There's a story in Mark 3, right at the beginning about a time when Jesus is asked to speak at a synagogue on the sabbath. The atmosphere was electric - can you imagine - JESUS delivering the message at your church. But in this case, the atmosphere was electric for all the wrong reasons. You see, the religious folks at the synagogue had taken the opportunity to try to trap Jesus in some kind of mistake so they could rid themselves of him. And they used this guy. They found this guy who had a shriveled up hand and they sat him right down in the front row. Now a guy with a shriveled hand should have been down in the front row - because Jesus is the healer - right? But these folks didn't care about that at all, they didn't care about the man at all, or his hand, or the mocking and abuse, the suffering and outcast life he had lived with this infirmity. They just wanted to make Jesus look bad.
And Jesus asks - is it right to give life or to kill - to heal or to harm? In other words, if I can help this guy and I don't I'm actually harm him. Which is keeping with the spirit of the loving living God who gave the sabbath? And no one answers. And Jesus is troubled - it says that he looked at them in anger deeply distressed at stubborn hearts.
When we gather for our worship services, do we come expecting to be transformed by the living, loving, healing, life changing Jesus? Do we pray bold prayers and expect God to act? Or do we come to pay attention to the music that was chosen and whether we like it or not or to check in on how the budget is going or how the latest fund raising project is going or to catch up on the idiot thing that the pastor is doing now? Do we come to be transformed by Jesus, or do we come with a stubborn heart that is unyielding to change? Does Jesus look around at our worship gatherings in anger, deeply distressed at our stubborn hearts?
The next time you prepare for worship - prepare your heart and mind for what you are going to receive without your preconceived notions of how it should be. Come with an attitude of needing to receive from God and needing to respond with songs of praise and thanksgiving. Come to worship expecting to be met by the living God and expecting to be changed. And just like the man in Mark 3, may you stretch out your hand and be fully restored. Amen.
Showing posts with label Gospel of Mark. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gospel of Mark. Show all posts
Friday, April 20, 2007
Monday, April 16, 2007
Organized Religion
I did a funeral today for a guy named Neal. Neal lived to be 90 years old, was a World War II vet, who enlisted early and came home late. He participated in five different beach landings in Africa, Sicily, Italy, and France. At one point when the allied army was stretched thin and unable to land replacements, this guy saw combat for nearly 400 straight days. By all accounts he was a respected father, member of the community, loving husband and all, but he never attended church. Said he believed in Jesus, knew God had to be real after all he'd been through in WW2, yet he didn't have a place for 'organized religion'. His wife attended church though, and put the kids through confirmation etc with his blessing.
By the way, a funny story, this guy was a little rough around the edges. The family had a parakeet, named Petey, who Neal was not fond of, so Neal would always say this one vulgar sentence to Petey.
Well Petey was a parakeet
And parakeets know how to talk after a while
So, the pastor of the church that Neal's family attended back in the day would over the course of the year make a visit to all his parishoners. And he and Neal had a fun relationship. I've got some guys in my church like this - their wives come to church, the husbands rarely do, but they're such fun guys you can't help but like them. So anyways one time this pastor is over to visit and its just him and Neal and Neal puts on a pot of coffee and they're talking when loudly from his corner of the room, Petey busts out and says:
"Petey is a beady-eyed son of a *****!"
The pastor turned around and looked and said, "Did he just say what I think he did?"
And Neal says, "Yes sir . . . And he certainly is for saying it while the pastor's in the house."
So anyways, this guy had no place for organized religion. And neither do I. And actually - neither did Jesus. There's this picture of Christianity out there that casts it as a bunch of hypocrites or holier than thous who are trying to control other people and their behavior by playing the God card. How did this picture come to be? Well, because in every age, people have used their position in churches to try to control other people and their behavior by playing the God card.
This is not a new phenomenon. In Mark 2, we read about Jesus healing a paralytic. Jesus says to him, "Your sins are forgiven." The teachers of the law reason in theri hearts (2:6) "who can forgives sins but God alone?"
Correct.
But they don't get it. They let their preconceived notion of what their religion is supposed to look like blind them from the truth. This happens day in and day out without fail in the Christian church. Why is it that we get so blind to these things? Maybe because we live such a pampered sheltered existence.
I mean, why is it that someone who has seen what Neal has seen can so easily cut through the smokescreen and find so little fulfillment in affiliation with a church? Probably because he was seen at the core of who he is what it means to live and to die and to place yourself fully at the mercy of your creator and know that whether you live or die tomorrow is in His hands.
But Jesus calls us to find out what it it like to be truly human, the way God intended, by following Jesus and learning to think, speak, and act like our teacher. In the mean time, we are called to love unconditionally and accept people and encourage them as they encourage us as we all grow to be more like Jesus. This is the picture of the community of faith that Jesus envisioned - a picture of the first believers.
I wonder if Neal had been able to find a church that had authentic interaction between people where people learned and grew in faith while being who they really were as they grew, I wonder if he would have made a better connection. I wonder if he could have found time and a place for that. That is what Jesus calls us to. Not organized religion full of pious people who all pretend they have it all together for a couple hours each week on a Sunday morning. Authentic community where we bear each other's burdens (Galatians 6), Jesus himself says he came to call sinners, not the (self) righteous (Mark 2:17).
Jesus loved hanging out with fun guys who were rough around the edges. Like Neal.
By the way, a funny story, this guy was a little rough around the edges. The family had a parakeet, named Petey, who Neal was not fond of, so Neal would always say this one vulgar sentence to Petey.
Well Petey was a parakeet
And parakeets know how to talk after a while
So, the pastor of the church that Neal's family attended back in the day would over the course of the year make a visit to all his parishoners. And he and Neal had a fun relationship. I've got some guys in my church like this - their wives come to church, the husbands rarely do, but they're such fun guys you can't help but like them. So anyways one time this pastor is over to visit and its just him and Neal and Neal puts on a pot of coffee and they're talking when loudly from his corner of the room, Petey busts out and says:
"Petey is a beady-eyed son of a *****!"
The pastor turned around and looked and said, "Did he just say what I think he did?"
And Neal says, "Yes sir . . . And he certainly is for saying it while the pastor's in the house."
So anyways, this guy had no place for organized religion. And neither do I. And actually - neither did Jesus. There's this picture of Christianity out there that casts it as a bunch of hypocrites or holier than thous who are trying to control other people and their behavior by playing the God card. How did this picture come to be? Well, because in every age, people have used their position in churches to try to control other people and their behavior by playing the God card.
This is not a new phenomenon. In Mark 2, we read about Jesus healing a paralytic. Jesus says to him, "Your sins are forgiven." The teachers of the law reason in theri hearts (2:6) "who can forgives sins but God alone?"
Correct.
But they don't get it. They let their preconceived notion of what their religion is supposed to look like blind them from the truth. This happens day in and day out without fail in the Christian church. Why is it that we get so blind to these things? Maybe because we live such a pampered sheltered existence.
I mean, why is it that someone who has seen what Neal has seen can so easily cut through the smokescreen and find so little fulfillment in affiliation with a church? Probably because he was seen at the core of who he is what it means to live and to die and to place yourself fully at the mercy of your creator and know that whether you live or die tomorrow is in His hands.
But Jesus calls us to find out what it it like to be truly human, the way God intended, by following Jesus and learning to think, speak, and act like our teacher. In the mean time, we are called to love unconditionally and accept people and encourage them as they encourage us as we all grow to be more like Jesus. This is the picture of the community of faith that Jesus envisioned - a picture of the first believers.
I wonder if Neal had been able to find a church that had authentic interaction between people where people learned and grew in faith while being who they really were as they grew, I wonder if he would have made a better connection. I wonder if he could have found time and a place for that. That is what Jesus calls us to. Not organized religion full of pious people who all pretend they have it all together for a couple hours each week on a Sunday morning. Authentic community where we bear each other's burdens (Galatians 6), Jesus himself says he came to call sinners, not the (self) righteous (Mark 2:17).
Jesus loved hanging out with fun guys who were rough around the edges. Like Neal.
Friday, April 13, 2007
The Beginning of the Gospel
"The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God." Mark 1:1
When you read the gospel account of Mark, you'll find that there is no story about Jesus being born, no account of the wise men from the East, no account of Jesus as a child. It simply states that this is the beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ. Then it moves to a scene of John the Baptist preaching "a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins." And then Jesus comes and is baptized and is tempted, and calls his first disciples and his first words in the gospel are "The time has come, the kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news." And as chapter one goes on you see ALL these people following him, astonished at the authority he brings, crowding in to be healed of all sorts of diseases, and Jesus simply moving on and on, "Let's go somewhere else - to the nearby villages", he says, "So I can preach there also. That is why I have come." (Mark 1:38)
Jesus says, "Repent!" and he can't keep the crowds away. Why is that? My experience is that people aren't really keen on hearing someone tell them to repent. The word has come to have a connotation of 'holier than thou-ness' and often the one being told to repent feels like its not anyone's place to tell him that. Thus - that message has become a difficult tool for the contemporary Christian to use. Because over time we (the church) have used that word in a manner that has been designed to strike fear in the hearts of the wayward, fear of eternal fire and brimstone. And while it is true that there is fire and brimstone, it doesn't look like Jesus is working from a position of fear in the gospels does it?
The word 'repent' means 'turn back' or 'turn away'. The message of the gospel is to turn away from what we thought life was about, what we thought defined success, what we thought it took to be right with God, and to find out the way through Jesus. Jesus said, "The kingdom is near." And people flocked to him. The message of the gospel is that the power of God and the goodwill of God is now immediately accessible to humanity through Jesus. THAT's what drove people do him. Sure, they experienced guilt or shame, but they were driven by, captivated by this good news - that the love of God was immediately accessible to them through Jesus. And that means forgiveness of sins. That means newness of life. That means that my life is an opportunity for me to be used by the hand of the transcendant God to make a difference in other people's lives, that they may come to know and experience this good news and experience it NOW.
Because the reality is that Jesus is alive and is enthroned as King of the Universe. Our message to people is to tell them that and invite them to reorder their lives around that understanding (also known as repenting) and to live lives as subjects and brothers of the king of the universe. All of the sudden life is not about me, because my brother, the king will provide for my needs. My life becomes about Him and helping others experience what I am experiencing. That the kingdom of God in near (it is upon us). It means that my heart is broken when I see people living in bondage in any way when the freedom of the kingdom of God is immediately available to them in Jesus.
Lord, may the life you give to me be used to further the spread of the good news that you are king and are reigning now. May we gladly and continually reorder our lives around who you are and what that means as we think, act, and speak like you. Because that is the beginning of the gospel. Amen.
When you read the gospel account of Mark, you'll find that there is no story about Jesus being born, no account of the wise men from the East, no account of Jesus as a child. It simply states that this is the beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ. Then it moves to a scene of John the Baptist preaching "a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins." And then Jesus comes and is baptized and is tempted, and calls his first disciples and his first words in the gospel are "The time has come, the kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news." And as chapter one goes on you see ALL these people following him, astonished at the authority he brings, crowding in to be healed of all sorts of diseases, and Jesus simply moving on and on, "Let's go somewhere else - to the nearby villages", he says, "So I can preach there also. That is why I have come." (Mark 1:38)
Jesus says, "Repent!" and he can't keep the crowds away. Why is that? My experience is that people aren't really keen on hearing someone tell them to repent. The word has come to have a connotation of 'holier than thou-ness' and often the one being told to repent feels like its not anyone's place to tell him that. Thus - that message has become a difficult tool for the contemporary Christian to use. Because over time we (the church) have used that word in a manner that has been designed to strike fear in the hearts of the wayward, fear of eternal fire and brimstone. And while it is true that there is fire and brimstone, it doesn't look like Jesus is working from a position of fear in the gospels does it?
The word 'repent' means 'turn back' or 'turn away'. The message of the gospel is to turn away from what we thought life was about, what we thought defined success, what we thought it took to be right with God, and to find out the way through Jesus. Jesus said, "The kingdom is near." And people flocked to him. The message of the gospel is that the power of God and the goodwill of God is now immediately accessible to humanity through Jesus. THAT's what drove people do him. Sure, they experienced guilt or shame, but they were driven by, captivated by this good news - that the love of God was immediately accessible to them through Jesus. And that means forgiveness of sins. That means newness of life. That means that my life is an opportunity for me to be used by the hand of the transcendant God to make a difference in other people's lives, that they may come to know and experience this good news and experience it NOW.
Because the reality is that Jesus is alive and is enthroned as King of the Universe. Our message to people is to tell them that and invite them to reorder their lives around that understanding (also known as repenting) and to live lives as subjects and brothers of the king of the universe. All of the sudden life is not about me, because my brother, the king will provide for my needs. My life becomes about Him and helping others experience what I am experiencing. That the kingdom of God in near (it is upon us). It means that my heart is broken when I see people living in bondage in any way when the freedom of the kingdom of God is immediately available to them in Jesus.
Lord, may the life you give to me be used to further the spread of the good news that you are king and are reigning now. May we gladly and continually reorder our lives around who you are and what that means as we think, act, and speak like you. Because that is the beginning of the gospel. Amen.
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