Only Jesus

 

Sunday, February 22^nd, 2009

Last Epiphany / Transfiguration B

Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA

Mark 9:2-10

Theme: The centrality of Jesus – his Lordship

 

“² Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, ³and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them. ⁴And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus. ⁵Then Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” ⁶He did not know what to say, for they were terrified. ⁷Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice, “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!”⁸Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus.

⁹As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead. ¹⁰So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead could mean.”

 

The transfiguration 

 

Even the naming of it has an otherworldly feel to it.  It is in the same league as the resurrection and the ascension.  It is one of the events in the life of Jesus that we struggle with, not necessarily on the level of faith, but as an event that speaks to that element of the Gospel story with which we naturally – and I mean that in the fullest sense of the word – struggle to come to terms with. 

 

Seeing someone transformed like Jesus was that day is not something we can associate with as an everyday occurrence.  We don’t commonly run into people whose face shines like the sun and whose robe turns to a white such as no one on earth could bleach, despite the claims of any number of daytime television show sponsors. 

Whether it was an actual physical occurrence, supported by details in the telling, such as the six days specified at the beginning, the names of the disciples involved, and the emphasis on solitude and the place, or whether it was a vision, suggested by the use of the verb ‘appeared’, scholars will tell us that the transfiguration served many purposes: to underscore the divine nature of Christ, to foreshadow his resurrection and ascension, to prepare his disciples to understand – in retrospect, perhaps – just who Jesus was.  To, through the appearance of Moses and Elijah beside him, along with the voice of God from the cloud in the sky, establish a clear continuity between the prophets of old, represented by Elijah; and the Law, represented by Moses, and the present Messiah – to link the Hebrew Scriptures with the current reality being lived in that day – and by his followers, who were reading and receiving this Gospel.  

 

They may all be valid and accurate assessments of what the transfiguration was – why and how it happened, and what purpose it served.  But ultimately, we have to bring the events of scripture in to a point where we can wrap our heads around them.  

 

So we quickly arrive at the question:  How does the transfiguration affect me, here, now, today?  Put another way, and this may be the preferable one, since the focus is shifted away from US – after all, WE are not the focus of the message, though we DO receive it, we are simply here to CONVEY it… the FOCUS of the message is and always will be CHRIST:  the question is better stated:  How do WE respond to the transfiguration?  It is a slight difference, but I believe a critical one, which makes Jesus the focus of our thought.

 

The gospel writer helps us in that sense through how the passage says the disciples who were with Jesus responded in the immediate aftermath:  Peter blurts out what seems to be the first thing that came to mind (that’s SO unlike him, isn’t it??):  “Here’s an idea!  We’ve just experienced this incredible thing, let’s put up three buildings – one for each of you three – Elijah over here, Moses over there, and Jesus, who, by the way >>I<<>This is great!”  Mark adds a fairly rare editorial comment here:  “he did not know what to say, for they were terrified.”   

 

How familiar is that?  We get into a situation where we are scared, or uncomfortable, uneasy, or unsure of how to proceed.  What is generally our first response?  We fill the emptiness with words, regardless of whether or not those words add anything of value to the experience.  It would seem to be an ingrained response.  We find refuge in words.  Words can provide comfort in their familiar sounds when we are surrounded by an unfamiliar and discomforting event or experience, when we are confronted with a situation with which we are at a total loss as to how to “best” respond.   

 

Peter’s response is one with which we can all identify.  We’ve all been in those situations.  Even going beyond the ‘nervous, knee-jerk reaction’ of saying something, ANYTHING just to fill the void, and going to the place where we examine his suggestion on it’s merit, and understand that it COULD be putting words to his – and our – deepest yearnings – to be in the presence of Christ – in the presence of the divine one and to just simply ABSORB that in and of itself… that longing to simply BE … speaks beyond our need for action and TO our need for substance. 

 

We can be comforted by the fact that in his suggestion, we can see that Peter and those disciples who were closest to Jesus, his ‘inner circle’ of friends, who spent the most quality time with him, were, even at this late date, still learning who Jesus was.  So we don’t lose heart.  We are reminded that it can take us a lifetime to get to know someone fully.  It is no different with getting to know Jesus. 

 

What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton? 

 

It is a fairly simple proposition.  Here we read where the disciples caught a glimpse of the fullness of Christ – his divine nature combined with his earthly perfect nature.  And after that walked back down off the mountain with Jesus again telling them to tell no one about what they saw until they understood what it MEANT. 

 

The call of Christ is not to dwell on those mountaintops where we may well BE able to commune with the Holy Spirit and great figures of our faith history, but to come back down off the mountain, back among the dwelling places of men and women just like us, people who struggle every day with the same issues and worries that we do, who share the same joys and sorrows, who have some of the same hopes and dreams, and to point them to the one who would transform their lives, their hopes, their dreams into an existence of abundant life … one where, even though we DO struggle with similar issues, we know on a much deeper level, in a much more profound way, that we serve a risen, glorious Lord, who is more than able to transfigure us daily into HIS presence in the world.         

          

Let’s pray.  

Made Clean

 

Sunday, February 15^th, 2009

Epiphany 6B

Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA

Mark 1:40-45

Theme: Jesus’ Redeeming Action – in History and in Our Lives

 

“⁴⁰ A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, ‘If you choose, you can make me clean.’ ⁴¹Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, ‘I do choose. Be made clean!’ ⁴²Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean. ⁴³After sternly warning him he sent him away at once, ⁴⁴saying to him, ‘See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.’ ⁴⁵But he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word, so that Jesus could no longer go into a town openly, but stayed out in the country; and people came to him from every quarter.”

 

It would seem to be a straightforward miraculous healing story from the life of Christ.  Jesus is out and about, a leper comes up to him and pleads with him to be healed, and Jesus does just that.  It is nothing surprising to us, since we know Jesus to be compassionate and caring, and willing to ‘make all things new.’

 

There are a couple of things about the story that are not readily apparent to us as twenty-first century readers, but that would likely jump out at the folks who read it or heard it read for the first time. 

 

The first is that Jesus actually touched a “leper.”  As you might remember, the term used then and which is translated as ‘leprosy’ could encompass any number of skin conditions and ailments, not just the one associated with the term today – which is more specifically named Hansen’s Disease.  Someone stricken with any of these forms of ‘leprosy’ was banished from interacting with society in general, sent away to live outside their given village or town or city, and forbidden from coming into contact with anyone that was NOT stricken with a similar ailment.  The fact that Jesus touched the man communicated in a dramatic way that he was identifying with what would be the most wretched outcasts of society.  In daring to come in physical contact with a leper, he was making HIMSELF unclean – but in the process, he was doing something greater and more powerful – he was not simply healing the man, he was making him CLEAN in the ritualistic sense as well. 

 

What would be somewhat perplexing to us TODAY would be his statement following the healing:  he ‘sternly warns’ the former leper to tell no one of what has happened, but to go show himself to the priest first, then offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving to God.

 

 

Wouldn’t it be nicer if Jesus had told the man to go greet his family first, to hug his mother or his wife and children, show them that he was healed, and THEN to go to the Priest?  It would certainly give us a much warmer, fuzzier feeling about the whole story, wouldn’t it?

 

When we read in the text that Jesus ‘sternly warned’ the man, we could easily envision him putting on his serious face, and intently saying whatever it was, maybe even shaking his finger a little bit.  But the term actually denotes a much stronger emotion – to the point of anger or even violent displeasure.  It gives us perhaps a little more insight into the interaction going on between the two.  It could even be an indicator of Jesus’ recognition of the man’s character… even though he was moved with compassion to heal him, there were still some changes that needed to happen in that man’s life, and he needed a swift kick in the pants to get started on them.  As it turns out, for all the stern warning he gave, it didn’t work. And Mark makes note of it. 

 

What did the man do?  He did what any one of us would have done.  He ran out and started telling everyone and their BROTHER what Jesus had done for him! 

 

It is interesting that in the course of the story, Jesus and the leper sort of switch places.  The leper is at first an outcast.  Jesus is not.  Jesus heals the leper, and in doing that gives him back his home, his family, his life.  What does the leper do for Jesus?  He forces him to remain out in the country, granted, for radically different reasons – too popular, too likely to be mobbed if he were to venture into any center of population, so he is essentially banished from a normal existence by this act of compassion.    

 

We can accept the story at face value, seeing it as just an illustration of Christ’s divinity, God’s miraculous healing power at work through him, and leave it at that.  After all, Jesus ministry WAS a big deal –  he WAS, after all, GOD INCARNATE.  People were going to find out just who he was sooner or later, or they were at least going to THINK they knew who he was, and of COURSE it was going to cause an uproar.  THIS is as good a time as any for that to happen.        

 

We can nod in understanding of that statement fairly readily today, but there is a question that needs to be asked in light of the event and in the reading of the Gospel:  Why is the story here?  What purpose is it serving being placed just so, after traveling throughout Galilee, and before being cornered at home in Capernaum – and being swamped there, blocked in by the crowd, and we have the healing of the paralytic who was lowered through the roof by his friends. 

 

If we could turn just a few verses further back – back to verse 34: 

 

And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him. 

                   

There is a recurring theme in the Gospel of Mark.  Scholars call it “The Messianic Secret” – there are multiple instances where Jesus tells people – not just his disciples, but people he has healed or had some form of contact with, who on some level recognize who he is and want to proclaim it, usually at the top of their lungs, just as this leper did, but whom Jesus commands to tell no one.  We can be find examples in Matthew as well as in Luke, but they are significantly fewer.  In the Gospel according to Mark, it is a unifying theme throughout the telling of the Gospel. 

 

There is a sense in Mark that the further you get into the story, the more involved you become, the more you get to know Jesus, the more you get to KNOW Jesus.  It is a growing thing.  Just as in any relationship.  The longer you spend time with someone, the more you get to know them; their quirks, their habits, their idiosyncrasies.  It is a similar situation with Jesus in Mark.  You catch glimpses of who he is, or what he’s about, as you read through the things that happen as he moves through his public ministry, but it isn’t until the last week of his life that we are made fully and completely aware of who Christ is.  And then we are left to do with that knowledge whatever it is God has for US to do.  Mark is singularly different at his conclusion.  The tomb is empty, and the women ‘left the tomb and fled, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.’  That is the end of the Gospel in the oldest manuscripts that have been found to date.  There is, of course, more to the Gospel as we have it now, an additional eleven verses that draw a picture that is more in accord with the other Gospel narratives of the resurrection. 

 

What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?

 

It is a tantalizing question.  What if the short version was the original, and what if it was left at that? 

 

Let’s think for a minute what the people who first heard this Gospel would have responded if the story had ended there.  I know how I sometimes react when a particularly suspenseful program comes to a cliffhanger point and then the dreaded words appear onscreen:  “to be continued” and it usually involves yelling at the television.

 

I can only imagine being in a congregation, sitting and listening to Aquila or Priscilla read the Gospel to me, and I edge closer and closer to the edge of the bench that I’m sitting on, and then the story takes that unbelievable turn, where the Messiah is beaten and crucified and DIES and is buried, and then the women come to the tomb three days later to finish dressing the body, and it’s not there! And they run away and that’s the end???  No WAY!!!

 

So I rush up to Aquila and grab him by the front of his robe and yell in his face “THEN WHAT HAPPENED???!!!” 

 

And he looks at me and smiles this incredible, knowing, gentle smile, and he says “sit down, let me tell you the rest of the story.”    

 

And that’s where we come in.  That’s where WE get to tell the rest of the story, because the rest of the story is the one that God writes with OUR lives – how God through Christ has made US clean. 

 

What better way to tell people today about what God is doing today than through the lives of people living today?     

          

Let’s pray.  

Astounded

 

Sunday, February 1^st, 2009

Epiphany 4B

Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA

Mark 1:21-28

Theme: Christ’s authority

 

“²¹They went to Capernaum; and when the Sabbath came, he entered the synagogue and taught. ²²They were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes. ²³Just then there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit, ²⁴and he cried out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.”²⁵But Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Be silent, and come out of him!”²⁶And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying with a loud voice, came out of him. ²⁷They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, “What is this? A new teaching—with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.” ²⁸At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.”

 

I began to fall asleep in church as a young boy, probably from the time I was a baby.  At first, it was a natural thing, something to be expected in one so young.  I would fuss a little, momma would give me a bottle or a pacifier, and I’d suck on it for a few minutes and then be gone for a good half hour at least, if not longer. 

 

As I got older, I’d last longer.  But usually about ten or fifteen minutes into the sermon I’d be gone.  I sat under the preaching of … probably at least a good dozen pastors.  Many more if you count guest speakers and evangelists, visiting missionaries and others. 

 

But I remember when it started to change. I remember once waking up during the preaching, having been laying on the pew with my head in my mother’s lap, and something in me was disappointed that I’d missed some of what was being said.  I must have been around ten or so. 

 

But the real breaking point came when I began to actually engage with what was being said.  It wasn’t all the time, but it began to happen more and more frequently.  I would still occasionally nod off, if I was particularly tired, or the topic was especially uninteresting to me.  It’s just the nature of the thing. 

 

So when I was reading in the passage this morning, especially where the contrast is made between the way Jesus was teaching as compared to ‘the scribes’ … to be honest, my heart went out to the scribes.  I can’t imagine having to bring the lesson on the Sabbath after Jesus made his debut. 

 

But the message of Mark is not about feeling sorry for a secondary character.  The message of Mark is to introduce his readers to the Messiah, and the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  And in this passage, he does that in spades. 

 

I remember the first time I was changed by what a preacher said.  Well, in retrospect, it wasn’t the preacher, exactly, because I don’t remember his exact words, or the text.  What I remember was what happened at the end of the service.  I understood that I needed Christ as my savior, and wanted him as my Lord, and I gave my life to Christ.  What I’ve come to understand from that experience is that the Holy Spirit was at work on me, and that changed me.  That was the right time and place for me to become a follower of Christ. 

 

Mark’s description of the events that took place in that synagogue are vivid, to say the least.  But he doesn’t fill his telling with details we find in other gospels – he doesn’t quote the passage that Jesus read from when he stood up, he doesn’t tell what Jesus taught.  What he DOES talk about is the reaction, the response from the people gathered in the synagogue. 

 

“²²They were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.”       

 

The word translated ‘astounded’ here is the same word used to describe the reaction of Mary and Joseph when they found Jesus teaching in the temple at the age of twelve, which is translated as “astonished” in the Gospel of Luke, verse 48.  I tried to put myself into each of those two situations … in the first, it is the emotion felt by a mother and father after three days of frantic searching for a son they thought they may have lost.  In this situation, it is describing the reaction of a congregation on hearing their faith taught, not as a matter of wrote memorization, or dry reading from ancient scrolls, but as a living thing – something relevant and pertinent and applicable to their daily living.  In other words, what was astounding to both Mary and Joseph AND to the men who heard Jesus teach that morning was the fact that what had for most of their lives been something that was simply a duty, something that HAD to be done, because you were one of the tribes of Israel, something that could put them to sleep just as easily as a lullaby had become a call to … worship, a transformative power to be reckoned with.

 

And the folks in the synagogue were confronted with just who it was that was teaching them right there on the spot. 

 

There is a whole separate message in the fact that there was a man possessed of an unclean spirit in the congregation, but we will hold that thought for later date. 

 

What is important for now is to realize that as a narrative element, this is pivotal.  Jesus teaches, and we are faced with our sinfulness, our own demons.  Some of the most traumatic events in my life have been when God’s word has been spoken to me in the context of a worship service, and I have been faced with something that I needed to change, to repent of, or to DO, to BE. 

 

This man’s cry is a cry of fear – fear of being changed, fear of ending a familiar surrounding.  The demonic spirit that was in him had become accustomed to the status quo – to the way things were, and here comes Jesus, totally disrupting the comfortable existence it was enjoying. 

 

If you are looking for an early version of the Gospel in a nutshell, I think this may be it:   

          

“What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.”

 

It is more questions than answers, and in the end, we are only confessing who Jesus is – the Holy One of God. 

 

In his first question, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?”  We are asking out of our sorrow, our grief, our despair; “what are you going to do with us, Jesus?”  it is a question born out of anxiety about where we will end up after Jesus takes us out of that misery, that grief and sorrow; because while it may be a terrible, lonely, sad existence, it is at least a familiar one.  And we do most definitely prefer the familiar and comfortable than the unfamiliar and uncomfortable, don’t we? 

“Have you come to destroy us?”, the second question, is one that might resonate with those of us who have been confronted with what the English poet Francis Thompson called the Hound of Heaven – Jesus as a relentless, persistent, unyielding hound … who is ruthless in paring away from us that which would weigh us down, distract, even destroy us.  Because it can, truly, feel like we are being destroyed, when we are being taken through the purifying fires of holiness, when we are struggling with coming to grips with living for someone other than ourselves, when we are learning to give EVERYTHING up for the sake of Christ.

 

The final proclamation becomes confession when we read it.  We confess that Jesus is indeed the Holy One of God. 

 

Snapping back into the context of the story, Jesus demonstrates with just a few words that the authority that he brought to his teaching style carries over into his deeds.  The old adage “Those who can’t do, teach” does NOT apply here.  Jesus not only talked the talk, but he walked the walk. 

 

In this era of movies and television shows that depict demonic possessions, exorcisms, and all things scary, to read the next line is to conjure up images from any or all of those scenes in the movies where someone is being released from the grip of that which possesses them – convulsions, screaming, writhing in agony on the floor, maybe even a head spinning – after Jesus has commanded the evil spirit to come out of him. 

 

You see, it’s never easy to let go of our demons.  They have insinuated themselves so far into every area of our lives that we don’t realize how painful their absence will be, because we have begun to believe their lie that tells us that THEIR life IS our life.  That their presence means that we ARE alive, when in fact, it is the opposite that is true. 

 

What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton? 

 

What is it that we are possessed by?  Do we quietly go about our weeks and come Sunday, we quietly make our way here, expecting everything to continue just as it was when we walked in this morning?  That is a form of possession.  It is the illusion of tranquility, of predictability.  It is a lie that tells us our lives have no impact, and that no other lives have an impact on us, that we can go about our regular, daily existence and not touch or be touched by anyone or anything. 

 

God in Christ is calling us to understand that we do not live in a vacuum; that we have impact, that we have the potential to make a difference in the world we live in – even a profound difference – and all we have to do is trust him to guide us, to change us, to remake us as his own. 

 

And I think it is safe to say, we will be astounded at the results.                 

 

Let’s pray.