Gospeling Your Life ~ the Luggage we Lug Around ~ Matthew 10

 

Chapter 10 begins with a commissioning and sending out of the disciples.  Part of this passage revolves around what the disciples are told to carry with them and what to leave behind.  Jesus gives them power to heal, help, hold the hurt of this world; they are told they don’t have to bring a change of underwear or an extra coat in case the restaurant’s dining room is doubling as a freezer space!  What do you carry with you?  Yesterday in worship, we talked about God creating in us a clean heart and renewed/refreshed spirit.  Some of what I carry in my heart is clutter and past hurts and things I said that I wished I had not.  I lug all that around in the luggage of my life.  What if setting down the “stuff” (both material and metaphorical stuff) might be one way to clean up the clutter of our heart and open space for the Spirit?  The disciples are told to be open to whoever and wherever they are welcomed.  Who has welcomed you recently?  Where have you been able to be fully yourself?  And when someone slams the door in the disciples’ face don’t carry that hurt, don’t add that to the luggage of life.  I read these words slack jawed whilst simultaneously scratching and shaking my head.  Because honest, I do the exact opposite of what Jesus instructs.  I carry (even cling to!) my possession, I stuff my life with stuff that I have been told by the Gospel according to economist Adam Smith will save me.  Faith?  Faith is fine for Sunday mornings, but I don’t want to be considered weird, so I don’t broadcast to the person next to me on the plane that I am a pastor ~ because honestly who would want to be stuck sitting next to that person in a tin can hurling through air 40,000 feet off the ground?  Moreover, when someone says something that hurts me I hold that for dear life.  When someone takes a metaphorical red ink pen to my life becoming the editor I didn’t ask for, I carry that for too long.  I don’t wipe the dust off my feet, I turn to the closest person and say, “I can’t believe what he just did!”  I love to triangulate and stir the gossip stew talking about those people. 

 

What if the mission of going out to those on the fringe and fray wasn’t just about the disciples back then and there, but for you and me right here and now?  What if we didn’t dismiss this passage quickly because Jesus upends and overturns our modern ways of traveling with enough luggage to clothe a small village?  What if we find one way today to greet those who cross our path?  To hold the hand of someone who is hurting.  To visit someone who is lonely without constantly looking at the clock on the wall.  To practice pay attention to the person, God’s incarnate and beloved, right in front of you.  Maybe chapter 10 might find flesh and breathe and expression in your life in these days.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life through hurts and storms ~ Matthew 8-9

 

One of the threads and themes in chapters 8-9 is healing, stilling the storms that rage within us physically and emotionally and spiritually.  So, the natural question here is, where are you hurting?  Maybe you are praying for family and friends following a surgery or divorce or loss of job.  Remember, Matthew is concerned about the metaphorical mountains of life, when our souls are strained or stressed, when we are exhausted or depleted or defeated.  That might be the weather pattern in your soul right now or in someone you care deeply about.  Hold yourself and those you know of.  Hold the stories of war in Ukraine, Israel/Palestine, Haiti, Sudan, the election season in the United States, our own community trying to face issues around schools and infrastructure and affordable housing.  Hold all that longs for a Balm in Gilead.  You may want to write down your prayers.  And write down where have you sense relief and release.  It may not be a complete cure.  But maybe the time you laughed with someone living with cancer over lunch or recalling a vacation you took together.  Or maybe it was holding the hand of someone grieving, knowing you can’t solve or fix someone, but you can show up.  Or maybe it was letting your light shine with God’s unconditional love.  Healing happens in many ways.  I pray these stories in Matthew will open you to God tending and mending and holding all that is holy and broken, beautiful and terrible right now.  Amen. 

Gospeling Your Life ~ Sermon on the Mount

 

Chapters 5-7 is the Sermon on the Mount.  I once heard a scholar suggest that if all of chapters 5-7 was preached at one time, the disciples’ minds would have exploded with too much information.  In three chapters we have more wisdom than we could ever understand or stand under letting these words guide/govern our lives.  I encourage you to read the Sermon on the Mount several times and in different translations.  You can go to www.biblegateway.com and find The Voice translation or Message for a different take on these words.  You can read the NIV or Living Bible.  Try and test out two or three versions.  Notice what is different and what sounds the same.  Where do you find your soul soaring in response to Jesus’ words, where do you want to raise your hand and ask questions?  I know for me it is right out of the gate, “Um Jesus, how can the poor in Spirit really be blessed, because the evidence doesn’t seem to convince the jury in my mind?  How can there be life in meekness, have you seen the internet?”  Also, I wonder when have Christians really loved our enemies?  What is your take on generosity in chapter 6 or prayer or fasting?  What about the part on worry?  I am an Olympic Gold medalist in worrying!  While I love what Jesus says about taking the log out of my own eye in chapter 7, I am not sure how good I am at doing that, because sometimes it feels like there is a whole forest blinding me!  Read and then re-read this sermon letting the words sink and settle into your heart, challenge your life, and prayerfully ask what is one passage, just ONE part of this sermon you might seek to embody?  You don’t, DON’T, have to go live every single word and sentence today.  But maybe there is one person that you could be just a smidge, more loving toward today.  Maybe there is one place you want to replace judgement with curiosity.  Maybe there is a meeting where one word of this Sermon can sustain you through.  Hold your insights and questions close, for that might just be where God is working in your life in these days.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life with Matthew 3-4

 

Jesus returns from Egypt and Matthew whisks us away to the wilderness, where we meet John the Baptizer.  Like Mark, John is an odd character, a bit like that relative on your family tree who is a reclose and you are not quite sure how to react to him/her/them.  Yet, John was also charismatic enough to get people off the couch, to stop surfing Netflix, and come to the wilderness.  John’s passionate pleading gets people to wade in the water. John is not subtle, the whole “brood of vipers” in 3:7 isn’t exactly going to win friends or influence people.  As Jesus is baptized, we see God’s claim and name of Jesus as beloved.  This is still your name when you are baptized.  Note that baptism isn’t being ushered into the “good life”.  Rather Jesus is driven (by the Spirit) into the wilderness where there is fasting and temptation.  I think of St. Teresa, who while crossing a stream, fell into ice cold water, drenching her.  Teresa shook a fist at God (see even the saints do that!  You are not the only one).  She cried out, “God if this is how you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few!”  That story makes me laugh, but there is a kernel of truth that there is no money back guarantee in faith.  Faith is not an equation where good deeds/right beliefs equal the good life.  There are trials and temptations, there are twists and turns that leave us disoriented and dizzy.  There is a rollercoaster of life.  Jesus experienced this and Jesus calls us as disciples (or students) into this path that isn’t smooth as an interstate, but as rough and rocky as climbing a mountain.  Sit with the truths of chapters 3-4 and let these words sink, settle, sing and saturate your soul, heart, and life this day.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life ~ with Matthew's Moutains

 

We move from Mark to Matthew today.  Matthew starts off with a family tree of Jesus.  Two things to note: there are four women named in the genealogy.  The four are particularly interesting.  Tamar was sexually assaulted, Ruth was a foreigner (one of those people); Bethsheba (who isn’t named, but referenced in vs. 6 as, ‘wife of Uriah’) had an affair with David, and Mary has a child out of wedlock.  I love how Scripture is not afraid to air our human-size dirty laundry.  I love how Scripture honestly says, humans are messy, and their halos are not nearly as blindingly bright as you’d think.  We have in Scripture stories of abuse and violence; pain and suffering, because this is part of the human story still today.  These stories are traumatic, and they also offer an opportunity for us to talk about the pain that still exists today.  Sexual abuse still happens far too much today.  Too often we treat foreigners not with kindness and humanity, but as “illegal” and unwanted and less than.  We don’t talk about sexual ethics, rather we still shame and shun women who have children out of wedlock ~ while not holding men accountable.  Jesus’ genealogy is dripping and drenched with honesty and humility in Matthew. 

 

Which raises the question: what are the family secrets in your genealogy?  There is a great song in the Disney movie, Encanto, “We don’t talk about Bruno”?  Bruno has been banished by the family for a variety of reasons and the family acts like he never existed.  Go ahead, Google the song, it is really catchy!  And it is so true.  There are family members who have been cut off from the family tree.  The writer of Matthew is willing to say what got us here isn’t a bunch of saints, but people who were human-sized.  To be sure, you don’t have to know the story of every name in Matthew’s genealogy.  But it can help you think about your relatives, the ones you know and the ones you rarely see, even at the family reunion.  Who are some of the relatives that have shaped your life?  What ways are their fingerprints still on your heart?  Who are the family members you don’t know, because you don’t talk about the “Bruno” on that branch of your tree? 

 

In chapter 2, we hear how humans are still motivated by fear where Herod (like Pharoah in the Exodus) let’s his ego cause heartbreak and soul ache by killing boys under the age of 2 when the Magi don’t come back with a full report of where to find God’s son.  It is not a coincidence that Joseph, Mary, and Jesus flee to Egypt.  In Matthew, Jesus is the new Moses.  It is not a coincidence that on Thursday you will read the Sermon on the Mount, echoing how Moses received the 10 Commandments on the mountain.  Matthew lays his cards on the table by showing us in the first two chapters, God’s presence among us doesn’t mean chocolate rivers and pony rides.  There is suffering and struggles and stumbles as we try to make our way up the mountains of life.  We get lost, wander away, run away in fear, have dreams, and try to be open to God amid the fear that is very real around us.  Too often we read the coming of the Magi without hearing the death/pain that followed by their not following Herod’s demand.  I know they were told not to, but the ripple effects are real.  This is an adult story that is still repeated and replayed in our world today.  What truths do you see in the first two chapters?  Take time to record these in a journal and hold these close as we lean into the promise of Emmanuel, God with us and for us, even when the evidence around us doesn’t quite look to convincing.  May God’s love protect and provide for you this day.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life According to Mark

 

Mark’s ending is a bit unsatisfying.  In chapter 16, your Bible might note that there is a shorter ending, perhaps the original ending, to Mark where the women encountering a “young man” in Jesus’ tomb (16:5), who tells them that Jesus is not there, the women run away afraid.  To be clear, I would be right with the women running away, maybe out in front of them!  Of course, at some point, one of the women found her voice and shared this story.  But one question for each of us is do we share the Good News of new life from the tombs we enter with others today?  How would you share that?  When?  Where?   Do you find ways to let your faith have the first, middle, and last word in how you are living?  For me, sometimes yes and sometimes no.  Sometimes I can be brave and bold, trusting in God.  Other times I stick my head in the sand, on the sidelines of life whilst singing, “La, la, la.  I can’t hear you”.  I can run away with the best of them, especially when I realize that the Good News isn’t just interested in a quick affirmation or a check list of belief, the Good News deeply desires to reorder my whole life.  The Good News can seem foolish and naïve.  Love your enemies?  Who does that today?  Take up your cross?  Um, that doesn’t sound like the good life to me.  Forgive people?  Seriously, after what they did to me?!?  The Good News isn’t just a story, it is a narrative for life.  Rewind and review Mark’s gospel.  What was your favorite part?  Please let me know.  What passage frustrated or flummoxed you?  Where were you inspired?  What new insight did you glean in your reading?  Where do you long to know more?  Hold these questions, letting them roam and rummage around your heart, head, and whole life.  May God, who continues to surprise us like God did on the first Easter with the women at the tomb, show up disguised as your life this day.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life According to Mark

 

Yesterday, you had the chance to read Mark’s Palm Sunday narrative.  Jesus rides into Jerusalem (the center of religion and politics ~ the capital city ~ a seat of power and privilege) on a donkey.  This echoes King David who also rode into Jerusalem on a donkey.  It would be like a person today riding in a boat across the Delaware River evoking memories of George Washington.  This confronts and contradicts Caesar who rides in on a stallion with a show of force.  Two different parades that still dominate our world today.  There are plenty of parades where might makes right is still on display.  There are plenty of parades and pulpit pounding demanding power and fear mongering.  There are plenty of parades where it is about cowering.  Jesus offers an invitation to a different parade, one that is based on humility, unconditional love, and grace.  The people cry, “Hosanna,” which means “save us”.  What really saves us?  Does military force?  Does yelling and scoring points on some imaginary score board on social media?  Does making fun of others?  Does posting cynical and anonymous posts with keyboard courage?  Mark’s Gospel is the shortest, but in chapter 11, the writer slows the narrative down to dwell and dive deep into Holy Week narratives.  Chapter 11 reminds us that Christ-like-ness is about facing suffering honestly, dealing with anger (Jesus turns over tables that unjustly hurt those on the fringe and fray and prey on the vulnerable), being questioned by those in power, how to live in Empire (see 12:13 about paying taxes and remembering God is God), loving God with your full self as you love your neighbor, serving others, facing death, and the promise of life that can be mysterious.  There is so much in chapters 11-13, it is like a dense/rich German chocolate cake.  Take time to go back, re-read, and savor.  Which verses in chapters 11-13 sing to your heart?  Which are like sandpaper to your soul?  Which confuse you (I know for me the whole fig tree image is a bit odd)?  Which passages are flat soda left uncapped in the fridge for a month, where do you think, “Meh”?  Take time with these chapters, remembering that one of this Gospel’s questions is, “how do we face suffering, struggle, and stumbling in life?”  How does Christ face this last week of his life?  How might the truths you read here meet you in your life?  May you also take time to breathe, knowing we are almost done with Mark and his witness to the Good News of God’s love.

Gospeling Your Life according to Mark 9-10

 

Chapter 9 in Mark’s Gospel begins with the Transfiguration, or transformation, of Jesus.  This takes place on a mountain ~ the setting is important.  Moses received the 10 Commandments on a mountain, Elijah heard the still, small voice of God on a mountain, and in Isaiah a mountain is where all God’s people will stream to in God’s kin-dom.  Mountains matter.  Here, Jesus foreshadows resurrection and a truth ~ new life that is possible.  I love how Jesus and Moses and Elijah have a committee meeting there ~ oh if only one of the disciples had taken minutes so we knew what they chatted about!  Jesus tells Peter, James, and John not to tell anyone about this, an echo of the Messianic secret we talked about on Tuesday.  I wonder if Peter, James, and John kept quiet?  Could they keep their mouths shut about an encounter and experience of the sacred?  Or when Jesus went off to the store for a smoothie for lunch did they spill the beans to the others?  “You will never believe what we just saw!!”  How we share, what we share, the stories we tell and the secrets we keep ~ all that matters and makes up the cake recipe of your life right now.  Let this simmer in your soul. 

 

Chapter 9 ends with such a human scene, the disciples arguing about who is the greatest.  This might be funny if it wasn’t so heartbreakingly true still today.  We love to rate and rank; we want to know whether our post is getting more likes than someone else’s.  We compare and compete and complain about others, especially if they seem smarter or thinner or better in any way.  Oh, we all have the sandals of the disciples here.  And Jesus challenges us not to seek the fame and spotlight, but the servant-heart and sidelines where children are found.  In Jesus’ day, children were seen as a burden, not a blessing.  They were another mouth to feed and there was no guarantee that the child would live and thrive and contribute to the household.  To be child-like wasn’t something you sought, children were often pushed to the side.  Hold this.  What does it mean to seek the very position and place that no one wants?  How does that challenge us in our life and living the good news? 

 

As we wind down and wrap up this first week, what are some insights you have?  What questions do you have?  What passage has warmed your heart?  What passage felt like sandpaper to your soul?  What thoughts does Mark offer you/us about suffering and getting the stuffing knocked out of you?  Remember, next Tuesday we will gather on Zoom to keep processing and talking and working our way through this Good News of God’s love according to Mark.  Amen. 

Gospeling Your Life According to Mark 7-8

 

Mark 7 dives into the conflict that can happen within the church.  Imagine a gathering of humans who don’t all agree on who God is, why Jesus came, or how in the world to describe the Spirit?  Imagine a gathering of humans where what we do with our budget or the decisions the Council makes don’t always sit well with each person?  Chapter 7 isn’t just about then and there; it is about the ways we can criticize and critique the church still today.  We are all a bit Pharisaic in our beliefs, otherwise, we would get new beliefs!  We think we have the “right” ways to do things and want the church to affirm/accept/adopt our ways.  Hold in your heart that God’s wisdom that can never be confined or contained or comprehended by any of us. 

 

And if that isn’t annoying enough, which it might be, chapter 7:24 begins one of the most disturbing stories about Jesus recorded.  He calls a beloved daughter of God, “a dog”.  I read this and think, “Wait, who is this and what has Mark done to Jesus?”  Or I think, “Jesus, um, maybe you need a Snicker’s bar, because you seem hangry!”  Or maybe this is a story about the humanness of Jesus, that even he made mistakes.  Or maybe this is a story of repentance, that Jesus changed his mind and direction of life (see mediation from Monday).  Or maybe this is meant to be like a speed bump in our reading, don’t get too comfortable or complacent thinking that we “know” Jesus, he will do things and say things that baffle and bewilder (even offend) us.  Hold this dizzying and disorienting story close to see what is provoked and evoked for you.

 

In chapter 8, we get a second feeding story.  Jesus already fed 5000 plus, now he feeds 4000, which I guess is good news that sometimes attendance dips at any religious gathering!  How is reading the first 8 chapters of Mark feeding you?  Some of what Mark lays out is sweet to our lips and fills our souls, like the images of healing and hope that we encounter.  Some of what we read will be bitter or sour to the tip of our tongue, like what we read in chapter 7.  Hold all this.  What are you feasting upon so far in the gospels?  What is filling you?  What would you take a pass on so far in what you’ve read?  Hold this as you are being held by the One who still feeds us with manna, bread of heaven, through the good news of God’s love.  Amen.

Mark 5

 

Mark 5 circles back to the main theme of the gospel, what do we do with suffering and facing storms?  Jesus comes to Gerasenes and meets a man with demons.  Note, this beloved of God lives in the tombs or graveyard or among the dead.  He lives on the fringe and fray, which is where we still push/place put God’s beloved people today.  And if that wasn’t enough, the people of the village, so afraid, chain him.  He moans and groans, he fills the sky with his cries, and he physically hurts himself because of his emotional/spiritual/societal pain.  This is a powerful parable that is still being played out today.  We still push people to the edge of society.  We still shackle God’s beloved with chains of debt or high rent or taxes or disapproval.  We still tell people to pull themselves up with their bootstraps, not recognizing their feet are bare naked, like the beloved in the story today. 

 

Jesus sees this beloved.  Jesus asks for his name.  Jesus sits with him.

 

Scholars call this the Gospel’s preferential option for the poor.  This does not, does not, does not mean God has picked a side.  This means that when, wherever there is hurting, a need for healing, and for love to make someone whole, God reaches out to the beloved in that graveyard of life first. 

 

Where do you find yourself shackled today?  Where are you pushing yourself?  Often today that is with schedules that are too full, and we demand ourselves to keep on going!  How is Jesus calling you by name and sitting with you right now seeing you in your full humanness?  This story is our story.

 

I do love the ending where the demons are driven into pigs who go and drown in the water.  Quick note (from an Iowan) ~ pigs can swim and for the love of all that is holy, why waste that much bacon!  But the point is metaphorical ~ God longs for liberation for all God’s people.  I love how the townspeople are more concerned with the economic impact of lost livestock than celebrating the liberation of one who was hurting.  We still do this today.  We don’t see people, we see immigrants who “steal our jobs”.  We don’t see people, we see those who vote that way.  We don’t see people who are hurting, we see someone who isn’t doing what we think that person should do (never mind they didn’t ask you to write their story)!  This story is one of the longest in Mark, so pay attention, slow down and turn this story in many directions so that the light of God can shine through it into your life this day.  

Gospeling Your Life According to Mark

 

Mark moves his Gospel along at a fast pace in the early chapters.  Mark loves the word, “immediately” ~ try to count/keep track of how many times you encounter that word.  Jesus seems to have gotten the jolt of a Venti expresso from Starbucks.  He is on the move, ready to go, healing people left and right.  And in 3:13, Jesus tells the people he heals not to tell anyone.  Jesus doesn’t want them posting on Facebook or posting selfies with him to Instagram.  Scholars call this the Messianic secret.  Jesus keeps his identity hidden.  This is confusing for us who live on the other side of Easter Sunday.  This is confounding in a world where everyone has a platform, and we count “success” by number of followers on social media.  What do you mean, don’t tell anyone about the amazing healing that is happening?  Maybe Jesus didn’t want to be overwhelmed by bigger crowds.  Maybe Jesus didn’t want people just to come for what was splashy and spectacular or because it was what everyone else was doing.  Part of the Messianic secret is that we don’t know why Jesus said this.  We do know that in Gospel times being a Christian, follower of the Jesus way, wasn’t socially acceptable.  Rome didn’t like anyone besides Caeser being called, “Lord”.  Faithful Jewish people weren’t sure what to make of their siblings who were now following this Jewish peasant preacher who had been crucified and supposedly resurrected.  It wasn’t safe.  And the truth is, that remains today.  Many people keep parts of their identity hidden away.  This is especially true for transgender people in our world today who don’t feel safe in the world.  This can be true for people in our church who are not sure if they will say something if we won’t extinguish their torch and send them off the island that the tribe has spoken.  Believing and belonging are still important parts of our life.  We hold certain things about ourselves close to our chest.  There are some things we can’t keep hidden, like race or certain physical disabilities. 

 

Are there parts of yourself you keep hidden from others?  Have you had experiences where your trust was shattered like a glass dropped on a tile floor into a thousand sharp sherds, because your friend shared your secret with others?

 

Chapter 4 launches into parables or stories about life in God’s realm.  Too often we reduce parables to fairy tale-like stories where there is a single message.  Like Goldilocks teaches us that bears can be so inhospitable and that breaking and entering a home unlawfully is sort of okay, just try not to fall asleep there.  That was a joke.  Parables are meant to turn the world upside down.  A farmer who just throws seed anywhere, rather than carefully sowing that seed in good soil, is a bad farmer.  A mustard seed is really an invasive weed that attracted birds to build nests and who would eat your crops.  And putting a light under a basket was wasteful and Smokey the Bear would not approve of that fire danger!  The best part of parables is coming back to them time and time again, finding new details, words hidden in plain sight that surprise you, but where there all along.  Read and re-read these parables with child-like delight who loves to hear Goldilocks and the three bears time and time again.  Amen.

Gospeling Your Life According to Mark

 

As you open your Bible, take a deep breath ~ breathing in God’s Spirit to awaken you.  Exhale a prayer of presence and openness to each word you will read in chapters 1 and 2 of the Gospel according to Mark.  Remember one of the big picture themes Mark is asking, how do we move through storms, stress, strain, suffering and moments of life when the stuffing gets knocked out of us?  Mark begins not with a birth story and singing “Away in a Manger”.  Mark begins with a brave and bold declaration, Good News!  Recall that is political language.  Good News is what Caesar claimed to bring when he conquered your village with violence.  Good News, or gospel, is what Caesar said he alone could bring as the prince of peace.  But Caesar’s peace comes with crosses of fear to keep you coloring inside the lines.  Mark 1:1 is not a sentence but a headline that shouts like a protest the powers that be.  Mark 1:1 is a declaration of independence, that freedom comes not from conformity but from diversity of God’s creation.  Good news of Jesus Christ, God’s love incarnate and in the flesh, (and spoiler alert, this isn’t all kittens and pony rides for God’s love will be crucified).  Mark quotes Isaiah about a voice in the wilderness.  The wilderness is an echo of Exodus and Exile ~ of wandering seemingly aimless following Moses and of being in a frightening and fear-filled place.  Wilderness is not idyllic where we post selfies or talk about our self-actualization, wilderness is to be avoided.  Wilderness is uncontrollable and uncontainable; it is a stressful place which brings us back to Mark’s theme.  The voice says out of the wilderness will come a voice to prepare.

 

You are preparing right now to read the Gospels with me in 50-ish days.  In the coming days there will be times of twists and turns.  You may find yourself one moment energized and another day depleted and other falling behind – even feeling discouraged.  You may start to wonder why.  Like when you are hiking and your feet start aching (or as my grandma would say, “My dogs are barking” when she had walked too much).  We get tired and wonder if we can keep on keeping on.  The voice calls out to you remind you that you are not alone.  You are not alone; you can join in the Bible Study group tomorrow night on Zoom.  You can come and talk to me.  Find connection in community as we make our way through these words.

 

As Mark ushers us into the wilderness, we meet John the Baptizer who calls for baptism and to repent.  The word “repent” is a word that can carry more baggage than a family of four going on a month-long vacation.  But “repent” means to change your direction, your destination, your mind and heart.  We “repent” all the time.  New Years Resolutions are “repenting” of sorts. I read a book that something I thought was good for me is not, so I try to quit.  In some ways, reading the Gospels is a way of re-ordering and re-organizing your life.  As Jesus is baptized by John, the heavens open and God names and claims Jesus.  And Jesus goes to the wilderness, do you hear the echo here?  The wilderness is a theme and thread that connects Mark’s story.  It is not just a backdrop, setting or scene, it is a spiritual location where we find ourselves.  Jesus comes out of the wilderness preaching and proclaiming a new kingdom ~ which is an affront to Caesar’s kingdom.  I know the word “kingdom” is loaded word, but it refers to where we reside and call, “Home”.  Am I living with God’s wisdom or human wisdom?  And the point is, like the man with an unclean spirit in verse 23, we all cry out because we are trapped wanting both!  We long for healing (which are most of the stories you read in Mark 1 and 2), we need rest which is where Mark 2 ends, with an invitation to Sabbath or resting in God. 

 

As you read Mark 1 and 2 consider where do you need healing ~ physically, emotionally, spiritually, relationally, and societally?  Who can offer that healing?  We go chasing all kinds of “Gospels” (including preachers like me) who promise to offer you a cure for what worries you.  And where do you find rest, renewal, and reconnecting with God, yourself, and others?  May these questions help you find “Gospel”/Good News in the wilderness of today.  Amen.