"Who Is This Man?"

“Who Is This Man?”
Mark 1:21-28
Rev Carolyn Waters
CCUM January 29, 2006

Mark 1:21-28
21They went to Capernaum; and when the Sabbath came, he entered the synagogue and taught. 22They were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes. 23Just then there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit, 24and he cried out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” 25But Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Be silent, and come out of him!” 26And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying with a loud voice, came out of him. 27They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, “What is this? A new teaching—with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.” 28At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.
This is the word of God for the People of God!
Thanks be to God!

Those of you close to my age, give or take maybe 10 years!!!! May remember from your early days getting home from school and turning on the TV about 4:30 in the afternoon and there in bold black and white were “Tonto and The Lone Ranger!” Every afternoon, without fail, they would arrive at the very moment of great need to assist someone in distress or avert acts of injustice. With an amazing sense of timing, it never took more than thirty minutes to save the damsel, or prevent the bad men from taking the town people’s money. And always, always before Tonto could mount his horse The Lone Ranger would ride off into the sunset always leaving a small group of kind act beneficiaries scratching their heads and saying, “Who was that masked man?”

Everyone always knew who Superman was! The Lone Ranger, on the other hand, never identified himself except by his own deeds, and then there was the mask!
There must have been some of the same confusion about Jesus. The crowds were at the synagogue to observe the Sabbath and receiving teaching from the scribes. It was a holy day like any other holy day until one teacher began to speak with a kind of authority that was unlike that of the non-tenured professors. Some were astounded by the words of this man. Others were enlightened in a way they had not been enlightened before. But one, the one that always challenged the teaching assistants at the synagogue raised his voice and tried to distract from Jesus teachings by challenging his authority to teach, and proclaiming before Jesus was ready to have the words spoken that Jesus was the “Holy One of God.” It was as if the mad one, the one with “unclean spirits” was trying to discredit Jesus by naming his source of authority. It would have been the same thing as taking the mask off the masked man.

New Testament scholar Wm Loader says this about Mark’s passage:
"Jesus silences the demon and demands he depart. The demon does so, but not without yelling at the top of his voice. The exorcism is achieved. The demoniac has been liberated. For those of us brought up with strict scientific methods such accounts of exorcism call for more informed explanations. They feel so strange that we may want to avoid them altogether. It is then very hard to appreciate Mark who has made them so central. There are ways of slipping the awkwardness we feel. The trouble is we may end up slipping past the message of Mark. However we understand exorcisms, those reported from the ancient world or from present day cultures unlike our own, something real is happening. People are being set free. Physical contortions and hugely dramatic moments will occur in many different therapies, whether the frame of thought is demonology or modern psychotherapy. "

"The important thing is liberation, setting people free. This is an essential component of the 'good news' of God's reign. It is a demonstration of what is meant when John predicts that Jesus will baptize with the Spirit. For Mark exorcising unclean spirits is a primary function of the Holy Spirit and the key element one should recognize in what Jesus is doing."

Well, Jesus started out teaching, dealt with the interruption, and then continued his teaching.
Teaching about what? We really don’t know. Actually it’s a challenge to figure out exactly what Jesus primary theme is, other than his focus on the Kingdom of God, AND his theme of liberation……….setting people free.

He was actually quite good at being who he needed to be, depending upon the situation and what was called for. Whether it was compassion for the woman at the well or a challenge to the church officials, inviting himself to eat with the tax collectors or avoiding the trappings of popularity with the masses, Jesus was able to show up and do what was needed, then move on.
Not that much unlike the Lone Ranger! He left people scratching their heads and asking “who is this?” “What exactly is going on here?” But unlike the Lone Ranger, he was not afraid to identify himself as the “Son of the Living God.” And unlike the Lone Ranger, he still leaves me scratching my head and asking “Who exactly is this man?”

Loader makes a wonderful statement at the end of his commentary on Mark 1:21-28. He says our challenge is to create the space, the ‘synagogue’, "where our madness can come face to face with the holiness of Jesus. That also means coming to terms with our own madness."

In other words in order to consider the depth of Jesus teachings and actually receive something significant from them, our own madness must come to the surface and encounter the holiness of who Jesus is. Loader says that means we must “come to terms with our own madness!” Wait just a minute. Do I really want to go there? Isn’t it much easier to have an understanding of a Jesus who rides in on a beautiful horse and takes care of the sins of the world, then rides off into the sunset leaving me to benefit from his having been here?

What about this Jesus that might challenge me to face my “own madness?” What am I to do with this Jesus that challenges me to look at myself and my part in the brokenness of my world and the world about me?

Just in case you are having trouble identifying any brokenness in your world hear this true story as told by Diane Carman in her column last Friday in the Denver Post:

By virtue of her age and her diminutive stature, 85-year-old Ellie Lindecrantz surely qualifies as a little old lady. Nobody would dare call her that, though. She's made of tougher stuff.
Still, occasionally everybody needs help, and on Monday it was Ellie's turn.

She had arrived at Denver International Airport about 1:30 p.m. to catch a 3:09 flight to Florida. She has serious coronary artery disease and has found that spending a few months of the year at sea level works wonders. Her husband had driven their car down and planned to meet her at the airport when she arrived.

Ellie had requested a wheelchair to take her to the gate and was waiting under the arrival/departure screens when she started to feel chest pains. "I hurt a lot," she said. "I knew I needed help."

A young man stopped to look at the screens overhead. "I said I had severe chest pains and really needed some help," she said. "The man said, 'I hope you feel better,' and walked away."
Ellie had four nitroglycerin tablets in her pocket. She took one, but the pain continued.
She called to another person nearby asking for help. She just needed to get to the airport urgent-care facility, she said.

The woman kept walking.

Ellie took another nitro.

The wheelchair still hadn't arrived, she was still hurting, and she was getting scared, so Ellie took a few steps toward a woman wearing a uniform and monitoring the lines at the ticket counter. "I said that I really needed somebody to help me," Ellie said.
The woman looked at her ticket and said, "You should ask American Airlines to help you."

Ellie sat down. She took another nitro, but the pain was severe and she was beginning to panic, so she called her daughter, Greta Lindecrantz, on her cellphone.

Greta was in her car, driving to Golden, but she dialed 911 immediately. The Lakewood dispatcher picked up the call and patched it through to Denver, which transferred her to DIA dispatch.
"I told the person where my mother was, that she was having heart pain and that she needed help," Greta said. "He said, 'We haven't had any emergency calls.'
"This is an emergency call," Greta told him. "My mother needs help."
"What do you want me to do about it?" said the call-taker.

In the meantime, Ellie, alone in a crowded airport, had taken her last nitro. She still had chest pains. It had been nearly 30 minutes, and she was frightened.

Finally, the wheelchair attendant arrived.

"I told him that I needed to go to the medical part of the airport right away," Ellie said. But he didn't understand. The attendant didn't speak English.

He could tell that something was wrong, though, so he took her to another airport worker, a friend who could translate for them. As soon as he knew what she needed, the attendant sped her through the crowds to the infirmary, where she was stabilized and dispatched by ambulance to the hospital.

"It was not a good experience," Ellie said later from her bed at Exempla St. Joseph Hospital.
The worst part for her was the sense of abandonment.

The throbbing swarm of human activity was devoid of humanity. Ordinary people looked the other way as she pleaded for someone to help save her life.

They were in a hurry.

They had planes to catch.

"Everybody is very busy," Ellie said. "I realize this. But we're not people anymore. We don't have time to be people."

In a culture obsessed with time, the airport scene rises above ordinary punctiliousness. It is the pinnacle of self- important, buzzing, on-time activity.

And it's the pits of human kindness.

Ellie will be back there soon. She hoped to be released from the hospital late Thursday, and when she gets the OK from her doctor, she'll try again to fly to Florida.
But this time she'll take a friend with her all the way to Fort Myers. It's the only way she can be sure someone will be there who's not too busy to care.

“We’re not people anymore. We don’t have time to be people.”
Maybe this man Jesus, can once again teach us how to be people.

A Little Get Up And Go

“A Little Get Up And Go”
Mark 1:14-20
January 22, 2006 CCUM
Rev. Carolyn Waters

Don’t you think it would have been exciting to have had the opportunity to have actually been one of the guys out fishing that day, doing their usual tasks of making their living, working as on any other day, chatting about the weather, the pending rain storm or the upcoming Broncos game………..and out of nowhere, completely unexpected comes this stranger that’s been the talk of the town, walks up to the guys with their fishing nets and says, “come with me! Leave all this behind. Are we ever going to be in for a ride! This is something you really won’t want to miss out on, come, follow me.”

Wow! Talk about a life changing experience!

Really, think about it. Wouldn’t it have been an amazing thing to have actually had the real life experience of being approached by the man Jesus and invited to join in on his little escapade. You would not have had any idea what would happen. You would not have known that where you were going to eat, or sleep, or what you were going to wear. You would not have know what you might experience or what history you would be making.

You would have simply been invited to take a pass for the day on mending your nets and going out later in the night to fish and swat mosquitoes!

Would you have gone? Or is it easier to just fantasize about what it might have been like to be invited!

I’ve always been one for taking adventures. I’ve always been one for doing things that other people don’t do. That’s probably why I played trombone in Junior High and High School band. One of two girls in a sea of football players at the district band events! But the two of us who were not football players always won out for first part, ahead of the football players. And then there was the bus-driving career I had the last two years of high school. It’s the way the busses got driven in my small town, but again it was usually the guys. This particular year three girls went to bus-driving school. We were the only three out of 200 high school guys on the college campus for two weeks being trained and laughed at. We passed in the upper 5%…..1/3 of the group failed. We drove the buses!

And then there’s the whole chapter of going into ministry when “women” just didn’t do that. There were times in the past 30 years that I thought I should have listed to that warning, and taken another path………..but in the current analysis of my life, I’m glad I didn’t.

In many ways it feels like my life had been one adventure after another. Moving from state to state, place to place, congregation to congregation, football team to football team………..constant change, constant growth, lots of adventure, a number of bad mistakes, and many opportunities.

Would I have gotten up from my comfortable position as first part fisherwoman net repair person and followed Jesus?

Well, let me think about that one for a moment!

What did this guy look like?

What kind of job security did he offer?

How was the pension fund doing in the current market?

Did his Masters of Divinity come from an accredited institution of higher learning?

Were the other followers intelligent people?

Had he made a fool of himself in public places?

By the time I finished checking his references, my guess is that he would have passed me by and gone down the fishing bank to more willing listeners and potential followers.

I’d like to imagine that I would have followed reckless abandon and just gotten up and walked. No questions asked.

An adventure of a lifetime I think…. it would have been.

William Loader, one of my favorite NT scholars, says that “the calling of James and John and Simon and Andrew to leave all and follow……….function as a protest not against life at home, but more generally against societal structures which simply perpetuate the past and trap people into the service of the status quo and its gods. But Jesus’ socially disruptive call upset the system not only for those called but also for those left behind. It called for a new way of looking at life, wherever you are. There is a new set of priorities. This means changed values, but it is more than that. It means a new god, or better, a return to the God of compassion and justice.” “That,” Loader says, “will make a huge difference wherever we are.”

So my own answer to my pondering about whether I would have gotten up and gotten on with following Jesus is that either way, I would have been changed because of who Jesus is. Whether I followed him then or stayed behind, whether I follow him now, or stay behind………….I am not the same person and the world is not the same place because he was.

And because he was, I am a different person than who I might have been had he not been.

So in my pondering if I would have followed if invited, the answer seems obvious that I have, that I am, that I did.

And you? What about you?

Did you, are you, have you followed? Or have you been invited to follow?

Follow what? In the footsteps, in the intention, giving up anything at all or choosing in any way to live your life differently because of who this man was……………do you follow this person?

Dallas Willard is a professor of philosophy at the University of Southern California and author of a popular book about four years ago, The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God says of discipleship or following:

“A disciple or apprentice is simply someone who has decided to be with another person, under appropriate conditions, in order to become capable of doing what that person does or to become what that person is.”

Ok, so I’d follow this man Jesus in order to do what he does? I don’t know about that. Don’t know that I’d be interested in that job description! Don’t think I like the retirement plan.
What else does Willard say about discipleship and following Jesus?
Hear his words continue:

“How does this apply to discipleship to Jesus? What is it, exactly, that he, the incarnate Lord, does? What, if you wish, is he "good at"? The answer is found in the Gospels: he lives in the kingdom of God, and he applies that kingdom for the good of others and even makes it possible for them to enter it themselves. The deeper theological truths about his person and his work do not detract from this simple point. It is what he calls us to by saying, "Follow me."
Ok, let me re-think this for a moment or a life-time. What Jesus does is that he lives in the Kingdom of God, and following him is about my learning how to live in the kingdom of God. That might be a life description that I can accept. So following Jesus and doing what he does is about living in the Kingdom of God.

What else? What about me?

Willard says:
“Another important way of putting this is to say that I am learning from Jesus to live my life as he would live life if he were I. I am not necessarily learning to do everything he did, but I am learning how to do everything I do in the manner in which he did all that he did.”
That a nice fresh twist on WWJD. Rather than pretending to live out “What would Jesus Do,” I live out what will Carolyn do learning from What Jesus Did?” WWCDLFWJD! Think it could catch on? Except that you have to put your name in there, not mine!
Willard continues:

“So as his disciple I am not necessarily learning how to do special religious things, either as a part of "full-time service" or as a part of "part-time service." My discipleship to Jesus is, within, clearly definable limits, not a matter of what I do, but of how I do it. And it covers everything, "religious" or not.”

Just wondering, does anyone have the energy, or the time, or the interest….or the desire….To Get Up and Go?

"Anything Different?"

“Anything Different?”
January 8, 2006 CCUM
Rev Carolyn Waters

Welcome back! It’s really good to see you! It’s really good to be here!

Welcome back! Back from the holidays! Back from trips here and there! Perhaps back from taking a little time off from the regulars of your life…………..Welcome back!

But especially I say welcome back to the routine, to the things in your life that are regular!

If there is such a thing!

It’s January, a good time to lie dormant and reflect on what is. A great time to finish up indoor projects, an appropriate time to hope for a snow day. In the tradition of the church year, or the liturgical calendar, we are in Epiphany! The season when we remember the light of the star that guided the Wise One’s on their new spiritual path. The season when we rehearse the baptism of Jesus and are asked to remember our own baptism. And its just early enough in a new calendar year to be challenged to set new goals for ourselves or to make changes for the year ahead. I like this month more and more.

Last week I went to get a new driver’s license. As I was answering those familiar questions of height, weight, eye and hair color something happened to me that had never happened before. I’m not talking about a sudden desire to tell the truth about my weight, rather the shock came when the young woman behind the counter ask for hair color. I said brown. Then I said, “or is it grey?” She just looked at me and smiled! Then I said, I’ve never put down grey, what do you think?” She smiled again and said with a sheepish grin, “I think maybe it’s grey!”

Great! Now I have grey hair instead of brown! I still think I have a long way to go to catch up with some of the rest of you, but it’s a significant change for me!

If change and transformation are not a part of what pushes or pulls you into a new year, then you are missing a wonderful opportunity for self-assessment and reflection.

In the reading from Acts Paul questions the disciples who are with him and asks: “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” A number of things can be read into that question, but the one that I think makes the most sense to reflect on would be this, “Since you became believers, is anything different?”

Paul was checking out the source of their baptism or the point of their becoming believers, to make sure they knew about Jesus. And further, he wanted to make sure that if they were baptized, then something about their life had changed. It would not have been possible to have “received the holy spirit,” and stay the same person as you were before receiving the holy spirit.

The question I take from Paul’s encounter with the followers is simply, “Is anything different?” Is anything different about your life now than it was before? Is anything different today than it was a year ago? Is there any part of life that because you say you believe in Christ, has changed?

In a scene from “Walk the Line” the current film portraying the life of Johnny Cash; young Cash goes into a small recording studio in Memphis a shy young man with a dream to sing but with little confidence or passion about life. The experienced recording producer, that has young Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Louis pictures on his wall, listens to JR Cash sing an old gospel tune. He stops Cash and asks if there is anything else he could sing. Johnny is offended that the man doesn’t want gospel music. The producer says, “you have to sing it like you believe it.” Johnny was insulted again, feeling this man was accusing him of not believing in God, which may have very well been the case. The producer kept pushing Johnny, “sing me a song and make me believe you believe what you are singing.” And then he said something to the effect of, “It doesn’t matter if you believe in God, what matters is whether or not you believe in yourself.”

Cash was angry, and he started to sing. He started to sing with passion, with conviction, with a purpose and meaning. On that day, he recorded his first record.

I have always believed that life lived without passion is flat, kind of like the absence of the Holy Spirit! And I also agree that the content of our belief is not the most important aspect, rather the importance of our belief has to do with the extent to which our belief shapes and changes us, transforms us into “new beings” or grounds us in our own convictions. And from that grounding place, from that baptismal place, what we say we believe is reflected in who we are………………and who we are is reflected in whether or not we believe enough in ourselves to live out the unique spark of who God created and gifted us to be.

So my question to you; is there anything different about who you are since the last time you said that you are a believer?

Much like the question Paul asked the disciples, is anything different, has anything changed, have you received the Holy Spirit? Or are you in the process of undergoing transformation? Is you hair getting grey?

A book called Tales of a Female Nomad by Rita Golden Gelman the ever-popular author of the children’s book More Spaghetti, I Say! is a delightful read about her life path taken after a divorce in her 40’s. For the past eighteen years she has lived as a nomad in the world without a permanent address and no more possessions than she can carry on her back. Midway through her story she says this:

"As a kid I sought spirituality in the synagogue, but I found words, music, social events, and fundraising. The rituals, the social stuff, and the camaraderie were great, but I never felt spiritual."

"I have also looked in Protestant, Catholic, Unitarian, and Quaker church. I looked in Nicaragua at the First Communion of Marco’s daughter. The setting was right: the chapel was dimly lit, the voice of the priest was soothing, and the sun-illuminated stained-glass windows told me that this was a holy place. But I didn’t feel anything spiritual. Not inside or outside. Any my Israeli experience wasn’t even close."

"In Palenque, considered by many to be a particularly spiritual place, I felt the presence of the ancient Mayans, but it was the dramatic history of the people that set off my imagination, and not really anything spiritual."

"Little do I know, as my plane flies over the Pacific Ocean, how deep and intensely spiritual my Bali experience is going to be."
p. 136-137

Rita Gelman tried to find spirituality in all the right places, but finally found her spiritual life deep within herself, with the help of a wise teacher that taught her how to look, to listen, to reflect, and to be open.

I tremble with trepidation at the thought of being responsible for your ability or inability to touch the holy that is all about you. I also tremble with the responsibility as a pastor and preacher to do the best job I know how to awaken and open you to what is already in front of you.

Paul asked his disciples if they had received the Holy Spirit. I ask you if your faith journey has made any difference in your life, if you are living in a world of change and transformation from the inside out.

What are you living for? What are you moving towards? How do you love? In what ways do you give? How have you changed? What have you learned? What difference does your life make? And is there any desire within you, to see beyond this day to something new, something challenging, and something that will awaken your soul, a journey that could change your life?

Who will go with you? Who are the people who you will tell your story to and create new chapters with?

It’s a new year. Is anything different?