What Is True Strength?
Mark 1:21-28 1 Corinthians 8:1-13
February 1, 2009
This morning's scriptures are about leadership. They are about Jesus' leadership and the perceptions people had of him early on in his ministry, and they are also about the leadership innate in each and every one of us as people who follow the thread of faith through our lives. In Jesus' situation, people didn't really grasp fully who they were dealing with. They knew he was an incredible healer and a teacher who could help them understand things better than anyone else had ever done; but it took awhile for them to comprehend who he was and where his gifts came from. Today's story tells of the time when all of this became illuminated. It tells of Jesus preaching and teaching in the temple, and of how astonished people were at the clarity and wisdom of his words. But the story gets better. A disheveled man cries out from the congregation, "I know who you are, the Holy One of God!" Imagine the commotion at such a claim. Imagine the shifting in the seats and the craning of necks to look around and see who was speaking, what his credibility might be. When they finally laid eyes on him, he was someone who might have been easily dismissed. He was clearly possessed, as they said in those days. He was not in his right mind. But whatever or whoever it was that was inside him kept shouting at Jesus, and he was difficult to ignore.
I find it interesting that such a one as this was actually the first one to recognize Jesus for who he was. The unclean spirit spoke out of the miserable man, pointing at Jesus and making audacious claims about him. The people around simply stared. It is significant that they didn't argue with the man at all. They didn't shout him down or push him out of their congregation. There was truth in what he said, and they finally saw it. The truth dawned on them as he spoke it aloud. It didn't matter that the source of the words was less than presentable. Truth is truth, and when you hear it, it rings true. This story got me to thinking a bit about the person of the truth-teller and how it is often someone on the outskirts of the circle who is able to see what is going on at the center. They are able to see things more clearly, perhaps because they are not caught up in the middle of the drama as participants, or perhaps because they have the distance required which enables them to see the patterns and the larger picture. They have a perspective on the situation that those who are close to the action may not have. I am reading a book now titled "Ireland: A Novel" by Frank Delaney. One of the main characters of the book is an itinerant storyteller, perhaps the last of his kind, who spends his entire life walking from place to place, regaling the local folks with stories for a night or three in exchange for a place to sleep and a few warm meals. Many of the stories he tells are those of Irish history, but what intrigues people about his stories is their clarity and the truth that lies at the heart of them. The storyteller is somehow able to bring people, places and events to life in a way that only someone who has observed people from the outside is able to do. He knows how people work. He understand their interactions and is able to make excellent guesses as to what makes them "tick," thus making even his stories of things that happened years and years ago come to life. His outsider status in the present somehow enables him to speak more eloquently about the past.
How do we deal with the truths that we discover? Are we quick to advertise them, quick to show that we know something new and special? The reading from Paul's letter to the Corinthians talks about this in terms of attempting to tease out the appropriate way to be in relationship with others when your understanding runs deeper than theirs may. Paul is speaking about things that no longer confront us these days such as eating meat that has been offered to idols, and yet the wisdom he shares is still relevant. When we are new to the faith, the best thing we can do is figure out some guidelines to help guide us on the way. It can help to know if something is deemed to be right or wrong, just in terms of learning new ways of being in the world. But as you grow more comfortable in faith, as your faith becomes more and more a part of who you are, then the guidelines and rules tend to hold less importance. The heart of faith eventually takes over from the rule books.
What Paul is addressing in his letter, is that it can be tempting to flaunt the rules once you feel more secure in your faith journey. It may feel as though you no longer need to worry so much about the things that used to keep you following the path before you really knew where the stepping stones were located. But we are not just responsible for ourselves. We have other people to consider, and they may not be comfortable feeling their way along the path at this point in their faith journey.
They may depend on the stepping stones, and could be hurt if we push them to move beyond them before they are ready. I remember a sermon I preached as a relatively new pastor. It was a sermon that stirred things up a bit, asking questions about some tenets of faith that many scholars no longer held to be valuable. In my naivete, I just threw the suggestions out there to the congregation, expecting a lively discussion at coffee hour. But some folks were hit hard by the ideas. For them, the tenets of their faith were important to be upheld, and messing with them was upsetting. Contrary to my assumptions as well as my personal experience, considering these new ideas did not help their faith grow. It was simply too challenging and they were not comfortable going out on those limbs for the sake of discussion. I learned an important lesson through that sermon. I think it is the same lesson Paul is speaking about here in his letter to the Christians in Corinth. We need to be careful with the faith of others. We need to be aware that others may be watching us, looking for clues as to how they might live a life of faith. It is all too easy to cause someone to trip and falter along the path if we take away the foundations on which they depend.
I wonder if when Jesus quickly sent the possessing spirit packing, he did so partly to protect the people around him from learning too much too fast. Was this partly to protect people who were not ready to hear the truth about him? Jesus himself was clearly not happy that the unclean spirit had pointed him out. The event seems to have shaken him up, at least in terms of how quickly he responded. I wonder if he had something else in mind for letting people know who he was? Maybe he had hoped people would figure it out for themselves, in their own sweet time. Maybe he wasn't quite ready for the kind of attention this claim foisted upon him. The scripture says that after this event, his fame spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.
But maybe Jesus had already started down the path of fame or notoriety, even before the man's possessing spirit spoke up. The sermon Jesus had been preaching was eye-opening for the people in the congregation. It was a different kind of teaching than they were accustomed to. His words had an authority that they were not used to hearing from the usual scribes who attempted to explain the ways of God to people. It was probably just a matter of time before Jesus' true identity and intentions were revealed to people, but he had a sense of preparing people to be able to hear what he had to say. He wanted to be sure that as many folks as possible could and would follow him into a new relationship with God. The example I gave of my early sermon being a bit too brash doesn't mean to say that we should not help people grow in their understanding of God and of their relationship with the divine. It is crucial that we do continue to grow. It is important that we do continue to explore new ideas and pursue new understandings. The issue is how we prepare people for this exploration. We need to figure out how to bring someone along for the journey, and not simply pick them up and plop them into the middle of unknown territory. We are responsible, to a certain extent, for one another, and so we need to be thinking not just of ourselves as we move forward in faith. We need to hold one another in our minds as well, drawing each other along as honestly and compassionately as we can.
Jesus, you showed us how to live in love with the world. You showed us what compassion looks like and how it is lived. Will you guide us in our growth so that we might deepen our faith. Will you help us to be good companions to one another along the way? In the name of Jesus who taught and healed and loved so well, we pray, Amen.