10am Sunday Sept 29 2024 Fr Bruce White presiding

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Sermon Transcript: Proper 21B September 29, 2024 Mark: 9:38-50 St. Raphael’s What if this is a person’s first Sunday in church--is there any good news? anywhere? The Book of Esther is the story of God looking out for the people of Israel and saving them from the more powerful Persians. It doesn’t come right out and say it was God. In fact, Esther is one of two books of the Bible that doesn’t even mention God. Anybody want to guess at the other? Song of Songs. But, what do we read about in Esther? Israel’s main tormentor being hanged. Israel is saved, but what of God's other created one. The Book of James mentions God often, but so rarely does it specifically point to Jesus, that some have suggested that it was originally a Jewish work that an editor got hold of and added something about Jesus in a few places so that it got included in the NT. And then there’s the gospel with all that talk about putting a millstone around your neck and being thrown into the sea, or cutting off arms and legs or poking out eyes. What was the lectionary committee thinking? Having gone through a seminar in my last parish with about 30 parishioners, with the focus on incorporating newcomers, I wonder what they must think. Will the good news will have to wait for another Sunday? Now, as I sat down with these lessons the gospel text reminded me of a time in the Education for Ministry session a few years back when we were critiquing one of the books. One man, an author himself, made the observation that the author must have used 3 X 5 index cards for his notes and included every one in his book. New paragraph, completely new topic. Mark has reached a point in his telling where Jesus will soon be going to Jerusalem and there are a few random sayings of his that he wants to include. So he puts a lot of them here. As Mark tells the full story of Jesus, about half way through is the smaller story of the Transfiguration. Peter and James and John are invited to follow Jesus up a mountain where his clothes turn bright white and Elijah and Moses appear beside Jesus. When the four come back down, they are met by the rest of the disciples with the tale of them trying to cast out demons, but not being able to. Earlier, they had been sent out by twos on mission trips and they report that they had cast out demons, but not this time. Today’s reading has to be seen in light of that. Jesus has returned to Capernaum, his home base for the last time and John reports: “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons. We tried to stop him because he was not following us.” I wonder whether the disciples were falling into the same trap that Israel had. God had chosen Israel to be his people so that all the world would be blessed. But Israel wanted God for themselves, to put them on top and all the other nations to serve them. Were the disciples trying to keep Jesus for themselves? Their argument about who was the greatest among them might lead us to think so. Or, were they simply worried about appearances. They couldn’t cast out a demon, because they had forgotten to pray first, and here is someone not of their group doing what they couldn’t. Our objective in spreading God’s kingdom is not to steal parishioners from the Lutherans or the Methodists but to bring in the un-churched. The facts are that few denominations are actually reaching out to the un-churched. We don’t have any problems working alongside those other denominations, but for most of the televangelists I might want to point to a millstone. Yet, isn’t that me trying to keep Jesus for myself. The unnamed person is casting out demons in Jesus’ name. He or she is a follower, but not one of us according to the disciples, not one of the “in” crowd. Someone is changing lives, restoring community and overcoming evil forces, all in Jesus’ name. Our response cannot be, “we’ve never done it that way”. Whoever is not against us, is for us. The second paragraph seems to follow the reading we heard last week. Jesus has brought a little child into their group. This is who you need to be looking out for: the weakest, the least fortunate; those that can’t help themselves. Causing one of them to stumble should cause us to look at ourselves to re-examine our words or actions. The Greek word translated as stumble is the root for the word scandal. Don’t be a scandal. Now I’ve never seen a biblical literalist preach, cite or even point to this second paragraph, cutting off hands, poking out eyes. I don’t think Jesus was being literal. He wanted to get their attention and I’m sure he did. There is a sense of urgency in his teaching of his disciples. Jerusalem is not far off. The word translated as ‘hell’ is actually Gehenna. It was a place southwest of Jerusalem that, before David had made it his royal city, had been used for child sacrifices. In Jesus’ day it was the town dump, the garbage pile where the fire that burned never went out. In rabbinic thought at that time, assignments to God’s punishment were for a limited time, until your debt was paid and the righteous in heaven prayed for intervention. You can see where the Roman doctrine of purgatory may have gotten its roots. Jesus’ message is that we are responsible for our own deeds. Yet, none of us is capable of representing Jesus one hundred percent of the time. So, it’s not about judging others, but judging ourselves. Remove anything that stops us from making Jesus the priority in our lives. Remove anything we do that would hinder others in doing the same. Why didn’t Jesus put it that way instead of all these gristly metaphors? Maybe it was for fodder in arguments with Biblical literalists, or maybe he wanted to get our attention too. What our aim should be is to not use Jesus as a way of enriching or empowering ourselves over others. If the message we proclaim doesn’t build up, doesn’t give life and hope in Jesus as Messiah for the world, then we are no longer serving the purpose for which we are called. This passage may not contain much, if any, good news. The gospel writers never intended that small slices be extracted and read Sunday by Sunday. For the first timer, there is good news and we know it. That God became one of us to lead the way to God’s kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. Today’s reading reminds us of our responsibility to be a part of that.