Mark 1: 21-28
When people heard Jesus speak, when they experienced Jesus in person, people sensed a unique authority or maybe we would say authenticity in Jesus’ actions and words. In the welcome words today, we heard this “We encounter that authority in God’s word, around which we gather, the word that prevails over any lesser spirit that would claim power over us, freeing us to follow Jesus.”
What are the words—in daily life, on Sunday mornings—what are the words that are God’s word to you? What are the words that sustain you in times of difficulty, that keep you from caving in to terrible fear? What are the words and actions that help you to come back to yourself at the end of the day?
As I have been preparing for the Lenten season that’s coming soon—in just over two short weeks—I have been reading a powerful book that Mike Peterson recommended to me and plans to lead us in conversation around this Lent. It’s called We Survived the End of the World: Lessons from Native America on Apocalypse and Hope. The author is Steven Charleston, who is a Choctaw elder, public figure, who has been Episcopal Bishop of Alaska, president and dean of the Episcopal Divinity School, and professor of systematic theology at Luther Seminary. He writes with incredible insight and clarity about how people have survived catastrophe. He writes about how important spiritual community is when things fall apart, as things change all around us, and I’m looking forward to these stories and insights each Wednesday this Lent.
Steven Charleston writes about surviving apocalypse. What is apocalypse? It’s used to describe catastrophes or even the end of the world, but that’s only part of the meaning. In Greek, the world means “uncover” or “reveal.” So, it might be a vision of the future, imagining what is to come. This is the same kind of writing that Mark uses to tell us about Jesus. According to David Schnasa Jacobsen, Jesus’ baptism happens after the heavens are ripped open. Then, the Spirit drives Jesus out into the wilderness to contend with Satan, hunger, beast and angels. Then, Jesus preaches that God’s kingdom is here and calls disciples out of their fishing boats immediately. Then, today Jesus is casting out demons. Everything in Mark is urgent.
What does all this mean for us, especially if “the things that threaten our world are not so much demons and ripped-open heavens but broken or [evil] systems of human construction?” Jacobsen quotes another teacher, Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, who says we are called to “steadfast resistance.”
And then Jacobsen invites us to pay attention to our bodies as we hear God’s word—this gospel of God’s work in Jesus is capable of sustaining steadfast, embodied resistance. Put another way, it’s to give us deep hope and allow us to practice even deeper love in steadfast resistance to any fear that might come our way.
Up ahead in Mark’s story is the fact that Jesus dies on a cross. And in Mark, the meaning of Jesus’ cross is not about Jesus dying for people’s sins. It is about calling a thing what it is. Jesus chose the way of weakness (not dominance) and suffering (not having it all together). This version of Jesus’ story is not about escape, but naming the world, its pain and its promise.
Jesus is not going for power and popularity but silences demons when they speak of his identity. He is humble even as his reputation grows. Jesus doesn’t dominate people but practices self-awareness.[1]
Jacobsen says, “This little scene from Mark 1… set in a synagogue on the Sabbath, is a sign of God’s reign for the real bodies in the room. It is… spoken by a Jesus who wants nothing to do with dominance schemes and good publicity. He aims with urgency to enlist disciples, and anyone else with ears to hear, in their own local practice of apocalyptic struggle.”
Finding our own local practices of steadfast resistance, of apocalyptic struggle, of inner purpose within spiritual community… this is, I think, the call of the Holy Spirit to us in 2024.
After all, we have so much evidence that things are changing all around us. On Thursday this week, half of our new Vitality Team met to do a prayer drive around our neighborhood. We were asked to watch for moments of desolation—sorrow, brokenness, fear, anxiety…
And moments of consolation—hope, healing, courage, peace…
We drove down Charles Street where we know that Kathy Harris lived for years until it finally got just too dangerous to stay. And we also reflected on neighbors who live in the historic small homes on Charles Street—and who have in fact purchased multiple houses—to live in and strategically build meaningful community. We saw the boarded-up businesses and the lack of family-owned restaurants that we remember once being here… we also saw the brand new Frogtown Community Center and the Hmongtown Market. Focus is a caring ministry of sharing meals, clothing and services with the most vulnerable, surrounded by non-profits, advocacy agencies and government buildings that are trying to influence matters throughout the whole state. This neighborhood is built to support the Minnesota State Capitol but so many people live here, too, and Ann shared that her mother described it this way, “Things might look sad in this neighborhood but people-in-need have always gathered in the shadow of the Capitol because they hope that they will be protected (it happens in every state, even in D.C.).” If this insight is true, I wonder how God is calling us to practice truth and equity alongside these neighbors gathering for protection. How do we share their hopes and question with them how our state government might better serve and protect these neighbors?
Let me end for now by inviting us to this season of accompaniment, with the quote that Steven Charleston uses at the beginning of his book, a quote from Joseph Campbell:
The mystical theme of the space age is this: the world as we know it is coming to an end. The world as the center of the universe, the world divided from the heavens, the world bound by horizons in which love is reserved for members of the in-group: that is the world that is passing away. Apocalypse does not point to a fiery Armageddon but to the fact that our ignorance and our complacency are coming to an end. –Joseph Campbell
Many people who live beyond the city of Saint Paul never drive in to our part of the city… any of us might have the cloudy view of seeing only desolation… but with God’s help, we have a new and different view. We are invited by Jesus, through the power of God’s Holy Spirit, to see things as they are… to notice both the places of desolation where Jesus is very present… and the places of consolation where God is bringing new life into being. This is the journey that we are being invited into this Epiphany, and the way of the cross we’ll go deeper into this Lent. This is how God is calling us and it’s my hope that you will join in this rich and deep, story-filled season, as we gather around God’s Holy Spirit, the stories of ancestors and our own selves--who will all work together to transform us and move us into the new reality that God is creating within and around us.
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