Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Love Looks Like Service--A Sermon for St. Mark Hope and Peace--Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, Feb. 4, 2018

                29As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John.30Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once.31He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.
                32That evening, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons.33And the whole city was gathered around the door.34And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.35In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed.36And Simon and his companions hunted for him.37When they found him, they said to him, “Everyone is searching for you.”38He answered, “Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.”39And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.

           I’m going to ask you to do something, and I want you to pay attention to the emotions you feel about doing it.
           Turn off your phone.
           How many don’t have a phone on you?
           Think about that.  Two decades ago-which is a blip in history—two decades ago, most of you would have raised your hands.  Now most of us have a phone on us or nearby at all times.
           How many felt some anxiety about being told to turn it off?
           I mean, you aren’t going to look at it during my sermon, of course!  But you still want the option.
           About the only time I turn my phone off any more is in an airplane.
           And I wanted to ask about that because I want to talk a bit more about Mark’s gospel.  It’s related.
           How many of us struggle to keep focused?  We are working on Task A, but Task B, and Task G, and Facebook and Instagram and checking messages, and “I wonder what’s in the fridge,” and any number of distracting thoughts and ideas and stuff intrude.
           IF you have trouble focusing, Mark’s gospel can be a challenge.  We’ve been working our way through Chapter One in the first gospel, and already it is clear that we will need to hone our focusing skills.  Because this gospel has a lot to teach us about Jesus, and about the call to be his disciples.  Stuff we need to learn, and we will learn, multiple times in every single lesson we get from Mark’s gospel.
           We’re gotta focus.  And take in a lot of information. 
           This morning’s lesson, for example. 
1.  Jesus leaves the synagogue (scene of last week’s lesson) and goes to Simon Peter’s house. Cures the mother-in-law who jumps up and starts serving them—we’ll talk about this in a minute, so don’t get hung up on it now.
2.  At sundown, they bring him a bunch of people who are sick and have demons and he cures them and tells the demons not to talk to him.
3.  He tries to take a day off.  People hunt him down and won’t let him have a whole day off.
4.  He says, “Fine, let’s go and preach the message.”
5.  Verse Thirty-nine:  “And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.”

           We gotta focus, right?  But on what?  There’s so much going on there. 
           Doesn’t life feel like that these days?
           I’m gonna suggest that there is one line in this lesson should command our attention.  Jesus does a lot of stuff, but he says one thing that is clearly about mission.
           Look at verse 38.  When the disciples found Jesus, in the deserted place where he was trying to be alone, they said everyone had been looking for him.  And he responded, “Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.”
           In the midst of a gospel in which Jesus is a Man of Action, teaching and healing and casting out demons right and left!—in the midst of that gospel and this chapter of that gospel in which Jesus is doing so much stuff…
           …he declares that what he really came to do was proclaim the message.
           He came to proclaim the message.  Which is?
           Love one another.
           And not just as a nice warm fuzzy feeling…but, of course, as an action.
           Put your love into actionLove one another…by serving one another.
           That is the message.  That is the most important thing a person can do with their life:  SERVE. YOUR. NEIGHBORS.
           When Jesus healed Simon Peter’s mother-in-law, he was freeing her to serve.  Because serving was the most important thing she could be doing.  It was her place in the household, and we might be a little uneasy about the power dynamics of that, but it is what it is.  The highest value in that culture, and in the world which God created for us to live in and created us to continue creating—the highest value is love proclaimed as service.
           Jesus came to proclaim that message.  That was the crux of his ministry, no pun intended.  (Think about it.)
           But don’t I always say there are two primary ministries of Jesus, and thus of his disciples?
           We are called to proclaim the word of love and…
           …to heal.
           Why is healing just as valuable as proclamation?
           Why is Jesus travelling through the Galilee healing people right and left, curing their illnesses and casting out their demons?
           Because illnesses and demons are barriers to loving and serving.
           It’s hard to focus on serving when you can’t get out of bed.  Or when some demon is talking to Jesus and you can’t get a word in.
           Peter’s mother-in-law can’t serve because she has a terrible illness which has kept her confined to her bed.
           By healing her, Jesus freed her to serve. 
           Demons get in the way of our ability to love other people, and to serve them in love.  We know that’s true, right?
           What are some demons that get in the way of loving each other?  [racism, homophobia, transphobia, classism, busy-ness]
           Those demons get in the way.  And when we cast them out, we are freed to serve.  When we quit asking whether people deserve our help, and we quit seeing them through the lens of their race or the outward and inward expression of their gender or financial well-being—when we can just look at another person and see a child of God, created in the image of God and therefore beautiful—then we are freed to serve.
           When we cast out the demon of busy-ness—all that stuff we do that gets in the way of serving our neighbors the way we do when we’re just imagining it in our heads and not trying to make it fit on the calendar…when we vanquish the demon of busy-ness, we are freed to love and serve our neighbor.
           Lent is coming.  And as I do each year, like clockwork, which it is, I will remind you a couple of weeks before Lent, which is, oh, now, that Lent is a time for reflection. And action.  Action and reflection.  One way we turn our hearts and minds to God in the season of Lent is to take up a Lenten practice.  Give up something that is getting in our way.  Take up something that will draw us closer to God and closer to the message of love and service.
           As you think about what to do this Lent to help you draw closer to God and to the gospel, perhaps you might think about what gets in the way of serving others, and cast it out.  Skip a couple of those Starbucks double mocha lattes and give the money to the ELCA hunger appeal.  Or St. James Place.  Or find some time and use it to serve people in need.
           Do something that helps you focus.
           I will engage in my annual Facebook fast as one of my Lenten practices this year.  Because I want to focus on God, and Facebook encourages me to focus elsewhere.  I haven’t decided what to take up yet this year.  Perhaps we can decide together.
           Community is great for focusing and accountability.  We have church at this time each week because it makes us accountable to each other.  We agree that together we are going to pray and learn about the gospel, and share the sacraments.  We focus on what God is saying to us and how God is calling us…

           …to serve.  There is no more important focus for a Christian life than service to the neighbor.  Let it be our focus this Lent, and every day after.

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