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“Enough for Everyone”
Mark 6: 1-56
A sermon preached by Lynn Welton, Student Minister
October 27, 2002
University Baptist Church
Minneapolis, MN
This morning we continue on our journey through Mark’s gospel. As I re-read Mark’s gospel in it’s entirety, I found that it had the tendency to be confusing and it seemed laden with conflicting data. And unlike the gospels of Matthew, Luke, and John, Mark’s gospel seemed choppy and harsh and abrupt. I got very little sense of who this “Jesus” character really was – he felt invented; he seemed exasperated; no one recognized him nor understood his identity – not even his own townspeople. And perhaps the most striking of all, is that even Jesus’ own disciples fail to understand who he is, even though he has specially chosen them to follow him.. And all the while, Jesus seemed to keep on talking, and teaching, and healing, and performing miracles -- like feeding the 5000 on five loaves and two fishes, and calming a violent storm at sea, and walking on water – and regardless of how much he talked and taught and performed miracles, the people just weren’t “getting it.” And the disciples – Jesus’ chosen Twelve – they didn’t seem very bright to me. After all the time Jesus spent with them and all the miracles and teachings they witnessed and performed -- not even they were “getting” who Jesus was. So, I began to question just what the Gospel of Mark was really all about. And what I discovered is this: That Mark has a very specific agenda. As Mark tells the stories of Jesus and all the amazing and wonderful miracles he performs, Mark is promoting Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of God. Mark’s gospel has been written to explain to us that the Messiah has come even when evidence of world conflict stands in stark contrast to this. Furthermore, this Messiah preaches a message of service, and sacrifice, and humility that even his own disciples don’t seem to understand. For Mark, following Jesus is not a ticket to glory; it is a path to suffering. Being a disciple does not bring exaltation – but rather humiliation and pain.
As this morning’s readings begin, Jesus is rejected – not by his opponents, but by his own townspeople. Those closest to him are most in doubt; they neither understand nor trust him. When Jesus teaches in their synagogue, they take offense at his words and wonder how he has the ability to do such miraculous deeds, since he is a mere carpenter whose unremarkable family lives among them. Jesus responds to this rejection with a proverb about the frequent rejection of people by those who should know him the best. He states, “No prophet is without honor except in one’s native place, among one’s own people, in one’s own home.” Jesus marvels at our “unbelief.” Rejection is a continuous theme throughout the scripture readings this morning.
As we continue the readings, Jesus summons the Twelve and charges them with a Mission. Sending them out in pairs, Jesus empowers them with the authority to cast out unclean spirits. He instructs them to take nothing with them but a walking stick and the sandals on their feet. Nothing else – not a change of clothing, nor food, nor money. Like Jesus, who leaves his family and his home, the disciples are sent out into the neighboring villages and instructed to live among the people. Jesus calls his disciples to live a prophetic and nomadic lifestyle – living on the margins of society – confronting the powers of evil, exposing and casting out the demons, and to work many miracles. And if any place should reject them and their teachings, Jesus instructs the disciples to shake the dust off their feet – turning the rejection back to the people – and to move on to another place where they can continue their work.
Well, as you might imagine, word of Jesus and the disciples’ healings and teachings spread quickly. And everywhere Jesus and the disciples went they were surrounded by the masses. When the disciples returned to Jesus and reported to him all that they had done and all that they had taught, they were exhausted. So Jesus and the disciples boarded a boat and headed off to a remote location to find rest. But as the old adage goes, “There’s no rest for the weary.” People saw them leaving and knew where they were headed. Word travels fast, and by the time Jesus and the disciple’s arrived at their resting place, it was crowded with people. Jesus took pity on the crowd – seeing them as sheep without a Shepard – and he begins to teach. As evening drew near, the disciple’s suggested to Jesus that the people be sent back to the villages where they would be able to find something to eat. Rejecting their suggestion, Jesus instructs the disciples to feed the masses. And the disciples rebuke him saying, “You give them something to eat. We’re not going to spend two hundred days wages to provide bread for all these people.” Then, Jesus speaks these most profound words: “FEED THEM WITH WHAT YOU HAVE.” “Feed them with what you have.” It gives me chills to hear these words.
I can’t help but wonder how many more must suffer and how many more must lose their lives to the demons among us. The demons of poverty and hunger, of loneliness and rejection. The demons of AIDS and other dis-ease. The demons of violence, and hate, and of war. How long might it be before we start “getting it?”
Each and every one of us is called to be one of the Twelve, one of the Chosen, a child of God. And in what ways have we answered the call to live a prophetic life? To live on the margins of society? In what ways have we responded to the task of confronting the powers of evil, of exposing and casting out the demons, of binding the strongman, and working to perform so-called miracles?
In a world of abundance fueled by fear and greed, when will we “get it?” When will we begin feeding the hungry “with what we have?” Feeding the hungry…. Those hungry for justice. Those hungry for peace. Those hungry for acceptance. Those hungry for closeness.
To my understanding, there is no way to deny the reality that we live in a world whose violence and destruction are unspeakable. Our capacity to harm one another and the earth numbs my senses. I get overwhelmed by the statistics. Israel, Palestine, Northern Ireland, Guatemala, the World Trade Towers, Afghanistan, Columbine, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Montgomery County Maryland and the Washington D.C area. The list goes on and on. Our capacity to inflict violence and suffering seems inexhaustible at times. And we withdraw to ease the pain.
Here in North America, our ears have been thoroughly trained by popular films and the mainstream media to associate the word “Palestinian” or “Arab” or “Muslim” with the word “terrorist.” We never hear that 726 thousand Palestinians have lost their homes, or that hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children suffer from cancer, probably as a result of the 1991 Gulf War. At that time, the US and Britain carpet-bombed the country, poisoning the land and water with depleted uranium and causing the rates of leukemia, neuroblastoma, and lymphoma to skyrocket throughout the region.
In a world where pain and despair are so evident not only in the far reaches of our globe but in our own lives, in our own cities, and in our own homes, it seems strangely natural to seek a distant place to stand, to claim our right to a refuge of denial. And frequently in our distanced places there is a beckoning truth that the violence and destruction must be taken hold of and stopped. And yet far too often, those of us who look to Jesus’s example for an understanding of radical love and for the gift of hope and life – stand at a distance, seeing all these things.
I went to see the Names Project Quilt in November of 1988 in Washington D.C., a living, growing memorial to the thousands of people who have died from AIDS. At 7:10 in the morning the quilt began to be unfolded. And from 7:10 in the morning until 6:00 in the evening, names were read. As I walked around the quilt, I saw loved ones weeping. Families standing in silence. I overheard friends telling stories. And there were thousands of others looking, searching for names, searching for a tangible sign that death has not had the final word. Silently, I wept.
Shortly after September 11th, I relived this scene once again. This time it happened while I was driving in my car. The radio was on. Without background music or any other sound, a lone commentator read the names of those who had lost their lives in the terrorist attacks. One after another, he read the names. Again, I wept.
These are the events that are ugly, events that try to strip away all human dignity, events that crush the spirit and threaten to silence life itself. These events are too horrible; too terrifying for us to bear. And so we draw ourselves apart, we stand at a distance. We view with compassion, those whose lives have been forever changed by these events, standing at a distance. And quietly, we are grateful for our distant refuge. We are grateful that we are able to stand at a distance. For many of us it is not just something we do during life’s most demanding moments or when we are afraid. For many of us, it has become a way of life.
It is like so much of life. Many of us convince ourselves that events like AIDS, or the terrorist attacks, or the suicide bombings in the Middle East do not touch our lives, our loved ones, our homes, and so we feel no compelling drive to touch these events, and certainly no call to stand up against them. Yet in the more honest moments of our lives we know once again that we lose the fullness of life when we cannot or will not “Feed them with what we have.” But how do we move from standing at a distance to becoming one who “feeds with what we have?”
As community of faithful, as a congregation, we are committed to God’s reign of justice and peace in the world. We must take hold of the injustice, and stop it. We must take hold of the violence and hate and terror – and stop it. The message and mandate that surely accompany our faith carry a similar message: We must turn the power of these events into action, into a love that is so radical and so interwoven into the fabric of suffering, that AIDS, and terror, and violence, and hunger are forever stopped. This is what it means to be the Chosen One. This is Mark’s challenge for us.
We are called to live a prophetic life. To live on the margins of society. To step forth from the distance and confront the powers of evil. To expose and cast out the demons among us.
Mark teaches us that it is not a ticket to glory. It is, indeed, a path to suffering and rejection and humiliation and to pain. But here’s the good news. Mark also teaches us that the Messiah has come. That we are not alone. That’s what this congregation is all about. Together we can take hold of the pain of injustice. Together we can step forth out of the distance. Together we can say NO to war, No to violence, and NO to the oppressive forces of injustice. For when we stand at a distance, we observe and perpetuate the terror and violence and hunger. But when we take hold of the injustices, when we expose and cast out the demons among us, we become bearers of life.
This is what it means to be Christ-like; this is what it means to pick up our crosses: We pick them up and we take hold of them so that some day there will be no more crosses on which we crucify life.
And if we come closer, if we step forth from the distance, we can take hold of the injustices. And together we must work to stop them. Together, we can “Feed them with what we have.” And through our work together, there will be Enough for Everyone. Brothers and sisters, “Feeding them with what we have” can be an exhausting task. But we are not alone. We have one another and together we will share the task.
And, our final scripture reading for this morning is from Mark 6: 54-56
…. and all who touched him, were made well – and forever changed. Amen