Fourth Sunday of Epiphany

Mark 1:21-28

Today’s gospel is the story of an exorcism.

Most of us have only encountered exorcism in movies or books but the word evokes the image of someone who is not in control of themselves, captive to destructive demonic forces. Mark uses unclean spirit, evil spirit and demon interchangeably, and when these characters appear in his narrative, what we see are “invisible spiritual beings …[who are] alienated and hostile to God.”[i]

Our text tells us this man appears in the synagogue, alongside the worshipers who were gathered there listening to Jesus teach. I think it’s important to note that this happens in a place of worship, and not in some shadowy den of iniquity. We once may have thought churches and synagogues, mosques and temples provided an extra measure of protection against evil, but the forces that defy God manifest here too.

I thought first of the violence at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston in 2015, but also of the murders at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018 and those at the Sikh temple in Wisconsin in 2012, and historically of church bombings, like the one in 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama. Pure evil.

But even focusing on those events obscures the reality that our churches can never be fully free from sin and evil because, let’s face it, we are communities of human beings, and every one of us is simultaneously saint and sinner.

In the gospel, the man interrupts Jesus and disrupts his teaching, asking him, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us?”

Now Jesus and the people in the synagogue have a choice. It’s tempting to dismiss the man, to shoo him away so they can get back on track with their worship. Or to ignore him and say, “Well, that’s just the way he is” and hope he won’t make another outburst.

We don’t hear how the people around him reacted, but Jesus doesn’t do either of those things. Instead, when the man tells Jesus, “I know who you are, the Holy One of God." Jesus speaks to him and commands the unclean spirit to come out of the man,

and the spirit obeys.

Isn’t it surprising that the unclean spirit knows who Jesus is?

All through Mark we hear how the disciples stumble and dither, not entirely sure of what they’re doing, but the spirits hostile to God know exactly what to expect from Jesus.

Mark had already told us that the audience had expressed their astonishment at Jesus’ teaching, not for its content, which we never hear in this passage, but for his authority which Mark contrasted to that of the scribes, “the doctors of the law, the authorized biblical scholars of their time.”[ii]

The people already thought that Jesus, the laborer out of Nazareth, taught with greater authority than the learned professors.

And then they witness his encounter with the unclean spirit and their awe only increases. That’s when they say,

What is this? A new teaching-- with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.

The new teaching isn’t “new” as recent but as previously unknown or, using the word that’s become ubiquitous over the last year: unprecedented.[iii] Jesus spoke and taught differently than anyone who had come before him.

Recall how Mark began his gospel, just 20-some verses earlier, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” This exorcism is Jesus’ first act of public ministry in this gospel and it is a revelation of the authority of God in Jesus to all who witness it.

Possessed, not by an unclean spirit, but by the Spirit of God, Jesus confronts evil and rescues this man from an impossible bondage. [iv]

In baptism, we too are offered freedom from all that binds us. Maybe it’s not something as visible as an unclean spirit, but all of us wrestle with things that draw us away from God, things like addiction, pride, selfishness, unforgiveness or idolatry.

What are those things in your life that whisper your failings and faults to you, draw you into shame and leave you questioning what God has to do with you?

Whatever they are, the good news is that Jesus, the Holy One of God, does not come to destroy you, but to restore you.

You do not have to remain captive to things that are hostile or contrary to God.

In Baptism, you are given new life, marked, or possessed, by the same spirit of God that Jesus has so that you will know how much God loves you.

Let us pray…

Good and gracious God,

Thank you for your Holy One, your Son Jesus Christ

Through whom we know your abundant mercy and love.

Free us from the grip of evil, the bondage of sin and all the forces that defy you and draw us away from you.

Help us submit to your authority in every facet of our lives, that through our words and actions, we would be witnesses to your Good News in the world.

We pray in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

[i] Lamar Williamson. Mark. 50.

[ii] Williamson, 50.

[iii] Williamson, 51.

[iv] Sermon Brainwave, Epiphany 4B, January 31, 2021.

Third Sunday after Epiphany

Jonah 3:1-5, 10

Fish tales are often about the one that got away, but our first reading today is about the one that didn’t.

More than a big fish tale, it’s part of the story about the prophet Jonah being gobbled up by a whale or a big fish.

We know that Jonah was a prophet in the Northern Kingdom of Israel under King Jeroboam II who lived between 786-746 BCE, but we aren’t sure about when this book was written or who wrote it, nor are we expected to believe that a human survived three days living inside a marine mammal’s stomach and being regurgitated onto the shore. Jonah’s story is one of the places in Scripture where we can say, “It may not have happened exactly this way, but it’s true.”

Our text today begins, “The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time.” (3:1)

The first time is the part of the story you may remember from children’s Bible stories and songs.

Basically, God sent Jonah to speak to the people in a place called Nineveh. The ruins of that city are in modern northern Iraq, and what we know as we read the story now is that Nineveh later became the capital of the Assyrian empire, who were enemies of Israel and known for their violence.

God asked Jonah to go to them and tell them to repent, to turn back toward God and leave behind the evil and wickedness they were doing.

But instead of following God’s direction, Jonah flees in the opposite direction, fleeing from Nineveh, and more importantly, from God’s presence.

He doesn’t get very far though, and when the boat he is on is swamped by heavy seas, he tells the crew to throw him overboard so that they’ll be saved.

And that’s when Jonah winds up in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights. (1:17)

Our reading picks up after the whale had spat him out upon on the shore, and this time, when God speaks, Jonah listens and follows God’s direction.

He undertakes the journey to Nineveh, a city the author tells us is three days’ walk across. The three days are a common biblical unit and mirror the three days Jonah spent in the whale’s belly.

Hebrew scholar Robert Alter suggests the city’s dimensions also exaggerate the enormity of the task before Jonah, explaining that,

Clocking roughly three miles an hour, a walker could cover as much as thirty miles in a day. A city ninety miles across would be considerably larger than contemporary Los Angeles, and …no actual city in the ancient Near East could have been anywhere near that big. (1295)

But Jonah only spends one day in the city before the people of Nineveh and the king himself believed what he was saying and repented, fasting and putting on sackcloth.

In the verses that follow our reading, the author’s flair for exaggeration is on display again as we hear how the king extends the fasting and sackcloth to not only the citizens of Nineveh but also to their cattle and sheep. The bizarre but humorous image of livestock cloaked under coarse fabric and bellowing to God helps us appreciate the urgency and totality of the people’s desire to repent and return to God. (Alter, 1296)

Then the text says,

When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it. (3:10)

The people “turned back from their evil way” (Altar, 1296) and God “changed his mind” (NRSV) or “relented from the evil that He said to do to them.” (Altar, 1296)

Well done, Jonah, good and faithful servant, right?

Except Jonah isn’t content or relieved. He is angry that God has shown characteristic mercy and love to God’s people and when he sees it, he yells at God.

And then Jonah leaves the city and sulks, but God talks to Jonah about his disappointment, his anger, and his desire for vengeance. And then, overlooking the city and its inhabitants, God reminds Jonah that God is God of all the people in it, not only the Israelites, but also the Ninevites, not only the pious and obedient but also the recalcitrant.

Jonah is angry because he knew the people in Nineveh were violent and wicked, and, just as he suspected God would, God extended mercy and loving kindness to those people. Those people who defied God. Those people who –– fill in the blank. The people you don’t agree with, the people you find difficult, the people whose behaviors or appearances unsettle you.

The same God who gave Jonah a second chance, the same God who gave the Ninevites a second chance, loves those people, and that same God also loves you, with the same abounding and steadfast love and compassion that we hear in this story.

And isn’t that Good News to share with the world?

Amen.

Second Sunday after Epiphany

1 Samuel 3:1-20

Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18

John 1:43-51​

There’s a scene in “It’s a Wonderful Life” after George and the angel Clarence have dried out from their icy plunge into the river, when they go to local watering hole, a place George remembers as Martini’s. The bartender Nick owns the place now and it’s a seedier and more raucous place than George remembers. And a belligerent Nick asks George, “And that’s another thing. Where do you come off calling me Nick?”

In today’s gospel, the question Nathanael asks Jesus is, “How do you know me?” but I imagine he has that same sneer and aggravated tone as he questions Jesus. Irritated. Cynical. Skeptical. After all, he was already halfway there when Philip told him Jesus came from Nazareth. Nathanael and Philip were from Bethsaida and Nazareth would have been their hometown rival, like Shelby and Kings Mountain. Eugene Peterson, in the Message, paraphrases Nathanael’s question, saying, “Where did you get that idea? You don’t know me.”

Psalm 139’s assures us that contrary to what Nathanael, or we, may think, God does know us. The psalmist declares “You are acquainted with all my ways…Even before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it completely.” (v. 3-4) Returning to The Message, Peterson says it this way:

You know when I leave and when I get back; I’m never out of your sight. You know everything I’m going to say before I start the first sentence. I look behind me and you’re there, then up ahead and you’re there, too— your reassuring presence, coming and going. (v. 3-5)

John Ylvisaker’s hymn “Borning Cry” echoes the psalmist:

I was there to hear your borning cry, I’ll be there when you are old. I rejoiced the day you were baptized, to see your life unfold.

God formed our inward parts and knit us together in our mothers’ wombs, so, yes! God knows each one of us. (v. 13)

Despite being known by God, we can probably all recall times in our lives when we were incapable of hearing or seeing God.

When like Samuel we didn’t yet know God. The text says “visions of God were not widespread.” Whatever ministry he was engaged in, it didn’t include hearing God speak or seeing God move. It took Eli telling Samuel that the Lord was speaking for him to respond.

Or like Nathanael our own biases keep us from seeing God. When Philip first told him where Jesus was from, Nathanael was dismissive, asking, “Can anything good come out Nazareth?” Nathanael’s prejudice against Nazareth becomes an obstacle, obscuring his vision, so that he could not see God’s own Son standing right in front of him.

Or even like Eli who must have seen clearly once, serving the Lord as the temple priest, but could no longer see. While his eyes may have been clouded by cataracts or his vision may have deteriorated because of old age (2:22), the text can be read less literally. We know that Eli had allowed his sons to abuse the power of the priesthood, seizing the best offerings and laying with the women who came to present sacrifices. Perhaps his failure to hold them accountable for their selfishness and exploitation affected his ability to see the Lord clearly.

It is one thing to be known by God, and another to see or hear God. But, then, when we do hear God speak or see God’s work happening in the world around us, each of us must decide how we will respond.

Samuel, for one, is tentative. Eli tells him to answer the Lord saying, “Speak, Lord, for Your servant is listening” and Samuel responds to voice calling out to him saying, “Speak, for Your servant is listening.” Hebrew professor Robert Alter cites a sixteenth century scholar when he wonders whether Samuel drops “Lord” from his response deliberately. Was Samuel feeling skeptical or dismissive, uncertain about who he is addressing?

However, he feels initially, he listens to the Lord and then, reluctantly he delivers to Eli the dismal but unsurprising news that the Lord intends to remove Eli’s priestly authority. (Alter, 188)

Nathanael responds more immediately with adoration and praise. He is transformed when he realizes Jesus wasn’t playing games. The recognition that Jesus had seen him and knew him prompts his reply, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” (v. 49)

How will we answer God’s call to us?

This weekend we commemorate The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who would have been 92 if he had had not been assassinated in 1968 when he was only 39 years old. An Atlanta preacher, King grounded his calls for racial justice in Scripture and theology. On Friday, April 12, 1963 - Good Friday that year - King was arrested during protests in Alabama, and a few days later he wrote his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”, addressing white moderate Christians who, he charged, were “more devoted to order than to justice; who [preferred] a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice.”

King wrote critically, naming his disappointment that the very same people who he believed would be coworkers with God “have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained-glass windows.”

And he urged his audience to “repent not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.”

King’s words challenge me. I’m uncomfortable. After all, I want to be one of the “good” Christians.

I’ve learned a lot about white supremacy, systemic racism and my own biases in the last twelve years.

But I confess that when the Capitol was attacked on January 6, I knew it was wrong, evil, and sinful, but I was ignorant of the ways in which our brown and black siblings in Christ were brutalized, watching such a very different response to the non-violent protesters, and even to the violent rioters, than we have seen before.

I know I’ve quoted The Rev. Dr. Yvonne Delk before; she is the one who taught me, “What you see depends largely on where you sit.” From where I sit, I could not see what Bishop Yehiel Curry of the Metro Chicago Synod of the ELCA, saw and shared later: that, if the rioters had been brown or black, they would have been shot. I have since heard that echoed by the voices of other black and brown siblings here in North Carolina.

During the summer, after George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis, as our synod and denomination engaged in conversations about racial justice, The Rev. Dr. Shanitria Cuthbertson, who pastors Emmaus in West Charlotte, described conviction as “being convinced and confident that something is true.” The work of the Holy Spirit, conviction leads us to acknowledgment, admission, sight and Godly sorrow –a cycle of restoration.

What I experience when I hear Dr. King’s words is Holy Spirit driven conviction that helps me see how I perpetuate injustice and the sin of racism by my own appalling silence.

And this conviction leads me to Godly sorrow that our black and brown siblings whose inward parts were formed by God and who were knit together in their mothers’ wombs  ̶ siblings created in the image of God and imbued with dignity from God  ̶ have daily experiences where they are told that they have less worth or dignity than another person whose skin is fairer.

And that Godly sorrow leads me to want to love fiercely and out loud. King wrote in this same letter:

Was not Jesus an extremist in love? – “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, pray for them that despitefully use you?” Was not Amos an extremist for justice? – “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.” Was not Paul an extremist for the gospel of Jesus Christ? – “I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.” Was not Martin Luther an extremist? – “Here I stand; I can do no other so help me God.”… So the question is not whether we will be extremist, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate, or will we be extremists for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice, or will we be extremists for the cause of justice?

My prayer is that, being known by God, we will hear and see God at work around us, and respond by being extremists for love and justice.

Amen.

Baptism of our Lord

Mark 1:4-11

Today the Church celebrates the Baptism of our Lord. All four gospels have an account of Jesus being baptized by John but today we hear from Mark, whose gospel is the earliest and shortest.

Lutheran pastor Delmer Chilton has called Mark’s gospel “the Cliff Notes version” of the gospel. [i]In this account of Jesus’ baptism, we don’t hear the objection the Baptizer raises in Matthew’s gospel and we don’t have the crowd of people who Luke says are there and we don’t hear John call Jesus the Lamb of God.

What we hear is John, standing outside Jerusalem in the waters of the river Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for all who come and confess their sins. And we hear John promising that one who is stronger, mightier or more powerful is coming after him. (v. 7)

What we hear is Mark revealing who Jesus is: The Christ or Messiah. The Son of God.

And then Jesus is there and we witness his baptism, and we see and hear the heavenly acclamation:

just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11 And a voice came from heaven, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased." (verses 10-11)

As Lamar Williamson explains in his commentary on Mark, the Greek is even more vivid. He translates it as, “As Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens in the process of being ripped apart.”[ii]

The verb here skizomenos is the same word that will be used when the Temple curtain is torn in two from top to bottom when Jesus is crucified at the end of Mark’s gospel. (15:38)

Its root skizo is the same as the word that is used when the Red Sea divides to let the Israelites escape from Pharaoh’s army in Exodus 14, and the same as the word that is used to describe the division in the congregations or communities of faith in Acts 14.

Division and disunity are part of the biblical narrative from beginning to end.

But here’s the Good News: so is God.

God shows up in the divisions, the tearing apart and the rending and creates something new: 

A new ministry where the baptism is one of grace; 

a new land where the people are servants of God and one another, instead of Pharaohs, patrons or benefactors; 

a new kingdom where our allegiance is not to any one human leader or even country, but to God.

That is good news, living, as we do, in a world where the divides seem deeper and more disruptive than ever. Living as we do, when the fabric of our nation appeared to be torn and tattered on Wednesday when rioters assaulted the Capitol building in Washington, DC.

Our redeeming and reconciling God is found in the midst of the chaos.

The Acts text moves us from Jesus’ baptism to our own.

Paul tells the Ephesians, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.” (Acts 19:4)

And it is in our baptism into Christ Jesus that we are baptized into grace.

Baptism isn’t merely a sentimental ceremony that yields an opportunity for families to gather or fire insurance against a Dante-esque inferno in the life hereafter. It is a sacrament where an ordinary element is joined with God’s command and promise. In the sacrament of Holy Baptism, the ordinary element of water is joined with God’s command[iii] and the promise that “You are a child of God, sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked with the cross of Christ forever.” [iv]

Martin Luther emphasizes how baptism is a precious and inexpressible treasure that God has given us, a treasure that depends on the Word and commandment of God.[v]  In his Small Catechism, Luther asks how ordinary water can deliver all the benefits of baptism – the forgiveness of sins, redemption from death and the devil, and salvation.

Calling baptism “a grace-filled water of life” and a “bath of the new birth in the Holy Spirit” Luther reminds us that, water – the most ordinary of elements - is made holy when it is placed in the setting of God’s Word and command. It is God’s gift and action for us that is transformational.

“Baptism frees us from sin and death by uniting us to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.”[vi]  We hear this again in the words from Romans that are included in the thanksgiving for baptism in the funeral liturgy:

“When we were baptized into Christ Jesus, we were baptized into his death. We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.”[vii]

God gets all the verbs, not us. We were baptized, we were buried, and we are raised.

All through God’s grace.

In this new baptismal life, just as Jesus was commissioned into ministry to usher in the kingdom of God, we are commissioned for Christ's ministry to work for justice and peace.[viii] And in the affirmation of our baptism, when we remember what God has done, we are asked to renounce three things that corrupt justice and peace.

First, we are asked, “Do you renounce the devil and all the forces that defy God?”

Second, we are asked, Do you renounce the powers of this world that rebel against God?”

And finally, we are asked, “Do you renounce the ways of sin that draw you from God?”

The devil and the forces that defy God; the powers of this world that rebel against God; the ways of sin that draw you from God.

I renounce them. Again and again, I renounce them.

Within our congregation and denomination, we have different political views, but we must be united in renouncing the violence at the Capitol building on Wednesday. While it is not a sacred religious space, it is a hallowed space, venerated in history and as a symbol of our republic, and it was violated, needlessly and recklessly. And even more grievously, lives were lost.

But that isn’t going far enough, is it?

Because, of course, we renounce evil and sin when we see them on display in the actions of others. But that’s the easy part.

What’s even more important to my life with God though is that I renounce them fully and completely, because when I am honest, I know that these enemies of God’s justice and peace scale the walls of my heart, break through my defenses and tell me lies. Unchecked, they settle into my heart and mind and seed resentment and anger.

Thankfully, baptism promises the sustaining presence of the One who gives us a spirit of wisdom and understanding, a spirit of counsel and might, and a spirit of knowledge and fear of the Lord. The Holy Spirit empowers us to confront evil and sin, renounce and repudiate it, and with our eyes opened, see beyond it to the new thing God is doing in the midst of the chaos and division.

So, now, let us
face the schisms that divide us and tear us apart;
renounce the God-defying evil that we have witnessed;
name and confront the sin that draws us away from God;
and, let us wade into the grace filled waters,
confident of God’s life-giving promises for us all.

Let us pray.[ix]
Lord God, Heavenly Father,
Sprinkle water upon us that we might remember our baptism;
Clean us from all our uncleanness and from our idols.
Give us new hearts and put new spirits within us.
Remove our hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh.
Unite us with Your Son Jesus in the life you have given us.
Amen.

[i] 211. “Lectionary Lab Live”

[ii] Lamar Williamson. Mark. 35.

[iii] Matthew 28:19 NRS

[iv] Small Catechism, 79.

[v] Large Catechism, 463.

[vi] ELW, 227

[vii] ELW, 280; Romans 6:3-4, NRS

[viii] ELW, 237

[ix] adapted from Ezekiel 36:25-26

Second Sunday of Christmas

John 1:1-18

Happy Christmas.

On this tenth day of Christmas instead of the story of Joseph and Mary traveling to Bethlehem, the shepherds in the fields or the magi coming to see the newborn King, we hear the beginning of John’s gospel. These first eighteen verses – the prologue or opening – of the fourth gospel are a confession of faith. Equipped with the stories of the Messiah’s birth, John now shows us how Jesus’ life reveals God to us.

It’s here that we meet Jesus as logos:

the Word was with God, and the Word was God (Jn. 1:1)

the Word became flesh and lived among us (Jn. 1:14)

New Testament scholar Don Juel once wrote that “language was previously understood [not as static words on a page, but] as moving people…a force acting in the world.” ("Strange Silence of the Bible") When we say in our liturgy, “the word of the Lord” we aren’t merely providing a citation; we are saying, “This is the divine speaking to us.”

The end of verse 14 descries the logos – the Word – as full of grace and truth, and then in verse 16, John says,

From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.

Grace upon grace; grace in place of grace; gift after gift.

Reading this verse, the image that came to me was of the Russian nesting dolls in which each one contains another, and another and another. But as with many of our metaphors for God, that is too finite, too small and too neat.

The gifts of God for us are born from the grace and truth embodied in our Messiah, our Lord and Savior, Jesus. And they are one upon another, and another and another, without end.

On New Year’s Day, a prayer resource I like called “The World in Prayer” offered this prayer:

Holy One, let us hear afresh your words of life: “I AM FOR YOU.”

This belief – that God comes into the world that we here on earth may know God – is at the heart of John’s gospel. The logos – the Word that was with God and is God – is here for us.

This promise that Christmas gives us is such a simple truth and yet it is so hard for so many to believe.

The first gift we are given is love
shown to us in Jesus, enfleshed here on earth.
And in him, we are given the gift of forgiveness
where we’re invited into relationship and new life with God,
and our life is full of God’s continued gifts.

It really is as simple as the words of the children’s song, 

“Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”

I wonder whether we recognize the gifts we are given? And how God uses us in the lives of others to be gifts to them?

As followers of Jesus, we are asked to bear God’s Word and endless love out to our neighbors, community and world -that they too will know God’s abundance is for them.

For much of 2020, we had a banner in front of the church building that said, “Jesus is always with you.” It was a needed word in the midst of isolation and fear, and by our presence, we were the bearers of that word to our neighbors and community.

In November and December, our congregation shared out of our abundance, providing more than $800 and 32 boxes of food to feed hungry neighbors who visit the Shepherd’s Table at the Episcopal church down the street. People experiencing homelessness, whose jobs haven’t returned or whose need is more than they can bear alone know God’s love in a hot meal and groceries that won’t spoil.

Now, in this New Year, I wonder how we will continue to bear God’s Word and God’s love to our neighbors, community and world.

Who does not yet know the grace upon grace and gift upon gift that is God’s unending love for them?

Who has not yet heard how much God loves them, and how freely God’s gift of forgiveness is given to them?

How can we speak God’s Word – the force and movement of God’s love – through our actions?

In the midst of creating resolutions and setting intentions for the New Year, I pray we will see where we have been shown love and notice where we point to God through our love for others, and I pray that we will follow Jesus in ways that tell the world God is here for you.

Amen.