'Everyone is searching for you'
Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany
February 8, 2009
Mark 1:29-39
When I was in high school, one of my teachers earned his doctorate at Vanderbilt. I remember asking him if that meant he was going to be leaving the halls of our high school for more ivy-covered halls. But he said he had no intention of leaving to teach at the university level.
He told me that, yes, his degree might open a door at one college or another, but that he already was teaching the students he wanted to teach. He said, “Students from my class go on to study at Harvard, MIT, Vanderbilt and more – and I have the opportunity to teach them right here.”
I’ve remembered that conversation all these years. At the time, we couldn’t believe that someone who could teach at a university would teach at a high school. One was clearly better than the other in our eyes.
If that didn’t convince me of how wrong I was in looking at the world, I got another lesson a few years later. I and a few others from my college were working as interns at a newspaper. One of the reporters there was ancient – he was in his 40s at least – and we couldn’t figure him out. The idea we’d learned was that you start as a reporter and then work your way up the editorial ranks, ending up as someone who told reporters what to do.
Someone who was still reporting at his advanced, we figured, must be something of a washout and none of us ever took time to learn much from him. And then a couple of years later, we were surprised at the news that he had won the Pulitzer Prize for reporting.
I like to think that I’ve learned a few things since those days. Things about what is important and the decisions we make. As youngsters, we were indoctrinated into the idea of hierarchy – that there’s a bottom to start at and a height to be reached, and those who ended up somewhere in the middle simply hadn’t worked hard enough or weren’t smart enough or had some other irredeemable flaw. You could measure success in job titles and college degrees and hefty salaries.
Well, all you have to do is read the newspaper or look at Wall Street to realize that this measure of so-called success doesn’t make any sense now. And, of course, it didn’t make any sense then.
What I did not pick up on back then was the subtlety of the lesson – not just that there are many measures of so-called success, but that there are many decisions to make along our paths. That life is filled with forks in the road and that some folks are better than others at choosing which path to take. Folks who see the value in the here rather than in the mysterious there, in the familiar rather than the exotic.
It may be strange to think of Jesus being in this position. But he was – and this is part of the mystery of Jesus Christ. In his divine self, as the Son of God, he always heard the voice of God and acted according to the will of his Father. But at the same time, in his human self, he made day-to-day decisions as a human among humans. These decisions often puzzled his followers.
Why did he go where he did? Why did he do the things he did?
There were many more perplexing things in his ministry – he called outcasts as disciples, he healed Samaritans, he heading straight to his death in Jerusalem – but in today’s story there is a small, strange element worth looking at.
But let’s start at the beginning. He leaves the synagogue and goes to the home of his friends – I’ve visited what’s believed to be Andrew and Simon Peter’s home, and it's only steps away from the ruins of a large synagogue.
After service here at St. Luke's, I’ve been known to go home for a nap. But Jesus wasn’t going to his friend’s home to put up his feet. Indeed, after his teaching at the synagogue, Jesus was going out to do his real work.
In this little stone house waited Simon Peter’s mother-in-law, lying in bed with a fever. This is what Jesus had come to do. To heal the sick, to show them the power of faith. He reached out his hand, he lifted her up, and she was healed.
And then she did something. When the fever left her, she began to wait on them. His ministry to her enabled her to begin a ministry of her own. She was healed and she immediately began to serve her Lord.
Word spreads fast when something like that happens. By nightfall, Jesus was besieged by those seeking healing. Many were possessed not only by fevers, but also with demons. And Jesus cast those demons out – demons who recognized Jesus, demons controlled and silenced by the Lord.
As I said, he was besieged. The Gospel says the whole city was gathered around the door. Jesus was suddenly famous – a stranger who could cast out demons, heal the sick, and preach with authority.
Fame comes so early in his ministry – surely if he were to stay here in this house by this synagogue in this town, then they would continue to come. His fame would be such that not just the city would come to his door, the whole country would come … the whole world.
So how does Jesus respond? He goes to pray. Before morning, gets up and finds a quiet place all alone. As the Gospels make clear, it was his custom to go off and pray alone whenever he could, especially when he was pressed upon by the crowds.
That part about praying alone I understand. But the next thing is what is peculiar about this story, something that comes up time and again in Scripture. He leaves. Jesus just up and leaves.
The disciples say, “Everyone is searching for you.” And he says, “Let us go on.” He does not say, “Then bring them to me. Let the crowds come to me.” No. Instead, he says, “Let us go on.”
This decision raises several issues that we face in Scripture. One issue is the need to spread the Gospel far and wide – Jesus does say he needs to proclaim the message in other towns. Another is the paradoxical secretive nature of Jesus’ plans for his mission – he was known to tell those he healed to keep it a secret.
But what interests me today is his reluctance to be surrounded by the crowds, refusing to stay in place and let the world come to him. Refusing to bask in the glory of the fame grew with every healing and every miracle.
Instead, he would push on, to new towns, to new people, to preach and heal in places where he was unknown, where he had no fame. In places that he would leave just as quickly.
We know that Jesus had been tempted before in the wilderness. And he told the tempter that he didn’t want glory, he didn’t want power, he didn’t want all the kingdoms of the world. Not for himself, for he eventually would win their inhabitants for the Kingdom of God, but then only after his crucifixion.
I cannot think that Jesus was tempted only the once. You and I are tempted in this life. And you know that you’re not tempted only once – you resist temptation today and it comes back tomorrow. You know how it is … turn down dessert tonight and someone’s already baking a pie for tomorrow.
Jesus was human. Divine, yes, but human also. And the crowds came to him. The whole city came to his door. And there stood Jesus at a fork in his road. Temptation on one side – a big name, many followers, fame. And on the other side? A lonely road. Away from those who admire him. Into towns where no one knows him, where the work will be hard and where many are ready to do him harm.
One choice is appealing to the typical man. The other is unappealing, in fact almost unthinkable. But we know what Jesus decided. And I suspect he made that decision every day, perhaps every hour.
It’s a hard lesson for many of us, who may long for recognition and perhaps just a taste of fame. To swim in the big pond instead of being a fish of any size in a small pond.
But think what happened with Simon Peter’s mother. She rose and immediately served her Lord. His gift would be remembered and passed on for generations through the work of that woman, who now had the gift of service. And this would be repeated over and over.
I think of my teacher and my reporter colleague and so many others who choose every day to labor out of the limelight, in the small towns and schools and, yes, even churches. Without romanticizing it, I do think that they made the sort of decision that Jesus made.
To prayerfully decide in the favor of others over selves, in favor of service over ambition. And we are asked to prayerfully decide every day, in favor of Christ over … well, in favor of Christ over everything else.
Amen.
February 8, 2009
Mark 1:29-39
When I was in high school, one of my teachers earned his doctorate at Vanderbilt. I remember asking him if that meant he was going to be leaving the halls of our high school for more ivy-covered halls. But he said he had no intention of leaving to teach at the university level.
He told me that, yes, his degree might open a door at one college or another, but that he already was teaching the students he wanted to teach. He said, “Students from my class go on to study at Harvard, MIT, Vanderbilt and more – and I have the opportunity to teach them right here.”
I’ve remembered that conversation all these years. At the time, we couldn’t believe that someone who could teach at a university would teach at a high school. One was clearly better than the other in our eyes.
If that didn’t convince me of how wrong I was in looking at the world, I got another lesson a few years later. I and a few others from my college were working as interns at a newspaper. One of the reporters there was ancient – he was in his 40s at least – and we couldn’t figure him out. The idea we’d learned was that you start as a reporter and then work your way up the editorial ranks, ending up as someone who told reporters what to do.
Someone who was still reporting at his advanced, we figured, must be something of a washout and none of us ever took time to learn much from him. And then a couple of years later, we were surprised at the news that he had won the Pulitzer Prize for reporting.
I like to think that I’ve learned a few things since those days. Things about what is important and the decisions we make. As youngsters, we were indoctrinated into the idea of hierarchy – that there’s a bottom to start at and a height to be reached, and those who ended up somewhere in the middle simply hadn’t worked hard enough or weren’t smart enough or had some other irredeemable flaw. You could measure success in job titles and college degrees and hefty salaries.
Well, all you have to do is read the newspaper or look at Wall Street to realize that this measure of so-called success doesn’t make any sense now. And, of course, it didn’t make any sense then.
What I did not pick up on back then was the subtlety of the lesson – not just that there are many measures of so-called success, but that there are many decisions to make along our paths. That life is filled with forks in the road and that some folks are better than others at choosing which path to take. Folks who see the value in the here rather than in the mysterious there, in the familiar rather than the exotic.
It may be strange to think of Jesus being in this position. But he was – and this is part of the mystery of Jesus Christ. In his divine self, as the Son of God, he always heard the voice of God and acted according to the will of his Father. But at the same time, in his human self, he made day-to-day decisions as a human among humans. These decisions often puzzled his followers.
Why did he go where he did? Why did he do the things he did?
There were many more perplexing things in his ministry – he called outcasts as disciples, he healed Samaritans, he heading straight to his death in Jerusalem – but in today’s story there is a small, strange element worth looking at.
But let’s start at the beginning. He leaves the synagogue and goes to the home of his friends – I’ve visited what’s believed to be Andrew and Simon Peter’s home, and it's only steps away from the ruins of a large synagogue.
After service here at St. Luke's, I’ve been known to go home for a nap. But Jesus wasn’t going to his friend’s home to put up his feet. Indeed, after his teaching at the synagogue, Jesus was going out to do his real work.
In this little stone house waited Simon Peter’s mother-in-law, lying in bed with a fever. This is what Jesus had come to do. To heal the sick, to show them the power of faith. He reached out his hand, he lifted her up, and she was healed.
And then she did something. When the fever left her, she began to wait on them. His ministry to her enabled her to begin a ministry of her own. She was healed and she immediately began to serve her Lord.
Word spreads fast when something like that happens. By nightfall, Jesus was besieged by those seeking healing. Many were possessed not only by fevers, but also with demons. And Jesus cast those demons out – demons who recognized Jesus, demons controlled and silenced by the Lord.
As I said, he was besieged. The Gospel says the whole city was gathered around the door. Jesus was suddenly famous – a stranger who could cast out demons, heal the sick, and preach with authority.
Fame comes so early in his ministry – surely if he were to stay here in this house by this synagogue in this town, then they would continue to come. His fame would be such that not just the city would come to his door, the whole country would come … the whole world.
So how does Jesus respond? He goes to pray. Before morning, gets up and finds a quiet place all alone. As the Gospels make clear, it was his custom to go off and pray alone whenever he could, especially when he was pressed upon by the crowds.
That part about praying alone I understand. But the next thing is what is peculiar about this story, something that comes up time and again in Scripture. He leaves. Jesus just up and leaves.
The disciples say, “Everyone is searching for you.” And he says, “Let us go on.” He does not say, “Then bring them to me. Let the crowds come to me.” No. Instead, he says, “Let us go on.”
This decision raises several issues that we face in Scripture. One issue is the need to spread the Gospel far and wide – Jesus does say he needs to proclaim the message in other towns. Another is the paradoxical secretive nature of Jesus’ plans for his mission – he was known to tell those he healed to keep it a secret.
But what interests me today is his reluctance to be surrounded by the crowds, refusing to stay in place and let the world come to him. Refusing to bask in the glory of the fame grew with every healing and every miracle.
Instead, he would push on, to new towns, to new people, to preach and heal in places where he was unknown, where he had no fame. In places that he would leave just as quickly.
We know that Jesus had been tempted before in the wilderness. And he told the tempter that he didn’t want glory, he didn’t want power, he didn’t want all the kingdoms of the world. Not for himself, for he eventually would win their inhabitants for the Kingdom of God, but then only after his crucifixion.
I cannot think that Jesus was tempted only the once. You and I are tempted in this life. And you know that you’re not tempted only once – you resist temptation today and it comes back tomorrow. You know how it is … turn down dessert tonight and someone’s already baking a pie for tomorrow.
Jesus was human. Divine, yes, but human also. And the crowds came to him. The whole city came to his door. And there stood Jesus at a fork in his road. Temptation on one side – a big name, many followers, fame. And on the other side? A lonely road. Away from those who admire him. Into towns where no one knows him, where the work will be hard and where many are ready to do him harm.
One choice is appealing to the typical man. The other is unappealing, in fact almost unthinkable. But we know what Jesus decided. And I suspect he made that decision every day, perhaps every hour.
It’s a hard lesson for many of us, who may long for recognition and perhaps just a taste of fame. To swim in the big pond instead of being a fish of any size in a small pond.
But think what happened with Simon Peter’s mother. She rose and immediately served her Lord. His gift would be remembered and passed on for generations through the work of that woman, who now had the gift of service. And this would be repeated over and over.
I think of my teacher and my reporter colleague and so many others who choose every day to labor out of the limelight, in the small towns and schools and, yes, even churches. Without romanticizing it, I do think that they made the sort of decision that Jesus made.
To prayerfully decide in the favor of others over selves, in favor of service over ambition. And we are asked to prayerfully decide every day, in favor of Christ over … well, in favor of Christ over everything else.
Amen.
posted by Michael+ at 12:08 PM
<< Home