January 19, 2020 – Mark 4:1-20

by | Apr 9, 2020 | News

Mark 4:1-20

One of the fun feature in Mark is that he consistently portrays the disciples sort of like idiots. Like, through the whole gospel, they just don’t get it. Over and over again, the train sort of leaves the station without them. And, yeah, sometimes you read what’s going on and it’s pretty incredible the level of cluelessness. Like, “really guys? Still not clicking for you?” But sometimes, you read the story and it’s more like, “Yeah, that’s weird. No wonder they didn’t get it. Jesus is weird.” This story is one of those times.

Jesus is teaching the people and finally, Mark records what he’s teaching. It’s a parable. About seeds and a sower and different types of ground. And we have the advantage that we know the end of the story. So it’s easy for us, when the disciples ask Jesus to explain himself, to think, “Duh, guys. Don’t you get it?” But if you just read the parable, without the explanation, it’s weird.

I mean, imagine if I came up here one Sunday and for the sermon, all I said was –

“Listen! The beach is full of sand. But for those with eyes to see, you will find shells among the sand. Some broken. Some whole. And among the shells are pieces of driftwood, carried in by the tide.

And among all these pieces is the sea glass, the thing that does not belong, but whose beauty has been revealed by the waves of the ocean and that same sand that polishes smooth.

Let anyone with ears to hear, listen!”

And then I just sat down.

That would be kind of weird.

So you could probably understand why the disciples might be just a little bit confused. Kudos to them, they at least get that this one’s important and they probably should understand it. So they ask. And Jesus seems flabbergasted that they don’t get it. So he breaks it down for them.

The sower – sows the word. Those are the seeds. With me so far?

Ok – the seeds on the path, that’s when the word is snatched away before it even has a chance to settle.

The seeds on the rocky ground, that’s when someone gets super pumped when they hear the Good News, but as soon as things get hard, they quit.

And the seeds in the thorns, that’s just when everything else in life just gets too big and distracting and the Word never really gets a chance to thrive.

But the good soil, that’s the soil that hangs on to those seeds, plants ‘em deep and lets ‘em grow. And just you wait and see what happens.

How is that not clear?!

And don’t you think the disciples were just kind of sitting there thinking, “Is he talking about us? Are we in trouble? Which one do you think we are?” The short answer, of course, is “all of them.”

It’d be really nice for the disciples (or for us!) to be able to say, “I’m good soil!” But if we’re going to be honest, sure sometimes. Sometimes we experience grace or love or forgiveness and it’s so big and so surprising, it changes our whole lives and we’re never the same again. And our lives bear fruit in beautiful and unexpected ways! I’d say more often, though, it’s one of those other situations.

You know, I will openly tell you, I am the queen of good intentions and poor follow through. I know prayer has the power to change my life. Or, it would, if I stuck with it long enough for it to make a difference. I know spending time among the poor and marginalized, and not in a “I’m here to help you” way, but in a “I just want to get to know you” way, I know that is where I will see God most clearly. I know that I have more than I need. Much more than I need. I know I am wasteful and my actions and choices support systems of oppression and global slavery. And I know that faith in God means loving my neighbor more than I love my own comfort. I know all that.

But things come up. I get distracted. Something more interesting comes along. And the Word of God planted in me gets choked out by thorns.

I won’t even go into all the times I miss God completely. Or all the times I’ve gotten super excited about something, only to give it up as soon as I need to invest any real work in it. If I’m gonna be honest, I’m not just one thing. And, more often than not, I’m not the good soil. And I’m guessing, if you’re willing to be honest, you’re not either.

But that’s what parables are. They aren’t meant to be answers, a “one and done” and now you never have to think about it again. They’re meant to make you go, “Wait, what? What is he talking about?” And these parables, they get planted in us, almost…like a seed. A seed that may or may not bear fruit. Or, may or may not right now. But the sower sows the Word anyway. The sower casts the seed over all sorts of ground, some of which doesn’t look very promising at all.

The truth is, the parables are supposed to make us think. Think about ourselves, about our lives, about our relationship with God. But at the end of it, the parables are not about us. They’re about God.

And yeah, if I’m gonna be honest, I’m not always very good soil for God’s Word to take root. Guys, I don’t know if you know this or not, but I’m a sinner. But the parable isn’t about me, or about us. It isn’t a “10-step plan to making yourself good soil.” It’s about our God who never stops casting seeds into the earth. Never stops calling. Never stops proclaiming that Good Word of grace and love and forgiveness. Even when the “results” of all those efforts will amount to absolutely nothing.

God still speaks. God still loves. God still forgives. All the while, God keeps working on all those rocky, thorny places in our own lives. Keeps turning the soil over.

The Good News of the parable is not that some small chosen few will produce amazing results and be God’s favorites.

The Good News is that God is foolishly, recklessly, and extravagantly generous. Throwing that Good Word around like there’s no end to it. Like it’ll never run out.

Still don’t get it? Well, you’re in good company. The disciples didn’t either.

So don’t worry. God will never give up on you. God will never let you go. God will never stop proclaiming that Good Word of grace, love, and forgiveness.

Let those with ears to hear, listen!

Amen.

January 12, 2020 – Mark 2:15-28

by | Apr 9, 2020 | Mark, Sermons

Mark 2:15-28

Mark does not waste time with details. We enter the story just after Jesus has been doing some teaching along the beach, he sees Levi, the tax collector, calls him as a disciple, and ends up at his house for dinner. From there, we go pretty quickly through 3 different stories that may have taken place one right after the other. Or there could have been weeks in between. Mark isn’t really interested in the narrative details. He just wants to let us know the important highlights.

And in each of these three stories, Jesus is confronted by a “questioner”. They aren’t enemies or critics just yet. Jesus hasn’t been around long enough yet to really start making people mad. Right now, they’re just trying to figure out who this guy is and what he’s up to. And they obviously respect him as some sort of holy man. Otherwise, they wouldn’t care what he was doing, or what example he was setting. So 3 questions, 3 stories, all having something to do with eating.

In the first story, it’s the scribes, watching Jesus eat with a bunch of obvious sinners. And the question, “Why does he eat with them?” So…who does Jesus eat with? In the second story, it’s a question of when. When is the right time to eat? Those guys are fasting right now. How come Jesus isn’t? And in that third story, it’s a question of how. Are those disciples really gathering food on the Sabbath? That’s not how you eat on the day of rest! How is that ok?

Three stories. Three questions. All about food and eating and the who and the when and the how of it all.

Now, it just might be me, but doesn’t this just seems like a disproportionate amount of time spent caring about food? I mean, so far, Jesus hasn’t said anything about how we ought to treat one another. Or how to get our act together and be better people. So far, it’s been a bunch of healings and now 3 stories about eating. 3 different questions about how and when Jesus eats and who Jesus eats with. And it just kind of seems like, “What’s the big deal? Why does it matter? Why is food such a place of contention between Jesus and the nay-sayers?”

But do you know what I realized? Do you know who has the time and energy to care about a bunch of rules about how and when and where you can eat? Hmm?

PEOPLE WHO AREN’T HUNGRY!

Rules and manners are all nice and good when you’ve got plenty to eat. But when you’re hungry, you just eat. When you’re hungry, you just need to be fed.

You know, I have, on occasion, practiced fasting as a spiritual discipline. And I won’t pretend to be good at it or lie and tell you it’s fun. It’s not. It’s terrible. And mostly, I hate it. But I have learned a few things from it. And of the things I’ve learned is that there are different kinds of hunger.

The first kind, the kind I call “habit hunger”, hits about mid-morning. That’s your body saying, “Hey! We usually eat about now. Don’t you want to go get something? Huh, huh, huh???” And it’s annoying and it’s uncomfortable, but it eventually goes away.

The second kind of hunger is a much deeper hunger. It’s the hunger of your body saying, “Ok, we need to eat now. This isn’t funny anymore.” And things start to happen in your body. The way your body operates starts to change. And everything becomes about food. Rules and manners are all nice and good when you have plenty to eat. But when you’re hungry, you just eat.

And Jesus didn’t come to appease the well fed or puff up the already satisfied.

Jesus came into a hungry world, among hungry people, to feed the hungry. To be bread for a world starved of grace.

Of course he eats with sinners. Of course he eats right now. Of course they plucked grain on the Sabbath. BECAUSE HUNGRY PEOPLE NEED TO EAT! And Jesus came to feed the world.

You know, it’s interesting. Mark tells us that Jesus was teaching the people. But he doesn’t tell us what Jesus was teaching. What he tells us is what Jesus was doing. For Mark, Jesus’ actions tell us far more about who he was and what he was after than his words did. What Mark records is the way Jesus made people question their assumptions. Question their beliefs. Question what actually matters in our life together and with God.

And what comes through loud and clear is that when people are hungry – hungry for food, hungry for connections, hungry for a place to belong, hungry for grace – you feed them.

When people are hungry, you feed them.

Rules and manners are all well and good when you’re not starving. But we are living in a world starved of grace. Starved of hope. Starved of connection. And starving people just need to be fed. We can worry about who earned it or who deserves it when the world is healed. We can ask questions later. Right now, we just need to be fed.

We just need to show up at the table and grab on to all God offers. And hold on to it like our life depends on in. Because it does.

Jesus came to feed a hungry world. A world starved of grace.

And it doesn’t matter who you are, or what day it is, or how you come to the table. If this is your first time here, or your hundredth time here.

If you are hungry, you will be fed.

God offers the fullness of the kingdom over to your weary, hungry soul. No questions asked. No payment needed. Because that’s what Jesus came to do.

Amen.