Embracing Amazement and Fear at the Same Time

Mark 10:32-34, The Message - Back on the road, they set out for Jerusalem. Jesus had a head start on them, and they were following, puzzled and not just a little afraid. He took the Twelve and began again to go over what to expect next. “Listen to me carefully. We’re on our way up to Jerusalem. When we get there, the Son of Man will be betrayed to the religious leaders and scholars. They will sentence him to death. Then they will hand him over to the Romans, who will mock and spit on him, give him the third degree, and kill him. After three days he will rise alive.”

 

                This is third time Jesus has given the disciples this prediction about His death.  The way in which Mark renders this prediction suggests that the disciples are finally beginning to believe that the prediction is true.  They were both amazed and afraid in response.  Jesus’s compassion and concern for them is seen as He seeks to prepare them as much as possible for what is going to happen.  This is what great leaders do and there is none greater than Jesus.

                I am reminded in this passage that fear and excitement can be present in the same moment.  I remember the months leading up to the time when I became a father.  I was excited about the possibility because I wanted to be a father.  At the same time, it scared me to death because I knew that it was the hardest job I would ever have and it would include stuff that I would never choose otherwise.  Some of the most difficult times I have ever faced have been because I was a father and there might still be such times ahead of me.  At the same time, I don’t even waste time thinking about what might have happened if I never became a father, because I know without a doubt that it was part of the path laid out for me by God.  To be a father is to embrace fear and amazement simultaneously. 

                Mark is trying to teach us that being a disciple is to embrace the same paradox.  God chose to enter human history as a human knowing that it would result in rejection and death.  Jesus’s purpose is fulfilled precisely in that willingness to embrace humanity and be rejected by humanity at the same time.  We are saved by such an embrace.  The bridge between us and God is built by this divine choice. 

                We, like the disciples in this passage, are called to embrace this same purpose.  The disciples are literally following Jesus to Jerusalem so that He can be killed.  They now know this if for no other reason than they have been told three times now.  They are beginning to feel it coming themselves and yet, they keep following Him.  Take a minute to really think about that.  They know they are following their leader to His death and they keep following anyway. 

                This is still the invitation of Jesus’s disciples.  Since the time of Jesus, His followers have embraced “the cross” they will have to bear, many of them even following Jesus though it meant their own death.  We follow Jesus even though we know that it will inevitably lead to unpleasantness.  It is at once the greatest and the most terrible invitation we will ever receive.  Jesus lived and died to show God’s love for others.  We are called to do the same. 

 

Question:  What joys and sufferings have you experienced as a result of you deciding to become one that follows Christ?

 

Prayer:  (This is John Wesley’s Covenant Prayer) :  I am no longer my own, but thine. Put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt.  Put me to doing, put me to suffering.  Let me be employed by thee or laid aside for thee, exalted for thee or brought low for thee.  Let me be full, let me be empty.  Let me have all things, let me have nothing.  I freely and heartily yield all things to thy pleasure and disposal.  And now, O glorious and blessed God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, thou art mine, and I am thine. So be it. And the covenant which I have made on earth, let it be ratified in heaven. Amen.   

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for people you know facing the loss of their independence right now (interpreting that however you wish). 

 

Song:  Covenant Prayer – New Life Church

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3_TjhpK5OY

The Problem With Having It All

Mark 10:17-31, The Message - As he went out into the street, a man came running up, greeted him with great reverence, and asked, “Good Teacher, what must I do to get eternal life?”

Jesus said, “Why are you calling me good? No one is good, only God. You know the commandments: Don’t murder, don’t commit adultery, don’t steal, don’t lie, don’t cheat, honor your father and mother.”

He said, “Teacher, I have—from my youth—kept them all!”

Jesus looked him hard in the eye—and loved him! He said, “There’s one thing left: Go sell whatever you own and give it to the poor. All your wealth will then be heavenly wealth. And come follow me.”

The man’s face clouded over. This was the last thing he expected to hear, and he walked off with a heavy heart. He was holding on tight to a lot of things, and not about to let go.

Looking at his disciples, Jesus said, “Do you have any idea how difficult it is for people who ‘have it all’ to enter God’s kingdom?” The disciples couldn’t believe what they were hearing, but Jesus kept on: “You can’t imagine how difficult. I’d say it’s easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye than for the rich to get into God’s kingdom.”

That got their attention. “Then who has any chance at all?” they asked.

Jesus was blunt: “No chance at all if you think you can pull it off by yourself. Every chance in the world if you let God do it.”

Peter tried another angle: “We left everything and followed you.”

Jesus said, “Mark my words, no one who sacrifices house, brothers, sisters, mother, father, children, land—whatever—because of me and the Message will lose out. They’ll get it all back, but multiplied many times in homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, and land—but also in troubles. And then the bonus of eternal life! This is once again the Great Reversal: Many who are first will end up last, and the last first.”

 

                One of the most memorable moments from the movie Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory comes at the end. After bequeathing his factory to the boy Charlie, Wille Wonka, played brilliantly by Gene Wilder, says the following to Charlie:

 “Don't forget what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he wanted…. he lived happily ever after.”

If only that were true.  So many people have found this out the hard way.  They amass wealth, power, and/or influence, thinking it they are securing the keys to happiness only to find themselves miserable in ways they never dreamed.  Jesus looks into the eyes of this young man who already has acquired great wealth and sees the hints of this misery already developing this young man and is filled with compassion for him.  He wants to save him from the suffering that is already on it’s way, but realizes it will be costly to the rich young man.  The hold that wealth has on the man is complete.  Jesus realizes that the only way this hold can be loosened is if the man is physically separated from it.  The hold that the wealth has on him is confirmed when he leaves Jesus sad because he cannot bear the truth with which Jesus confronts him. 

After the man has left, Jesus uses the encounter to point out the difficulty of wealth to his disciples.  It is a rare individual who can be wealthy and follow God completely.  This is hard for anyone to hear, but in Jesus’s time, it was even more difficult because the teaching flies in the face of the then-common belief that wealth was a sign of divine blessing.  Jesus teaches here and elsewhere that often, the opposite is true; wealth can be a curse.  It can create a blockage to divine blessing and connection.   

We’d all like to think that we are the rare individual who could pull it off – we’d be the one who could hold wealth, but not let it erode our trust in God.  I think the disciples may have been thinking the same thing and so they ask, “than who has any chance at all?”  They were hoping Jesus would say something like, “it won’t be a problem for you guys,” but alas he says something even more surprising. 

““No chance at all if you think you can pull it off by yourself. Every chance in the world if you let God do it.”

Peter points out that all the disciples hearing this actually done what Jesus told the unfortunate man to do.  They’ve left behind people and things in order to follow Him. 

                Jesus finally offers some reassurance in response that the disciples’ sacrifices have been noticed by God.  They have chosen God over other things and their choice was the wisest thing they’ve ever done.  They, unlike the wealthy young man, were able to trust God to provide for them when they gave up the means to provide for themselves.  However, their choice doesn’t accomplish the provision; God does.  God always does.  This truth is at the core of the entire passage.  Only God can offer eternity.  Eternal life cannot be earned; it is always the gift of God. 

 

Question:  To what extent do you believe you have earned the blessings you now enjoy? 

 

Prayer:  Lord, expose any way in which we feel entitled to the good things we enjoy and break any unhealthy attachments we have to things other than you.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for those who are wealthy nut miserable nonetheless.

 

Song:  Can’t Buy Me Love – The Beatles

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srwxJUXPHvE   

What is It About Children?

Mark 10:13-16, CEB - People were bringing children to Jesus so that he would bless them. But the disciples scolded them.  When Jesus saw this, he grew angry and said to them, “Allow the children to come to me. Don’t forbid them, because God’s kingdom belongs to people like these children.  I assure you that whoever doesn’t welcome God’s kingdom like a child will never enter it.”  Then he hugged the children and blessed them.

 

                It’s hard to adequately explain how countercultural Jesus’s actions were in this passage in our current culture where we have shifted to the other extreme.  The disciples, by attempting to keep the children away from Jesus, were doing exactly what they were supposed to do.  Children did not merit being present in the room when a prominent Rabbi was teaching.  In most cases, it would have annoyed the Rabbi and at best distracted the adults present.  Generally, the Rabbi would have been thankful to not have to stop to deal with the children himself.  So imagine the disciples’ surprise when they experience Jesus’s anger instead of his gratitude.  Once again, Jesus is turning cultural expectations upside down.

                Instead of banishing them, Jesus blesses and hugs them.  Even more surprising, He holds them up as an example for the adults to follow.  This would have been downright offensive to even the disciples.  Children are to follow adults, not the other way around!  Even more disturbing – if the adults are not like these children, they will never enter the kingdom of God.  This is a crazy teaching indeed!

                This is essentially important teaching regarding the Kingdom of God here.  First, it primarily belongs to people who are like children.  Children are not able to earn anything.  Their whole existence depends on the provision of others.  In a proper household, even children who tend to be wayward are can still expect to be cared for and provided what they need.  Most adults tend to lose this dependence, which is generally a good thing.  But it is not a good thing when it comes to the Kingdom.  Ther kingdom belongs to those who know they haven’t done anything to earn it.  Much lip service is given to this truth by people who quietly believe their “good” behavior and deeds entitles them to more than certain others.  Jesus is calling such people on the carpet here; to the extent that you think you rightly deserve the kingdom, it will never be yours.  Children tend to trust that what they need will just be there without a thought that they could earn it.  In the Kingdom, all of us are called to trust that way. 

                Finally, Jesus obviously just loves children, for He welcomes, embraces, and blesses them.  Jesus models how children are to be treated in His community.  It’s supposed to be natural for children to be welcomed in the midst of the many activities of the church.  Having them in the midst of the Kingdom community reminds all of us that their dependence mindset should be our mindset as well.  It is also a reminder that our faith is one that is passed down.  Current generations are to always be thinking about how they transfer the faith to those who are coming next.  Our faith is a faith that continues by giving it away. 

 

Questions:  Are there any shreds of entitlement in your relationship to God and or God’s community?  What is your core disposition towards children?

 

Prayer:  Lord Jesus, forgive us for thinking we deserve any of the blessings we have received.  As we experience Your humility, may we live into it ourselves.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for people who will be somewhere they don’t want to be for the holidays.

 

Song:  Someday at Christmas – Stevie Wonder with Andra Day

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MaA7B9cu4kU

Did Jesus and Joseph Talk About What Happened Before He Was Born?

 

Mark 10:1-12, CEB - Jesus left that place and went beyond the Jordan and into the region of Judea. Crowds gathered around him again and, as usual, he taught them.  Some Pharisees came and, trying to test him, they asked, “Does the Law allow a man to divorce his wife?”

Jesus answered, “What did Moses command you?”

They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a divorce certificate and to divorce his wife.”

Jesus said to them, “He wrote this commandment for you because of your unyielding hearts. At the beginning of creation, God made them male and female.  Because of this, a man should leave his father and mother and be joined together with his wife, and the two will be one flesh.  So they are no longer two but one flesh.  Therefore, humans must not pull apart what God has put together.”

Inside the house, the disciples asked him again about this.  He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if a wife divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

 

There is a lot more going on in this passage than the casual 21^st century reader would ever realize.  While it seems that Jesus is a “divorce is always wrong” guy, the context for this discussion can help us discern whether that’s really true.  What is never said (but would have been clear to the audience) is that the Pharisees are asking Jesus to weigh in on an ongoing debate in the Rabbinical community concerning divorce.  Rabbi Hillel, representing the most popular camp, held that a man (and only a man) could divorce his wife for any reason by simply giving her a certificate of divorce.  In theory, this gave the woman permission to re-marry another man.  In reality, a divorced woman in first-century Judaism was an outcast and the chances that any man would ever consent to marry her were very slim.  The “certificate” actually served to absolve the man of any further responsibility for the woman and, at the same time, marked the woman as “damaged goods.”  This was why Joseph, trying to save Mary from this fate, planned to “quietly divorce her” (Matthew 1:19).  He was trying to follow Mosaic law without harming Mary. 

It makes me wonder whether Jesus and his earthly father Joseph ever had a conversation about what had happened before Jesus was born.  This is because, Jesus, in responding to the Pharisees’ question, is displaying the same compassion for the woman in the equation as Joseph did for Mary.   The original purpose of Moses’s declaration was to protect and care for the woman because the men were going to discard their wives anyway.  However, Moses’s law, like so many other imperfect laws over the course of history, ironically ends up achieving the opposite of its intention.  It legitimizes the ruining of women and gives men license to do it at will.   

This is why Jesus uses non-exceptional language in the case of divorce.  He is siding with the other Rabbi in the ongoing divorce debate, Rabbi Shammai.  Shammai contended that man can divorce a woman only on the basis of adultery.  In a culture where women have few rights, Jesus quotes the words of truth from the Pharisees’ highly held Torah law.  In marriage, God makes the woman and man one.  To break that union is to undo what God has done. Rabbi Shammai is closer to the truth, but Jesus cuts through and pushes beyond the debate.  He raises the status of women in the process. 

God does not like divorce because it breaks up life as He desires it to be for us.  It damages our soul.  God allows that sometimes divorce is necessary to prevent even greater damage than has already been caused, but divorce doesn’t fix what is broken.  Divorce should never be taken with any allusion that it will not damage us in the same way adultery does.  That damage does not put us beyond the restorative grace and love of God, but it is real nonetheless. It’s crucial to note that Jesus doesn’t forbid divorce or re-marriage here; He simply describes that there will be inevitable obstacles to overcome.  Jesus Himself is the way in which such obstacles are overcome and the broken can be restored and/or healed. 

 

Question:  How do you understand God’s design for marriage?

 

Prayer:  God, help us understand Your desire for our most treasured relationships, including marriage.  Give us the ability to express the same grace in our human relationships  as You do with us. Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for the marriages of people you know today.   

 

Song:  Joseph, Better You Than Me (ft. Elton John, Neil Tennant) - The Killers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW8oEWfuEIg

It’s Okay to Be “Salty”

Mark 9:49-50, NLT - “For everyone will be tested with fire.  Salt is good for seasoning. But if it loses its flavor, how do you make it salty again? You must have the qualities of salt among yourselves and live in peace with each other.”

 

                Jesus finishes this difficult teaching session with a summary statement; “everyone will be tested with fire.”  In other words, following Jesus will involve difficulty and unpleasantness.  No one gets through this life without their faith being tested.  Other translations say, “everyone will be salted.”  The common quality of fire and salt is that they change that with which they mix.  The path that God lays out for us means that we will come through the process changed.  As some have said, change is the only constant.  If, as a Jesus follower, you aren’t being transformed, something is wrong.

                Jesus then flips the salt metaphor and further teaches that we must have that same transformative effect on each other.  This is Mark’s parallel teaching to Matthew’s “you are the salt of the earth.”  (Matthew 5:13)  Not only is something wrong if we aren’t individually growing in our faith, there is something wrong with the Christian community where the transformation of people isn’t happening.  In fact, it’s nearly impossible for the former to happen without the latter. 

                I think back to my life as a Christian teenager who was just beginning to own for myself the faith of my parents before me.  As I do, I am at once both amazed and disappointed with myself.  I’m amazed at how strong my faith seems now when compared the shakiness of my teens.  I’m amazed at how my understanding and experience of God has expanded and deepened from the narrow-minded faith of my youth.  I’m absolutely blown away by all the difficulties and trials God has brought me through and how those very trials brought the strength and expansion of my relationship to God.  It has been an incredible journey.

                But I’m also disappointed in the fact that I still have some of the bad habits and attitudes that have persisted since I was a boy.  I still struggle to show as much of the fruits of the Spirit as I think I should by now.  There are still people I really struggle to love.  And there are still moments when my faith seems as shaky as it was when I was twelve.  I note these disappointments and it seems that I have farther to go now than when I started.  Ironically, for someone who has been invited by God to embrace eternity, this is exactly how it should be.  The more you know, the more you know that you don’t know.  The more you grow, the more you become aware of your need to grow even more.  Everyone will be salted/tested with fire and the Christian community is the very place where that salting/testing is supposed to take place.

Question:  How has your faith changed/grown since you first decided to follow Jesus?

 

Prayer:  God, thank you for the way you have brought me through my life to this moment.  Thank you for loving me through the joyful and sorrowful times.  Show me my growing edges and teach me to trust You and Your community to accomplish that growth. Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for people who are homeless right now facing extreme temperatures. 

 

Song:  I Have Decided to Follow Jesus – Lydia Walker

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OWWqS1jnOw

Tough Choices

Mark 9:43-48, The Message - “If your hand or your foot gets in God’s way, chop it off and throw it away. You’re better off maimed or lame and alive than the proud owner of two hands and two feet, godless in a furnace of eternal fire. And if your eye distracts you from God, pull it out and throw it away. You’re better off one-eyed and alive than exercising your twenty-twenty vision from inside the fire of hell.”

 

In the last reflection, Jesus warned that it would be better to drown than cause harm to those most vulnerable.  He continues in that same hyperbolic vein, musing that it would be better to be handless, maimed, or short one eye than to wander away from God’s path.  The point, of course, is that following God might require perhaps even tougher choices than losing a body part.  Sacrifice is at the very heart of the Christian faith.

This call is hard to swallow in a culture of excess and comfort.  Hear Dietrich Bonhoffer’s reflections from The Cost of Discipleship: 

“To be called to a life of extraordinary quality, to live up to it, and yet to be unconscious of it is indeed a narrow way. To confess and testify to the truth as it is in Jesus, and at the same time to love the enemies of that truth, his enemies and ours, and to love them with the infinite love of Jesus Christ, is indeed a narrow way. To believe the promise of Jesus that his followers shall possess the earth, and at the same time to face our enemies unarmed and defenseless, preferring to incur injustice rather than to do wrong ourselves, is indeed a narrow way. To see the weakness and wrong in others, and at the same time refrain from judging them; to deliver the gospel message without casting pearls before swine, is indeed a narrow way. The way is unutterably hard, and at every moment we are in danger of straying from it. If we regard this way as one, we follow in obedience to an external command, if we are afraid of ourselves all the time, it is indeed an impossible way. But if we behold Jesus Christ going on before step by step, we shall not go astray.”              

Bonhoffer eventually paid for his convictions with his life as he was executed by the Nazis at Flossenburg concentration camp in 1944 for his resistance to the practices of Hitler’s regime. 

                The bottom line in all of this is that following God is not about getting what we want.  Rather, it is about God having God’s way in us.  The result is that we get exactly what we most need – a redeemed life that leads us towards the things of God.  What we find is that the things of God are what we wanted most in the first place, but didn’t know it. 

 

Question:  Have you ever experienced what initially felt like a setback or disappointment, but later realized it became the very thing that needed to happen for you to get to a better place?

 

Prayer:  Dear God, be with us when tough choices come along that challenge our notion of how things should be.  We trust you Lord; help us to trust you more.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for all the victims of the winter storms and tornadoes in the past week.

 

Song:  I chose this song for the chorus, not the verses.

You Can’t Always Get what You Want – The Rolling Stones

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krxU5Y9lCS8           

The Mood Has Changed. . .

Mark 9:42, The Message - “On the other hand, if you give one of these simple, childlike believers a hard time, bullying or taking advantage of their simple trust, you’ll soon wish you hadn’t. You’d be better off dropped in the middle of the lake with a millstone around your neck.

 

In the last reflection. We saw Jesus sticking up for newer believers that doing powerful things in Jesus’s name, but who were not part of the group Jesus had chosen.  Now, in our text above, Jesus builds upon that instruction with a warning.  If you cause these new believers spiritual harm, there will be consequences and they won’t be pleasant. 

This is a Jesus that makes us uncomfortable.  He uses harsh language and is issuing threats.  The suffering promised to those who harm the vulnerable is worse than being drowned.  He stops just short of Dirty Harry’s “go ahead punk. . . make my day!”  This is not the Jesus we’re used to hearing.  This isn’t “peace I leave with you” Jesus. It isn’t “neither do I condemn you” Jesus or “blessed are the meek” Jesus.  You hear Jesus talking this way and you can’t help but give pause.

And that’s the point.   When it comes to protecting the vulnerable, Jesus is deadly serious.  Don’t harm them or you WILL be sorry.  The intensity of the warning should stop us in our tracks and return readily to memory when dealing with those who are the most vulnerable among us. To the extent that we have power, position, or authority, we should use it protect those who don’t. 

To be clear, Jesus is not promising to drown those who don’t heed His words.  His warning is purposely exaggerated to express the intensity of the heart of God for people who are vulnerable.  But neither is the warning and idle threat.  When you exploit, bully, or otherwise harm the vulnerable, you have set yourself against God.   It is not a road you want to go down. 

In the next several reflections, we will see that Jesus’s harsh language and imagery doesn’t end here.  It serves as a corrective to the overly passive and milk-toast characterization of Jesus that has become very popular in our day.  If the Jesus we know doesn’t challenge us, than it is not the Jesus of scripture. 

 

Question:  List your top 5-10 adjectives to describe the Jesus you know.  How does your list compare to the Jesus we’ve encounter in Mark so far?

 

Prayer:  Lord, too often, we get it backwards. We make You into our image instead of vice versa.  Forgive us.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for Pray for people in the path of deadly winter storms right now.

 

Song:  I Wonder as I Wander – Harry Connick Jr.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45khRvRfJOE