Epiphany 5
Isaiah 40:21-31
Mark 1:29-39
(prayer)
A few weeks ago, I shared the scripture story of Jesus by the lakeshore inviting James, John, Andrew and Simon to join him in a new kind of fishing – the catching of people. In Mark chapter one, we can read that they all immediately left their fishing nets to follow Jesus. Sometimes, we can hear that as if these people completely turned their backs on their old lives; cut all ties with work and friends and family and put every gram of the focus on Jesus. That kind of commitment is extraordinary and, frankly, beyond what most (if not all of us) feel we might be capable of. It’s the level of involvement and isolation that we fear as we look at how some people have been drawn into cults. I doubt that this is the image we hope to see in relation to Jesus and his disciples – that they were like the crazy cults of our day: shut out all association with your life before and only focus on the new life before you.
Fortunately, our gospel record is clear that this is not how things were. Sure Simon and the others saw something in Jesus that drew them into a significant re-focusing of their lives, but it did not require them to leave everything behind with those nets on the first day.
The setting of our reading from Mark today is Simon and Andrew’s home in Capernaum. It was a Saturday. Earlier that day, Jesus and his new disciples had attended the service at the local synagogue. Jesus had amazed the crowds there with his knowledge and the confidence with which he taught. People were amazed at how he spoke with such authority.
After all that was done, they retreated to Andrew and Simon’s home.
So, clearly, these two fishermen were still connected to their family, even if they weren’t going to out in the boat every day. Verse 30 gives us a nice glimpse into the life of Simon Peter. He was married and his mother-in-law lived with him and his extended family. She is under the weather that Saturday (in bed with a fever the text says). Jesus goes to her, helps her out of bed and suddenly she feels better. For women of that day, unfortunately, that meant that she would need to attend to the mid-day Sabbath meal and see to the affairs of the household. In her illness, she was separated from her involvement in her home and her community. Jesus restored, not only her wellness but, her identity and dignity as a person in her community.
[I hope that Jesus’ motivation was not simply that they wanted her to serve them (as the text says she did). As the parent of a couple of teenagers, I know what it is like to be asked to serve those late evening hunger needs of my boys, regardless of how I or Patti might be feeling. “Umm, could you make me a pot of macaroni?” Believe me, “Oh not tonight, I’m not feeling great” is seldom a good enough excuse. I hope that wasn’t why Jesus healed Simon’s mother-in-law: to just get up make the boys something to eat.]
Earlier that day, Jesus had spoken with remarkable authority. It gained him an instant reputation that almost immediately began to spread throughout the region. In the middle of the day, Jesus actions showed a measure of this authority as he abated his host’s fever. As evening came, when the Sabbath was formally over, people flocked to where Jesus was and he brought comfort and wellness into their lives. Many of the diseases that people had were such that they would be required to be isolated from the community. Their ability to be fully involved was limited because of their illness of body or mind. Jesus restored, not only their wellness but, their identity and dignity as people of their community.
The next day, when Simon and the other awoke they realized that Jesus wasn’t in the house. He had gotten up early to think and pray on his own. I imagine his thoughts dwelling on the day before – the synagogue teaching, the needs of the sick. Jesus’ conclusion? – they needed to take a road trip and do this same kind of thing elsewhere. Jesus new travelling ministry would be two-fold: teaching: to restore the hearts and minds of people and acting: to restore them to wellness and community.
“That is what I came out to do?”
We can reasonably assume that Simon’s home in Capernaum was their home base. It was the hub, where they returned to renew and restore from the various excursions into the neighbouring towns.
//
I am pleased that the invitation to follow Jesus was not one that required or expected the disciples to leave everything else behind. I know this seem contrary other gospel passages where the text says to drop everything and follow: “let the dead bury the dead” and “give it all away and come”. The subtle consistency is that in those cases the people Jesus was talking to were unwilling to make any effort to re-focus. Remember, the rich young didn’t want to change anything about his life; he went away depressed when Jesus challenged him to be generous.
This new faithful exploration was a complement to the life they were leading before, not a replacement for it. What they found was that there was room in their lives for the glimpse of the divine that was in their midst in Jesus. And they were so very fortunate that, so often they caught much more than a glimpse.
//
As time has marched on since the first century, that isn’t always the case. Sometimes the divine can seem elusive.
//
Imagine a person who has been in a real funk lately - for a few weeks or more, feeling increasingly overwhelmed with a sense of dread and a lack of hope. Maybe you know how that feels.
//
This is a demanding time we live in: even normal day-to-day life. Expectations abound – professionally, personally, relationally. There can grow a time when the expectations seem to outweigh the possibilities. And that can create this trapping void where hope becomes but a distant, indistinguishable dot on the horizon.
Such a person might reasonably ask: What’s the point? Am I getting much bang for my buck out of life? Is this the limits of who I will be? Ironically, this kind of funk can have a person feeling both inadequate and unappreciated at the same time.
//
The Babylonian exile was a demoralizing time. They were not prepared for the life they were forced to have in Babylon. And...the people felt as if God no longer cared; that they had been abandoned; that clearly if their God had some power it was no match for the gods of the Babylonians. For centuries, the Temple had stood as the place where God was experienced. For many a theology had developed that it was the only place God could truly be found. Now that temple lay in ruins. Where was God now? Gone?
It is into this depressing mood that the prophet speaks.
O Lord my God,
when I in awesome wonder
consider all the works
thy hand hath made,
I see the stars,
I hear the mighty thunder,
thy power throughout
the universe displayed.
Then sings my soul,
my Saviour God, to thee,
How great thou art!
//
Have you not known? Have you not seen? God does not grow weary,
God’s understanding is boundless.
Just wait...God will renew our strength.
//
It’s the waiting that is hard.
The words are nice. It is meant to be comforting and assuring to say that we have company in the Spirit. A little later in this service, we will recite together the United Church Creed, with those marvellously hope-filled words – “We are not alone”. That is the promise in the words of the prophet.
Words sometimes seem like they are not enough. As we look around and focus on what is missing, on what is wrong with our situation – as we focus on our feelings of loneliness and abandonment, we are challenged to consider that God is not really so far away from us and our concerns.
In the exile, in the wilderness, sometimes all we find is that glimpse.
//
God’s presence is subtle – and it can be missed. The ‘still, small voice’ was how God spoke to the prophet Elijah (see 1st Kings 19) – still, small voice might even be too obvious: the NRSV translates that phrase with the oxymoronic words ‘the sound of sheer silence’. God is not going to heard or known or experienced over the noise and busyness of this life. God can only be heard and known and experienced in spite of all that chatter and distraction. The God to whom we sing “how great thou art” needs to be found in the quiet in the cracks between the noises of the rest of our existence.
Sometimes, we need to force open a crack to invite in the silence.
//
I am a hypocrite talking about this because I am as guilty as anyone could be for not making time and space for the sheer silent voice of God to be heard. There are not enough hours in the day. No matter how much I am able to accomplish, there can be disappointment, even condemnation that something was needed.
So, I am preaching for myself and to myself at least as much as I am offering these insights to you.
What has the prophet said to me (to you)?
Yes, even at our best, in our prime, we will run out of steam. Weariness is the expected result of a full life. But, God is not like us. God does not get weary or downhearted or spent. God is the ever-flowing stream – constantly able to kick start our renewal. When we are able to find that crack in life to let God in, God is there to be known. That’s the prophet’s promise.
It is similar to how Jesus chose to minister: to be where the need was, to be where inspiration and wellness and community renewal was needed.
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That is how Jesus started his active ministry.
The prophet’s words of hope, were the beginning of the exiled peoples restoration, long before they would make the journey across the wilderness back to Judah one day.
// [end]
Every new thing has a start.
For those of us desiring more hope and purpose and appreciation for this life – a starting point can be allowing that crack to invade the busyness: allowing us to begin to believe that we are not alone.
I am trying hard to make this happen more in my life. I think this is a good start. [prayer>>]
Let us pray:
Help me find a way to you O God, not so I can escape this life, but to be able to enjoy this life most abundantly. Amen.
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