Pentecost 4

May my words and my thoughts be acceptable to you, O Lord, my refuge and my redeemer. (Psalm 19:14)

SEASON: Pentecost 4
PROPER: 9 B
PLACE: St. John’s Episcopal Church, Kingsville
DATE: July 6, 2003


TEXT: Mark 6:1-6 – Rejection by Jesus’ Hometown
Then Jesus said to them, “Prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house.” . . . . And he was amazed at their unbelief. Then he went about among the villages teaching.

ISSUE: The passage tells of how Jesus was rejected by some of the people closest to him, and he was amazed at their unbelief. Yet he persisted in his ministry at great risk, and a few people followed him, and a few joined his movement but stayed at home. We must not forget that he brought something new and demanding in the Gospel of love, and preaching hope to the poor and disenfranchised. The church folk of today must not become too familiar and comfortable, or we are like his closest family and friends. Mark presents a challenge to rethink you position and join with the active ministry of Jesus Christ, proclaiming the Good News today.
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In today’s reading from the narrative of Matthew, Jesus comes home to his own. In the past weeks of readings from Mark’s Gospel account, Jesus has calmed a storm, expelling the evil spirits, saving his disciples from the elements. He exorcised, or restored is better, the Greek Demoniac in the Gerasenes. He has raised Jarius’ daughter from the dead, and raised a woman who was unclean for twelve years in Jewish territory. His ministry of healing, restoration, and his bringing of some unique peace to his own has been presented as one unique and dynamic ministry, constantly on the move, and touch the lives of Greeks and Jews, men and women (in a man’s world). Mark manifest Jesus Christ as Son of the living God, bring Good News and hope to the world. HE is fine wise sage, a prophet of hope, and a folk healer touch humans and their human spirits.
In sharp contrast he comes to his hometown, and cannot do a thing. It is as if he becomes impotent in Nazareth, except he heals a few. His closest family and friends take offense at him. From the perspective of the 1st century Middle Eastern culture, Jesus is really quite radical. In fact he was thought to be maybe even a little mad by his own family. Earlier in Mark’s Gospel account (Mk 3:20-21) Jesus family sets out to bring him home from a large dinner gathering, because people were saying, “He’s gone mad!” Here in Nazareth, his place in the society is challenged. Who does he think he is? Where does he get such wisdom in his sayings? The greatest of insults by family and friends is when they refer to him as Mary’s son, intimating that he was an illegitimate offspring.
There are some scholars who seem to think that the rift between Jesus and his family may reflect some very early rift in the early Christian movement (William Loader: Pentecost 4, 2003), in which Jesus’ brother James may have taken some early leadership. This interpretation is only speculation. What Jesus does in his ministry is what was thought to be deviant behavior. He leaves family and friends behind to begin his ministry, as a kind of renegade kid. Appropriately, he should have been at home taking care of his mother and younger brothers and sisters. Notice the listing of the names of the brothers: James, Joses, Judas, and Simon. (It was a man’s world; therefore, the sister’s names are not listed.) There is, of course, considerable resentment that he would dare to teach them or speak in their local synagogue. Who does he think he is? He is essentially little more than a carpenter and/or stonemason, a laborer. Yet he travels from town to town with a select few and spends time in the wilderness alone, in close proximity to evil spirits. From the point of view of his town and family, Jesus is really quite deviant and dares to step out of his assigned place. As a sage, a teacher, a healer, he has no honor, and honor was the highest value of the time, in his own hometown, and thus, the proverb: Prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house.” He was amazed at their unbelief, and moves on to other towns and villages teaching.
Consider the opposition that Jesus faced. The Pharisees frequently challenged him, for his teachings that challenged some of their teachings of the time. It was not even that he was so radical but sometimes he gave a new and improved slant about what the law actually meant in terms of keeping the law with compassion and love. He was challenged by people who thought Jesus was deviant in his teachings and behaviors: his traveling, leaving family, his enchantment with the wilderness where he had no fear of evil spirits and used quiet remote places for prayer, meditation, sabbath rest. Remember that in the wilderness places Jesus fed folk spiritually as at the feeding of the 5,000 and the Sermon on the Mount, and on wilderness a mountaintop he was transfigured in the presence of Moses and Elijah. Yet all this was considered deviant behavior, and challenged his honor and status. His arrest and condemnation to crucifixion was a quite dishonorable position that caused many to turn against him in the end. In fact, in Luke’s account (Luke 4:18) of Jesus’ visit to Nazareth, the people run him out of town and attempt to push him over a cliff! He knew throughout his ministry considerable resistance. He is amazed at their unbelief.
What we might say today is that “Familiarity breeds contempt.” There is a basic assumption in many of our local American communities today that everybody, or at least a very large part of our communities, are a members of the folk American-Christian Church. And we becomes settled in to a kind of apathetic, lackadaisical, comfortable acceptance of our Christianity, which by and large gives us a secure feeling of our place in the Kingdom of God, and something of great discomfort when we are confronted by the changes that come in the world, or when there is a more specific demand upon our attention to live a lively and active commitment to the presence of Jesus Christ in our lives.
Many folk will admit to their commitment to Christianity. But when the going sometimes gets tough, demanding, or uncertain, there is a grabbing for exceptions to the rules. For instance, we all know that we ought not to be prejudiced, and that Jesus commanded a love, an understanding for all people, and an acceptance for all of God’s people. It took a very long time for the American people to adjust their thinking about the African-American people living in this country. Many Christians were very resistant to, and still are, to that awareness of how powerful white people dehumanized others because of the color of their skin. It was a time for repentance and renewal, and a harder look at our Christian belief system. Human consciences had to be shaken.
Right now, there is considerable debate in the nation, because of the Supreme Court decision regarding the place of gay and lesbian people in our society, as regarding their privacy rights. It is being debated in the church as well, and perhaps some day there will be some kind of resolution to this issue that seems at times to be in conflict with our morality, and with a new sense of morality on this issue. I hear Christian clergy saying that gay rights, and their rights to privacy are detrimental to the well being of family life in this country. From my own point of view, the people that I know who are practicing Gay and Lesbian people live in very stable family relationships, both between themselves and with their extended families. They make good homes, pay their taxes, sometimes adopt children, work hard, and contribute to their respective communities. Are there bad gays and lesbians? Maybe so. But my God look at the mess of so many of the broken disastrous homes of straight people ruined by alcoholism, drug addiction, adultery, and just down right stupidity and immaturity. We condemn others to take our attention away from our own need for redemption, change, and healing. The Gospel of Christ is about understanding, compassion, and an acceptance of people that are different. The sin in this situation is not so much whether a person is gay or lesbian. The sin seems more importantly to reside in sexual promiscuity in all people, and how people are used, abused, and humiliated, and treated like animals rather than humans with dignity. It must be wonderful to know everything already, and to have all insights, and never have to grow, think, or change. All of which seems a bit unreal to me.
Surely, we have all heard some good person say, I know I am supposed to forgive Uncle Joe, but I will not forgive him for as long as I live. That’s a far cry from the standard of forgiving one another 70 times 7, and a far cry from “Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.”
Christian people, overly involved with their own lives, will say that they don’t have time to walk and extra mile with someone in need. They can’t turn the other cheek. That doesn’t work; it’s a little much for Jesus to ask. You have to live and act from a position of power and strength against you enemies is the lead banner of much American thinking. Yet Jesus and St. Paul’s teachings clearly stated that when one was weak, then were they truly strong. It is not in the flinging of weaponry around that heals the world’s conflicts; it is ultimately negotiation and understanding. War has become the world’s vicious cycle.
Jesus also taught generosity and sacrifice, recognizing the abundances come from God. Sacrifice and generous giving is not exactly what many Christians have in mind in light of Jesus’ command to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, or at a minimum to share an extra sweater.
Jesus had a wonderfully unique understanding in his own time of what was truly honorable. Honor was the main virtue of the time. You would do anything to preserve you honor including lying. Repeatedly the Gospel accounts speak of Jesus as saying, “Truly, truly, I say to you . . . . . .” Speak the truth is what is implied here. Truth is honorable for Jesus.
His precious Sermon on the Mount tells of what Jesus saw as truly, honestly honorable in the eyes and sight of God: It was the poor that were honorable, not the self-righteous shot shots who looked down on others. It was those who mourned, who had known suffering. Those who sought the truer purity of God in terms of what came out rather than what you put into yourself. Those who strived in their world for justice and what was right for all people exhibited true honor. It goes without saying that Jesus played havoc with the standards of the time.
The resistance and the rebellion often expressed to the Gospel teachings of our Lord are sometimes every bit as real today as they were in the first century. It is not just against God, or even lack of literal belief in Scripture that is offensive to our Christian faith. It is apathy, complacency, self-satisfaction, knowing-it-all without reflection and openness to possible change that offends and minimizes the true effectiveness of our ministries, and our faith, loyalty, and trust in God. He was amazed at their unbelief, their lack of belief that what came from God was the measure of true honor: that love, forgiveness, compassion, mercy, giving, sacrifice, thinking, praying, reflection, meditation, caring, concern for justice were not seen as the stuff that truly honors God.
. Good works, self-righteousness, being right, or even our high standards of morality are not what save the world and us. We are saved, redeemed, enlightened by our belief in the way of Jesus Christ as our Lord and Master, Teacher of true honor.