Stuck in the Middle
Gramps49
Shipmate
Next week I get to preach. The appointed RCL passage is Mark 3: 20-30, but I am thinking about extending it to the end of the chapter because it makes more sense to have the family looking for Jesus as the bookends of the story.
Now here is my struggle, obviously, the first audience saw the world through a spiritual dualistic world. Now, that prism is not as clear these days. Now I do not want to get into a long discussion about whether or not Beelzebub or his demons exist. I want to focus more how people tend to divide over new ideas or situations. For instance, the pandemic caused a lot of stress for individuals, families, faith communities, and even nations almost to the breaking point -- a house divided. Now is the time to bring things back together again, in my view.
But I want to ask you, what do you get out of the story? What do you think it conveys. In other words, if you were the preacher, what would your sermon be?
20 Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. 21 When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”
22 And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons.”
23 So Jesus called them over to him and began to speak to them in parables: “How can Satan drive out Satan? 24 If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. 25 If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. 26 And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come. 27 In fact, no one can enter a strong man’s house without first tying him up. Then he can plunder the strong man’s house. 28 Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, 29 but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.”
30 He said this because they were saying, “He has an impure spirit.”
31 Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. 32 A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, “Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.”
33 “Who are my mother and my brothers?” he asked.
34 Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! 35 Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”
Now here is my struggle, obviously, the first audience saw the world through a spiritual dualistic world. Now, that prism is not as clear these days. Now I do not want to get into a long discussion about whether or not Beelzebub or his demons exist. I want to focus more how people tend to divide over new ideas or situations. For instance, the pandemic caused a lot of stress for individuals, families, faith communities, and even nations almost to the breaking point -- a house divided. Now is the time to bring things back together again, in my view.
But I want to ask you, what do you get out of the story? What do you think it conveys. In other words, if you were the preacher, what would your sermon be?
Comments
I’m in the germination stage, but I’m probably going with that connection - whoever does the will of God is within the family of God - and tie it in with our vision of an inclusive church.
On the other hand, see if you can find Original Blessing: Putting Sin In Its Rightful Place by Danielle Shroyer It is really a quick read and presents the story in a much different light.
The point is that the “teachers of the law” were calling Jesus evil because he was challenging and casting out evil. And Jesus’s point with the house divided bit was that obviously he is not evil because evil would not challenge evil and cannot fight evil, cannot fight itself, without destroying itself. They are speaking nonsense. He then challenges those teachers with a warning—that it is a dangerously serious thing to do as they have done and call the work of God evil.
An interesting thing is that the teachers of the law aren’t talking to Jesus when they say he’s possessed. They seem to be talking either to some in the crowd, and Jesus hears and calls them over. But what they had to say is paired, in a way, with what Jesus’s family had to say that Jesus had “gone out of his mind.” So Jesus’s family is also attributing his actions to something over than God. And what he says on their arrival is paired with the warning he gave teachers of the law, when he says that his true family are those who do God’s will.
Given all of that, I think I’d be inclined to focus in some way on watching for what God is doing in the world and who is doing God’s will in the world, and on being part of that work. In other words, on being the family of Christ in the world. I’d probably connect that to the challenges that have arisen during the pandemic and to the needs that have been exposed, or exposed more urgently—particularly in terms of racism, inequality and injustice in the US.
But you know your congregation, and I’m convinced the best preaching comes is in “conversation” with the congregation—not in the sense of being co-written, as it were, but in the sense that the preaching is rooted both in Scripture and in the life and needs, the wounds and hopes of the congregation and the place it is in. So ultimately, I’d say go the direction in which you are led.
There seems to be something missing here. Why would they say that he was out of his mind?
It would appear that Mary had not told his family that Yesus was 'special' and they had not noticed anything special in his first 30 years
Evil will beget evil, but surely only the good fights it?
The problem with your idea, Enoch, is that it does not fit the theology of my denomination. It is not about letting Jesus' love in, it invades us even when we do not want it. I think the comment about the unforgivable sin goes to what the scribes were saying. I am not sure it applies to today.
When we looked back through the previous two chapters, we got a whole lot of stuff. There was the homeowner left with a hole in his/her roof and a huge mess to clean up (aka the healing of the paralyzed man); the fight in the synagogue (aka the healing of the man with a withered hand); Jesus' decision to take a notorious evildoer as a daily close associate (the calling of Levi); Jesus' attendance at a meeting of criminals and lowlifes (the banquet at Levi's house); Jesus' refusal to stick to bare minimum decency in public, AND his unprovoked insults to the religious leaders, who were just doing their duty (aka "Why don't your disciples follow the tradition of the elders?" and handwashing).
If you look at these episodes from Mark's point of view, the God point of view--well, the gospel aspect is highlighted and we can totally see and agree with what Jesus is doing. But if you take it from the viewpoint of the neighborhood gossips, it becomes clear that "our sweet, gentle Jesus" has gotten into bad company and gone completely round the bend, who would have thought it, a brawl with the clergy, how embarrassing, and on the Sabbath itself! Oh no, he must be out of his mind, we've never had anything like this in the family before, property damage and whores and traitors, <swoons>.
I'm not surprised Jesus' family had a hissy fit. Reputation is everything to most people, and watching Jesus throw his to the four winds as he concentrated on REALLY helping people, well....
My sermon on Genesis 3 isn’t going to be very conventional, but that’s another tangent.
My understanding of the incident in the Garden is changing. Not sure where it is right now, so I would not want to broach the subject in a sermon. I can point out, that there is no "Fall" or "Rebellion" in Judaism, nor is there one in Eastern Orthodox. I think Judaism says what happened was the maturing of the human race.
In any case, there is sort of a joke within the story. After Adam and Eve realized they were naked and had to cover up, they used fig leaves. Well, fig oil is an irritant to human skin. So, not only were they trying to hide from God, they were probably wishing they had Calamine Lotion available. No wonder God make animal skins for them.
At one point I kind of got into the weeds with the religious authorities thing. But everyone said it was a good sermon.
The times I have preached in black churches I got to learn as long as everyone is saying something like "Amen" they are tracking you well. As soon as you hear, "Help him, Jesus," you are having problems. I was definitely having problems in the middle, but I think I recovered well at the end.
Thank you for asking, Nick.
(And at least “Help him, Jesus!” shows they’re still listening.
Like LC said, Jesus rather turned this on its head, by touching unclean people and refusing to obey purity laws. He was effectively showing that his purity overruled the impure. The argument he has in this chapter shows the trouble that people had believing this could happen.
I thought that was an interesting take on Jesus's ministry. Previously I'd mostly heard his healings etc glossed as "He was proving who he was".
Later Ezekiel (chapter 46:20) makes just the opposite decision, with the divine messenger telling Ezekiel that transmitting holiness is in fact a thing (and giving instructions on how to avoid it).
Jesus appears to come down on Ezekiel's side through his whole behavior and attitudes. Which must have frustrated the leaders no end.
10 On the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lordcame to the prophet Haggai: 11 “This is what the LordAlmighty says: ‘Ask the priests what the law says: 12 If someone carries consecrated meat in the fold of their garment, and that fold touches some bread or stew, some wine, olive oil or other food, does it become consecrated?’ ”
The priests answered, “No.”
Consecrated meat > fold > food != consecrated food
Ezekiel 46:20 Then said he unto me, This is the place where the priests shall boil the trespass offering and the sin offering, where they shall bake the meat offering; that they bear them not out into the utter court, to sanctify the people.
Consecrated meat > outer court = consecrated people (if they partake of it)
I find these sort of discrepancies interesting, but not worrying. The Bible has many parts which disagree with or are an overturning of accepted tradition.
Matthew's take on Jesus' approach to this in Matt 15 is
"10 Then he called the crowd to him and said to them, ‘Listen and understand: 11it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles.’ 12Then the disciples approached and said to him, ‘Do you know that the Pharisees took offence when they heard what you said?’"