Dear friends in Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Prepare our hearts, Lord, to receive your Word. Silence in us any voice but your own that in hearing we may believe and in believing we may obey your will revealed to us in Jesus Christ. Amen.
I love the story of Jesus’ ministry as portrayed by the Gospel writer Mark. The author uses very few words with a fast-paced flow to pique our interest and draw us into this quickly moving version of the greatest story ever told.
In no time at all, Jesus puts in motion a quiet commotion. He
– proclaims good news to people,
– calls a few disciples,
– silences a demon,
– heals Simon’s mother-in-law, and
– helps a hurting host of inhabitants who haul before him all their tired, their poor, their huddled masses yearning to breathe free…
of disease, of dejection, of demonic despair—
and that doesn’t even get us out of the first chapter! It leaves us wondering if we’ll ever get a chance to stop and catch our breath!
. . . which is an interesting way to describe that feeling, when you think about it. To catch our breath—it’s kind of like Peter Pan trying to catch his shadow—and yet, we all know what it means. Trying to catch our breath evokes images of hard workouts, crazy schedules, difficult situations, and challenging experiences that can leave our heads swimming, our eyes glazed, and our nerves frayed—in short, leaving us greatly in need of a moment just to breathe, to be quiet, to pray?
It reminds me of that old soap commercial on t.v.—in the middle of a hectic day, a woman cries out, “Calgon, take me away…!” In the next scene we see her relaxing in a tub full of suds, all of her troubles forgotten.
Certainly, Jesus does not snap his fingers and slip into a tub of hot, sudsy water to take a break from the madness, from the fast-paced action, from the daunting task of dealing with so many people’s pain. No, he does it the old-fashioned way—he sneaks off to a lonely place in the desert…to catch his breath…to be still before God…to pray…something to which you and I should pay very close attention.
For the truth of the matter is that we stand in constant need of prayer—for many reasons, the most important of which is, or should be, that we stand in constant need of God’s reassuring, reaffirming, re-energizing Word of life and love and grace. The truth is, I don’t know many people whose lives aren’t often hectic, filled with difficult choices, or peppered with little headaches, big heartaches, a bag full of questions, a boat-load of confusion, and more than enough pain, anger, or fear.
People are facing a lot of struggles these days:
Globally: war, disease, famine, poverty, climate change…
Nationally: financial uncertainty, unemployment, moral vacuum…
Locally: energy costs, crime, dependencies, a winter that knows no end…
These all are big issues, and the temptation is to think that they can only be fixed by the people at the top—that if only we could get the leaders of nations, administrations, corporations together, then we could get things settled, then everything would be fine.
Our daughter, Rachel, just spent three weeks in Cairo, Egypt. She had a wonderful trip, even though it was during an outbreak of hostilities between Israel and the Palestinians. Our advice to her was to stay safe and be smart.
It threw me back to 1977 when I was a college student on a month-long class to Israel and Greece. It was only four years after the Yom Kippur War between Israel and all its Arab neighbors, so the peace was still fragile.
Needless to say, I was both amazed and delighted when the very next year, President Jimmy Carter convinced Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Menachem Begin of Israel to meet one-to-one and fashion an agreement for peace. Do you remember that? Those three men shook hands, were nominated for Nobel prizes, and created a sense of hope that things would change…but, as the saying goes, the more things change, the more they stay the same.
Fortunately, God has a history of thinking outside the box, is not caught up in the idea that it’s best to work through the people in charge. In fact, God seems to take special delight in working heaven’s will for life through the ordinary people of this planet.
When the cries of the Israelite slaves in Egypt reached the ears of heaven’s host, did God choose an honorable commander to lead them to freedom? No, but Moses—a self-conscious speaker and a fugitive from the law.
When Israel needed a hero to fight the Philistine giant Goliath, did God call on an experienced warrior to prevail? No, but a shepherd boy named David.
When the time came for the whole world to receive heaven’s holiest hope, did God engage the help of a mighty king or queen? No, but a frightened young woman, and her bewildered, betrothed boyfriend.
And that brings us back to our gospel lesson. Think of the people who came to see Jesus…we’re told in verse 34 that he cured many who were sick…and cast out many demons—but many does not mean all…
Why not? Why didn’t Jesus cure all who were sick or possessed? What was more important than the hands-on work he was doing?
I think that Jesus never intended to bring us a bail-out, a fix-it-up for a broken-down-world, a panacea for all our problems, a creation-wide cure for our world-wide woes. Instead, he does something much more meaningful, infinitely more productive, and far-and-away more fruitful.
By living the crux of the very parables he will teach, Jesus incites, inspires, invites us all into God’s quiet commotion. Like a little yeast in some ordinary flour, or a pinch of salt in a recipe that’s bland, the Lord
– calls a few followers here
– sends out two disciples there
– heals one woman, one man, one child at a time…and off they go to tell what they know to those who know and love them. Jesus is about building relationships between people and our God.
A recent National Public Radio broadcast featured two ordinary people who have connected in an extraordinary way. It’s the story of an Israeli and a Palestinian—two men separated by religions and cultures and borders and hate-filled histories, yet, who for the past year, have been communicating with each other through e-mail. The Israeli calls himself Hope Man while the Palestinian goes by Peace Man. They are not leaders of their nations, they are not people of power, they are, in fact, powerless to stop the bloodshed and the hate…but they are able to communicate with each other, to connect with one another—and here’s the result. Says one about the other, I think that over time, we've really become friends, and there is full and complete trust. I trust him with my life and, I think, vice versa.
The Lord of Life wants ordinary people like you and me to do both parts of Jesus’ quiet commotion well:
– to pray to and praise God, and
– to love, serve, and help each other help ourselves and our neighbors as together we bless this wonderful world in which we live. Amen.
Pastor Scott Fuller