems an odd way to follow up that experience in the synagogue.  

As well, this must have been an interesting return for Simon. We first met him back in verse sixteen, where he and brother Andrew “immediately” dropped their nets and walked right off the fishing boat in response to Jesus’s call. It seems like a rash decision. One can only wonder how Simon was contemplating explaining all this to his family, especially his mother-in-law, perhaps. “You mean to tell me that you just up and walked away from a perfectly good fishing business to follow this homeless preacher? Son, have you got any sense in you at all?” I have to wonder if Simon might have been wishing that Jesus would change his mind and go looking for more demons to cast out.

Instead the homecoming became an occasion for another act of healing from Jesus. It’s interesting that Mark describes the event rather un-dramatically, even anticlimactically. Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever; Jesus took her hand and raised her up, and she got up and started to serve. Simple. (Yeah, right. Simple.)

Again word starts to spread, and before the day is over the whole town is gathered outside the house, with all those with illnesses or unclean spirits crowding around Jesus to be healed. For the people of Capernaeum this must have been an occasion of great joy, with health being restored, wholeness being reclaimed, and burdens of suffering and despair being lifted.  

Yet I ask you to consider that this is only the first occasion for healing to be found in today’s scripture.  

I realize that the rest of today’s reading doesn’t use the word “healing.”  Verse 39 does allude to more casting out of demons, true. But specific mention of healing? No, not in the rest of this passage.

And yet, after a full Sabbath day, first in the synagogue with the man with the unclean spirit, then at Simon’s home raising up Simon’s mother-in-law, and then with a whole townful of people seeking healing, we need to pay attention to what Jesus does the next morning.

He goes to find a “deserted place,” or a "solitary place," depending on which translation you read. Away from the city, away from the synagogue, away from Simon’s home, away from the crowds which were, according to Simon and his companions, searching for Jesus.  

Jesus went away to that isolated place, and he prayed.

If Jesus, son of God, “eternally begotten of the Father” as the creed we'll say later puts it, needed to pull away from the crowds and find a deserted place to rest and heal and get back in touch with his Father in prayer, we certainly can’t expect to be able to press on relentlessly without pause or without recharging our spiritual selves. If Jesus needed to pray, we need to pray. If Jesus needed to retreat to a solitary place, we need to step away ourselves.

In those moments there is healing to be had. In prayer there is nothing less than re-energization, from the very source of our being. In the retreat to prayer God is present to restore our strained energies, our frayed nerves, our exhausted spirits and worn-down souls. We cannot possibly think that we are superhuman enough to press through the grief, the stress, the weariness when our very Lord and Savior made a point of seeking out solitude and prayer.  

This is hard to fathom in our world where we are taught never to press the pause button. If Jesus were being directed by some kind of modern corporation or publicity firm, can you imagine their reaction to his going off to a deserted place to pray? First of all, there’s no way he could have done what he did on that Sabbath day without being hustled out the next morning to be on all the Monday morning news shows. The pursuing crowds would no doubt be joined by jostling cameras tracking his every step. Had Jesus been so bold as to slip out and find that deserted place, the handlers and spin doctors would have no doubt gone ballistic. “You’ve got to capitalize on the moment,” they’d say. “If you want to take advantage of this momentum you’ve got to get out there RIGHT NOW and press your advantage. Rest is for the weak.”  

You get the idea; our culture does not reward or even comprehend what Jesus did that morning. At what would seem to be a high point, a moment of triumph, Jesus disappeared. Simon seems to have had to organize a search party to find him. And Jesus didn’t relent and return to the disciples; they had to go and find him. Jesus took this time of restoration and healing seriously. We can do no less, no matter how much the world we live in discourages such behavior. 

Of course what happens next is equally intriguing. Simon and his companions finally catch up with him and let him know in no uncertain terms that he had disappointed a whole lot of people that morning. And Jesus’s response was…to leave town.  

Not to plunge into the crowds and sign them up for long-term membership (or even to get them on an email list). Not to exploit the masses for fame and recognition. For Jesus, the next step was to get on with the work of proclaiming the good news.  

Notice where Jesus’s attention was focused; his job, “why I have come” as he puts it in verse 38, was to proclaim the gospel. Given his retreat and prayer time, Jesus came away focused on the core of his mission, taking us back once again to what we might in modern jargon think of as Jesus’s mission statement, back in verse fifteen; “The time has come, ... the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” The temptation to continue to work the present crowd, to ride the wave of popularity, would be very hard for us to pass up. Yet for Jesus, his own retreat and healing and prayer brought him back to his basic animating purpose, and he walked away from the crowds to find the next synagogue in which to teach, and continued to proclaim the good news.

As you know, this church is at a transition point. I haven't been in this interim role quite for a year yet. The church is looking forward, trying to catch a vision of just what God is calling us out to do. We all come to this moment aware of the passage of time, and aware of the uncertainty before us. What is our next step? Where do we go from here? What are we to be as a church, both as a worshiping community and as a witness to this town and this world?

Let one thing be crystal clear: we will go nowhere without all of us, together as a church and individually in our own homes and isolated places, taking time on occasion, as needed, to step away from the immediate crush of worry and uncertainty, and restoring our connection to the One who calls us his children. We can exhaust ourselves doing many things, but without the time of prayer and discernment and searching and listening for the still small voice amidst the whirlwind and chaos, we will go nowhere fast.

This congregation has been through a lot. There have been some wounds, some disappointments, some weariness as this church has sought its way forward. The church cannot find that way forward if its members don't take some time for healing and recharging, time spent in prayer and searching and discernment, a work that is not done with my call here or even with a new installed pastor in place; it is a work that is beginning and a work that will be ongoing.  

For the message that healing that comes in many forms, Thanks be to God.  Amen.

 

Hymns (from Glory to God: The Presbyterian Hymnal); #645, Sing Praise to God Who Reigns Above; #793, O Christ, the Healer; #30, O God, in a Mysterious Way