The Gospel of Mark: Power, proclamation and pigs
October 6, 2013 | Anita Retzlaff

Grace and peace to you from God the Father of our Lord and Saviour Jesus the Christ. For some reason negativity sells! Do you have any idea why? I wonder about this – a lot lately.  Check the headlines anywhere.  Most are meant to scare, to scandalize and to titillate.  The new crop of TV shows that air during prime time are the most bizarre, macabre 60 minute bits of horror, murder and abuse that I have ever seen in my 57 years… and I watch the stuff. I confess. And at the same time that I am disgusted, even frightened by what is unfolding on the small screen, I don’t turn it off.  I continue to watch because I want to find out what activates this darkness in people’s hearts. And then of course I want to know how the investigators unravel all the sordid details and stop the bloody murder and mayhem - of course never before 2 or 3 more characters are mutilated and assaulted - between commercials.  These are the TV choices available to us; our recreational viewing before we head to bed, watch the news and then try to sleep.  Long gone are John Boy Walton, Colombo, Marcus Welby and Mary Tyler Moore.

It seems to me that all of this sells because we are curious about evil, about disturbed minds and enjoy the shock of the scandalous and brutal manifestations of incredibly antisocial human behavior.  However, all this does is add to the anxiety that we live with, daily, in our global community. We have good reason to be skeptical, anxious and worst of all paralyzed by the realities around us.  There seems to a ratcheting up of animosity between extremist western Christians and eastern Muslims. There are continuing conspiracy theories around this escalation.The word “terror” is commonplace in referring to international relationships and daily events in some parts of our world. Closer to home the political gridlock that has gripped the U. S. in recent days is billed as a force that could bring down economies around the world, ours among them. Our Quebec neighbours are considering a charter of values that though it is meant to even the playing field in some ways it will greatly restrict the use of symbols as personal expressions of religious and cultural commitment.  Environmentally we have a whole host of challenges regarding extraction of oil and gas on our continent, metals in South America and a whole host of other crises.  The population growth in our own province provides some significant challenges for us in terms of good planning for the future.  The systems that have been built to organize our world sometimes turn against us.  We are surrounded by evil forces within the very systems that are meant to help us function well and keep us safe. This is not news to anyone but it often becomes an underlying source of anxiety for many.

Into this scenario the Good News of Jesus enters for us.  There is another perspective on life in the global community.  The gospel of Mark is eager to engage us in the possibilities. Mark’s gospel, hurried and spare in its narrative, is confrontational because it is so direct and rapid. Mark is considered the founder of the Coptic Christian Church in Egypt. The original form of the Book of Mark tells no stories about Jesus’ birth or childhood and does not have an account of the resurrection.  What we get in Mark is an immediate immersion into Jesus’ message of the Good News of Jesus Christ and it ends with the closing verses at the empty tomb: no explanation of what happened or what happens next.  And in between this abrupt beginning and ending we are party to a whirlwind ministry of power and hope and sending forth.

Jesus confronts evil forces that arise to challenge him wherever he goes - everything from the keepers of religious traditionalism to individual hearts of darkness and self-centeredness. He goes about stripping evil and negativity of its power. In a moment we will hear such a story. The pushback is immediate and unrelenting! There is always opposition to the suggestion that something other than the powers of society be they government, religion and even family togetherness – that something other than these has the power to save.  The book of Mark tells the stories of Jesus as he exposes the darkness in people’s lives. With the power given him by God, Jesus changes lives.

One such story of power is found in the 5th chapter of Mark where Jesus journeys to the country of the Gerasenes (definitely the wrong side of the tracks) and confronts a man possessed by demons. Use your imagination as you hear this story of transformation. We too use imagery to describe some of the grace that has come into our lives and sometimes there are events that are dramatic and almost impossible to explain in a rational way. Hear the story of a man healed, of pigs annihilated and of a community stunned by the power of God. Sara and Janna will read this story from Eugene Peterson’s translation The Message. (Mark 5: 1-20)

The pigs! An unhappy ending for them.  A work of incredible power for the man relieved of the torment with which he had lived for so long. A huge financial loss for the owner of those pigs but a whole new future for the man who had once referred to himself as Legion or Mob referring to the many demons that held him captive.  Jesus frees him, sends him on his way to tell the community, to proclaim the life-changing, healing power of God.

Do you see that the thrust of Mark’s gospel is to calm the fears of those who are held hostage by all manner of forces that bind them?  Do you also recognize that at the same time the death-dealing forces that bind people are cast off into the darkness from which they came? This is the power of God and the urgency of Mark’s message.  The power of good is stronger than the power of evil.  “Can you see it? Do you get it?” says Mark in story after story, encounter after encounter.

This message is for us too.  Will we receive it as freedom or as scandal?  Consider with care! Your family is not the centre of the universe and it isn’t the source of your salvation. Our church is not the centre of the universe and it isn’t the source of our salvation.  Our economy, politics and social structures do not save us or provide the peace that we need in order to challenge the forces of evil and destruction that creep into our lives. Only the forces of peace and love will turn us toward the good.  The power of Jesus to heal, restore and reconcile; this is the centre of our universe. 

And so you see in our search for freedom and our desire for calm we often don’t see the subtle ways in which we get caught up in rules and institutional wrangling and self-centered pursuits that miss the mark. Jesus was an event not an institution.  That is hard to get our heads around sometimes.  What Jesus did was to change lives and change the world.  How do you spread that message without institutionalizing it and keep it fresh? The life and ministry of Jesus was an event that the writer of Mark was passionate about sharing. 

Jesus sent this once-crazed man, the used-to-be madman back into town.  “Go tell your people,” Jesus instructs. Each and every one of us who has been freed from anxiety or pain or fear through the grace of Jesus Christ is invited to hit the road and share that good news. Jesus sent his disciples two by two and tells them (in Eugene Peterson’s translation), “Don’t think you need a lot of extra equipment for this. You are the equipment. No special appeals for funds. Keep it simple. And no luxury inns. Get a modest place and be content there until you leave.  If you’re not welcomed, not listened to, quietly withdraw. Don’t make a scene. Shrug your shoulders and be on your way.” (Mark 6:8-11)

In many of the stories of Jesus’ healing people he sends them to tell others or to wait with the message until the opportune time.  Proclamation of God’s grace is the response to the event of Jesus Christ.  We tend to build churches instead.  You know what I mean by that. We can become consumed with meeting budgets and planning Sunday School and hundreds of other details and forget the central thrust of our faith; the sharing of our experience of God and the sharing of our lives with others.

Let us not be overwhelmed by the scary things around us. Jesus goes before us to show us how to do this.  We give power to the good news and the goodness in life and we testify to that. We do it by sharing stories of our faith.  We heard about it last Sunday when Annette Epp shared about her work in our province’s north country.  She got the idea from her father Ernie and so on and so on and so on.  Stephanie Epp is in New Brunswick right now providing support to First Nations communities there who want a careful environmental assessment done as fracking equipment is being moved in. We have differing opinions about how to go about working for justice. We have a significant variety of gifts to offer. It is not only Annette, Ernie and Stephanie who share their gifts and stories.  It is everyone of you here. We could spend many hours hearing of the ways in which you have all contributed and shared. Let us not be paralyzed by the enormity of negative forces around us for we have been given power by God to go out and change the world – not all at once but one person at a time: one on one or two by two.  The scandal in all of this is truly that we believe that by the power given us by God through the life and work of Jesus Christ that we can make a big difference a little at a time.

So, on this World Communion Sunday we are empowered to spread the good news of God because of the stories we read in Mark and in all of scripture. Next Sunday we will celebrate communion together in the truth that we are freed by God’s grace. The stories of our lives are added to the stories we read in the bible.  The spirit of oppression and darkness is overcome by the light of our communion together, the miracles of grace that have occurred in our lives and the continuing promise of the Holy Spirit to guide, direct and inspire us in all times and places.  Thanks be to God.  AMEN