Plymothian

²⁰ Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. ²¹ When his family^[b] heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”

²² And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons.”

²³ So Jesus called them over to him and began to speak to them in parables: “How can Satan drive out Satan? ²⁴ If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. ²⁵ If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. ²⁶ And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come. ²⁷ In fact, no one can enter a strong man’s house without first tying him up. Then he can plunder the strong man’s house. ²⁸ Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, ²⁹ but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.”

³⁰ He said this because they were saying, “He has an impure spirit.”

³¹ Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. ³² A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, “Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.”

³³ “Who are my mother and my brothers?” he asked.

³⁴ Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! ³⁵ Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”

Jesus’ True Family

Jesus’ family think that he is insane and at the beginning of this passage they head out to apprehend him.  The story of the family then breaks off only to conclude at the end of the chapter.  This kind of bracketing ties the one story with the story that is surrounds.  The synagogue leaders and the family want to apprehend Jesus.  They are both in opposition to his teaching.  The question is whether Jesus will stand up to two towering authorities of the time, the authority of the Jewish family tradition and the authority of the Jewish religious tradition.  His answer to the question of family is to redefine family without eliminating it.  His answer to the religious authorities is to show them that their logic is flawed.  Such extentsive dismantling of Satan’t kingdom could only be done by one stronger than Satan.  Perhaps this passage means that Jesus bound Satan and left him in the wilderness following the temptation.

The lesson for us is plain.  We need to adhere to Jesus and show loyalty in the face of opposition.  His authority transcends the religious traditions and Satan.  His authority transcends the bonds of blood relatives.  We, within the church, should be friendly with all people as much as it depends on us.  However, with those of the faith we should extend fellowship that resembles family.

At the time of writing this I have two students in my house playing Candy Land with my son.  One is Jonathan, a former 5th grade student of mine, and the other is Ryan, a former Moody student. My desire is that they would feel like sons or younger brothers tonight as we play board games together.

Prayer

Jesus, I lacked a consistent and loving Father and so help me to look at the Father in Heaven as a loving guide.  Help me to be a faithful father to my children, but help me to extend the fellowship of my own house to all who follow Jesus.  In today’s world families are poorly blended and children often are scheduled to death.  Help us to create something more worthy of the faith within the church.

Questions

1. How are teh beginning and the end of the passage related?
2. How are the two stories told here connected?
3. How would the recipients of Mark have been encouraged by Mark’s writing?
4. How is Jesus removed from authority in the lives of people today?
5. How do you stand up for Jesus and form a family that welcomes others who defend the faith?

⁷ Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the lake, and a large crowd from Galilee followed. ⁸ When they heard about all he was doing, many people came to him from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, and the regions across the Jordan and around Tyre and Sidon. ⁹ Because of the crowd he told his disciples to have a small boat ready for him, to keep the people from crowding him. ¹⁰ For he had healed many, so that those with diseases were pushing forward to touch him. ¹¹ Whenever the impure spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, “You are the Son of God.” ¹² But he gave them strict orders not to tell others about him.

¹³ Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him. ¹⁴ He appointed twelve^[a] that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach ¹⁵ and to have authority to drive out demons. ¹⁶ These are the twelve he appointed: Simon (to whom he gave the name Peter), ¹⁷ James son of Zebedee and his brother John (to them he gave the name Boanerges, which means “sons of thunder”), ¹⁸ Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot ¹⁹ and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.

A Disciple Is One Who Is Continually With Jesus

Jesus is with a large group of disciples and withdraws to the hills around the Lake of Galilee where revolutions are born.  As he withdraws it is important to note who is with Jesus and who is not.  The people who went with him originally are the true disciples, but a crowd of thrill seekers and people with illnesses seek him for healing.  Jesus actually moves away from the crowds and probably heads out on the lake with his fishermen friends in a small flotilla.  He is crowded by people with real needs, but they are detracting from the real reason he came.

Jesus came so that true disciples could be with him, not as exciting Sunday entertainment.  Some of the more crowded churches today are crowded because people are entertained.  They do not grow in a relationship with Jesus when they passively look on or are seemingly healed from some minor illness.  Of course, Jesus can and does heal.  However, when he heals the body it is in order to enable a person to more fully answer his call.  He restores the mind, body, and soul so that a person can be in a deepening relationship with him.

When real change is occurring, real opposition often follows.  If a person wrecks Satan’s work, Satan will rise in opposition and so will his demons.  They name Jesus in the passage in order to control him.  Jesus exercises his absolute authority by decreeing silence.

Being up on a mountainside connects Jesus with Moses who brought a new beginning to Israel by meeting God on a mountain.  Jesus calls a selection of people to himself.  Notice that he doesn’t call everyone for the task at hand.  Not everyone is gifted in the same way, but out of those who are willing to follow him certain individuals stand out.  He wants a closer relationship with some of his disciples and those who are closest he is even intimate enough to give nicknames to.  Andrew could also be listed as closer to Jesus, along with Peter, James and John.  This core of 3 or 4 have a closer walk with Jesus than the others.  The next two groups of 4 are also close, but not quite in the same way.  However, being close means having greater responsibility.  When Jesus calls them, he calls them to be with him.  This is Mark’s way of describing what Matthew called being known by Jesus.  In the end it is what measures the value of a life.  Were you with Jesus during your life?  How intimate did you become?  With what did Jesus entrust you?  Every disciple today has the opportunity to draw near to Jesus.  It baffles me how we got into this strange notion that a person prays a prayer at a children’s camp and that is evidence that they are with Jesus.  That is evidence that they will be in heaven?  Evidence that you will have a relationship with Jesus in eternity is that you have a relationship with him now.

Prayer

Oh God, I pray for the small group.  I have no control over them and yet I wish I could gather them into an intimate relationship with you and with each other.  I wish there was stronger evidence that all of our lives are marked by being with you.  Miracles and great singing at church are all very nice, but really I want you.  I want to feel the strength that comes from walking with you in trying times.

Questions

1. Where did Jesus go in today’s passage?
2. Why did people go to find him?
3. What is the difference between those who tracked him down and those whom he called?
4. Do you walk with Jesus as a disciple?
5. How do you act in Jesus’ authority as an apostle?

Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. ² Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. ³ Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, “Stand up in front of everyone.”

⁴ Then Jesus asked them, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” But they remained silent.

⁵ He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. ⁶ Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.

Zombies Want to Kill Jesus

I find it interesting that Jesus repeats his provocative actions on the Sabbath.  He has developed a reputation by this point of disobeying Sabbath observances and they are looking to build a case against him.  What type of man was Jesus?  In the eyes of the religious elite and social elite, he was a trouble-maker.  There was a national identity tied up in the Sabbath observance which they thought honoured God by its lack of action.  Of course, there should be a rhythm of work and rest in life.  That is something we are losing in our modern world.  However, when a good idea is legislated harshly and becomes part of a national identity of harsh legalism, it needs opposing.  Jesus is frustrated that a rule that was meant to indicate God’s presence is misrepresenting God so harshly.  In the name of good, people are doing evil.  They are killing the relationship that God wants with people.  they pay homage to God with their lips, but their hearts are far from him.

The primary problem with the Jewish elite of Jesus day, and the elite of any culture or age, is that they are married to the status quo.  It is how they got their status.  They are proud and stubborn and unable to accept new teaching.  Anyone who is not learning something new about themselves and changing appropriately is dead.  When the comfort of living deadness is challenged the powerful want to bring death to those who disturb their repose.  Jesus is the Life and the zombies want to kill him.

Prayer

Help me to be less resistant to your changes in my life.  You are truly alive but I love the comfort of death.  I love to be undisturbed and rest in peace.  Sometimes being active and alive is painful.  I risk rejection, safety, and losing control.  There are things recently that I wanted to control and have a certain way.  I believe in rigid rituals for my benefit and the benefit of others, but when I am thwarted I am angry in an unhealthy way.  Help me to discipline myself appropriately with a view to developing authentic relationship.  Help me not to develop check-lists and routines that mask the fact that my spiritual life is cold and I lack a pulse.

Questions

1. What had Jesus been doing with his Saturdays (Sabbath)?
2. Why were people so upset with healing on a Saturday?
3. If Jesus went to synagogue on a Saturday, why are Christians keeping Sunday special?
4. If no day of the week is more special than any other, how does a Christian keep Sabbath appropriately?
5. If rigid law-keeping kills and is evil, why do so many churches love it?

²³ One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. ²⁴ The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?”

²⁵ He answered, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? ²⁶ In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.”

²⁷ Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. ²⁸ So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”

Stop Working So Hard!?

In this passage Jesus is challenged over how his disciples break Sabbath tradition. Jesus does not deny that his disciples have broken with the tradition, but he justifies their choice.  What they have done is worked so that they can have a snack.  They are harvesting the grain, one grain at a time.  Probably they are ‘grinding’ the grain into a mush in their hands and eating it.  It’s a casual action, so why do the Pharisees draw attention to it.  The Pharisees police the nation in the informal way many journalists do.  We should think of them as ‘do-gooders’ who think they have the moral high ground to judge whether new celebrities are worthy of respect.  They catch Jesus’ disciples breaking one of their laws which equates picking grain with the labour of harvesting.

Jesus points out that their precious King David broke ritual law when his men were on a mission with him.  The Pharisees would have had a hard time defining David’s actions as wrong.  The historical distance between David and the Pharisees gives David the righteous high-ground of a mythological giant.  Jesus points out how David’s thinking was indeed superior to the Pharisees of Jesus’ day.  David perceived that God had set rules in place for the benefit of man, however the Pharisees had developed restrictive rules that suffocated people rather than set them free

In today’s society the Sabbath, Saturday, and The Lord’s Day, Sunday, are days to get bargains in our worship of consumerism at the local mall.  We are as frantic in our leisure time as we are in our week day activities.  We could actually do with more Sabbath rest.  However, I remember a time when Sabbath rest was so strongly legislated that it was suffocating.  I went to a camp once where a horizontal hour was legislated for teens.  The question to ask ourselves about our weekend activity is whether I finish the weekend closer to God and refreshed.  Often I know I finish my weekends looking forward to the work-week so that I can live at a sustainable pace of life.

I have a suspicion that our own greed and elevated standards of living have led to this exhaustion.  To keep a house running is a full time job.  In a bygone era one person kept the house going and the other brought home the salary that paid for the necessities of life.  Somehow we elevated the perceived adventure and importance of working in the marketplace and devalued domestic life.  Now, in effect, we have replaced two full-time jobs with three full-time jobs and people are very tired.  In many cases the home is neglected or has become a burden so that children have all their needs paid for but lack the nurture and care of a bygone generation.

Also a consumer mentality drives us.  We believe that more things are ‘essential’ because we have indoctrinated by a capitalist society that measures success by the size of a profit margin.  I do not believe Jesus was a communist, but I am equally skeptical of the modern day church’s adoption of consumerist capitalism.  Capitalism and its desire for gain is diametrically opposed to the wisdom literature in the Old Testament.  We need to take time out of the rat-race.  We need to assess whether we believe that we should accumulate things to make us happy, or whether our purpose is fulfilled only when we are mindful of God.  Being mindful of God will lead to a different attitude about every day of the week and what we do with it.  then we might agree with Jesus, “Man was not made for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath was made for man.”

Prayer

My wife tries to hold down a full-time job and so do I.  We are also trying to sell a large house so that we can buy another one.  We both have to clean the house, maintain the house, and raise a family of two small children.  Was society not meant to be this way?  Am I just lazy because I am tired of being in constant motion?  The question is whether this activity has impoverished my relationships.  It is hard to get together with friends who are scattered all over the Chicago area.  It is hard to get to a school 30 minutes away and also get to work 2 hours away and have time for any kind of family life.  We have to work hard to have a house big enough to entertain in.  Americans are used to so much space.  I remember in England being literally sat on top of each other in church meetings, but in America they wouldn’t go for that.  The perception is that to have a healthy relationship it needs to be surrounded by space, but space comes at a price.  It costs money to buy big spaces and it costs in other ways to be so spread out from each other.

What do we do with all this business and activity?  Help me to know how to manage the time and space and serving opportunities that I have to enhance the lives of my family and friends.  helpus not to be so married to convention that we hurt each other.

Questions

1. What were Jesus’ disciples doing on the Sabbath?
2. Why do you think Pharisees were watching them so closely?
3. Why do you think Pharisees had laid out a more detailed description of how to refrain from work and rest on the Sabbath?
4. How do we make rules that are meant to benefit us but they actually hurt us?
5. What societal norms do you adhere to that were meant to set men and women free but have actually led to less rest and less worship of God?

Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. Some people came and asked Jesus, “How is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but yours are not?”

¹⁹ Jesus answered, “How can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them. ²⁰ But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast.

²¹ “No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. Otherwise, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. ²² And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins.”

Safe and Miserable By Keeping The Rules

The religious leaders of Jesus’ day fasted.  It is interesting to see they were largely fasting to gain approval with or manipulate God. I think that those who fast today often fast for the same reason.  It is essentially manipulative.  We want God to do something so we pray.  He doesn’t answer in the way we demand, so we up the ante by fasting.  If he doesn’t respond after that, we throw a tantrum and leave a faith that didn’t play by our rules and give us what we wanted.  However, that is Jesus’ point.  The time of trying to play by the rules and manipulate God are pointless.  He has come to replace those traditions.  God doesn’t organise life to make us happy.  We don’t exist to manipulate our environment to make it do what we want.  We exist for a great marriage with Jesus.  We exist to enter into a relationship where fasting might have a place once we have learned to enjoy one another.  The joy of partying with sinners and seeing their lives transformed can not be dampened by the disciplined eating.

You can imagine the rule-keepers looking in the windows at Levi’s house whilst Jesus is reclining, drinking wine, eating a feast and telling stories.  “Hey, John, how come Jesus is religious and he is having such a good time with it?”  The problem is that they don’t have a relationship with the Messiah, Jesus.  They just keep up the grind and expect to find fulfilment through obedience to all the old ways that were handed down to them.  Without a transformation in their perspective, they will explode like a dry, old sheep stomach filled with fresh wine.  They can’t contain this idea of freedom and morality – they will settle for the safety of slavery to rules.  Then they will walk away feeling safe and miserable.

Prayer

Jesus, I sometimes wish that I could just press the happy button.  I wish that I could just fast for a day and feel an instant reward.  However, relationship with you is not like that.  I have to relate to you and spend time seeking out who you are and how you tick.  When I know you as a bride knows her husband, my life starts to make more sense.  However, if I pursue making more sense, I miss you, and I lose my peace.  Help me to discern when you might want me to fast because it might help my relationship with you.  Help me to hear your voice.  develop in me the capacity to connect heart to heart.

Questions

1. What question do John’s disciples and the Pharisees ask about Jesus’ disciples?
2. Why will Jesus’ disciples fast?
3. How did people in Jesus’ day need to change their thinking to have capacity for him?
4. Why do people fast today?
5. How do people need to change their approach to religious disciplines to make them meaningful?

¹³ Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them. ¹⁴ As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.

¹⁵ While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. ¹⁶ When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

¹⁷ On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

(Note:  I skipped yesterday because I was having a lot of problems logging into my blog and then I forgot)

Staying Separate From Scum

Jesus is regularly spending time down by the lake of Galilee in the northwestern corner.  Although storms often blow through and whip the lake into a frenzy, more often than not a mild Mediterranean climate makes the location very pleasant.  There are hills, and nestled at the bottom is Jesus’ little town of Capernaum.  Capernaum also served as a border town between two of the Herod brothers.  Herod is a surname of the line of kings who were puppets for Rome in the Palestinian region.  Herod the Great died and left his kingdom divided between three of his mediocre sons.  These kings then passed on diminished kingdoms.  The Romans allowed for a toll to be set up as people crossed the borders between tetrarchies.  A tetrarchy is literally a rule by four, but Palestine was ruled by three.  This border toll was new and had to be unpopular, as tolls always are.  The man to collect these tolls was Levi.

Levi is often associated wit Matthew because in Matthew’s gospel a tax collector is called by Jesus and becomes a disciple.  However, it has to be acknowledged that this is an educated guess.  It is possible that Levi was another disciple not called as one of the twelve disciples (Jesus had more than twelve).  Since Levi is a son of Alphaeus and James is listed in the disciples as a son of Alphaeus, it could be that James and Levi are the same person.  It is possible that Jesus called more than one tax collector who, unlike the fishermen, followed Jesus with no chance of just coming back and picking up where they left off.  They left their toll booth by the side of the road and walked away with Jesus.

Levi invites Jesus back for a party and Jesus accepts.  Levi’s life transformation is not unique.  Jesus comes for the underbelly of society.  If this were today, it would be a room full of Chicago politicians, prostitutes, drug-barons, and swindlers.  It’s not the usual crowd that we see in church on Sunday.  This points out to us that, like the Pharisees, we have become an authentic group of rule keepers.  We don’t want our neat ways of doing things disturbed.  We don’t want order disordered.  We don’t want people who we can’t relate to in our churches.  Some churches exclude working mothers by arranging women’s ministries in the mornings when only stay-at-home mothers can attend.  Other churches have pastors who struggle with obesity strangely railing about drugs and alcohol without addressing their own preferred sin.  Still other churches complain how everyone has moved away without thinking who has moved into the houses the previous attenders vacated.  Food, music, lifestyles, and ethnicity divide people and the church just reaches out to the people who are similar in cultural norms.

However, rather than making barriers to keep the sin we fear out, like Jesus, we should be making bridges to dark places to bring transformation in.

Prayer

Jesus, I don’t want to be corrupted from the path on which I am traveling.  I want to follow you.  I want light to permeate my world, but you call me to walk in dark places.  How do I know which places I should go that I leave untouched?  I have prejudice.  There are people with whom I would associate most easily, but I don’t really know how to find people with whom I wouldn’t naturally associate.  Help me to be open to chances to connect with others in ways that I would not normally.  Help me to support connections across cultural norms.

Questions

1. Where was Levi?
2. Why is there some doubt as to whether Levi is the same person as Matthew?
3. What kind of company did Jesus party with?
4. With whom do you party?
5. How could your social circles be challenged by Jesus?

A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. ² They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. ³ Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. ⁴ Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on. ⁵ When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

⁶ Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, ⁷ “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

⁸ Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, “Why are you thinking these things? ⁹ Which is easier: to say to this paralyzed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and walk’? ¹⁰ But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the man, ¹¹ “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” ¹² He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”

Authority To Forgive Sin

It is possible that Jesus comes home to his own house in Capernaum, but the house may have also been one that he just used as a base.  Jesus told them the good news that he had to tell them, but then an opportunity occurs where he can settle an issue with regard to his authority.  Four men climb up the sturdy walls to the fragile thatched roof and rip it back.  Then they lower their friend in who has been paralyzed.  The man has both a spiritual and a physical component to his illness and the two were connected.  Illness has always got something to do with sin in the system.  It wasn’t the role of priests to directly heal such people.  God healed them and priests just confirmed his actions. The teachers of the law rightly point out that a person shouldn’t go around proclaiming that they forgive sins.  However, Jesus counters by showing that a prophet is proved right by his actions.  The sins are forgiven because the man is healed.  Then all the people, possibly even the teachers of the law, accept the conclusion.  The man was healed because his sins were forgiven.  Jesus had that authority.

Prayer

Jesus, you showed to the teachers of the law that you had authority to forgive sin.  Thank you for forgiving mine.

Questions

1. Where does Jesus return?
2. What happens to the roof?
3. How does Jesus demonstrate his authority to forgive?
4. How has Jesus proven the words of scripture to be true for you?
5. What is your response to Jesus’ authority to forgive sin?

³⁵ Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. ³⁶ Simon and his companions went to look for him, ³⁷ and when they found him, they exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!”

³⁸ Jesus replied, “Let us go somewhere else—to the nearby villages—so I can preach there also. That is why I have come.” ³⁹ So he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons.

⁴⁰ A man with leprosy^[h] came to him and begged him on his knees, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.”

⁴¹ Jesus was indignant.^[i] He reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” ⁴² Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed.

⁴³ Jesus sent him away at once with a strong warning: ⁴⁴ “See that you don’t tell this to anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” ⁴⁵ Instead he went out and began to talk freely, spreading the news. As a result, Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places. Yet the people still came to him from everywhere.

Jesus Focuses On Why He Has Come

We do not know what time of year it was necessarily that Jesus got up before dawn.  However, before dawn is before the work day in ancient cultures that had no energy supplies to allow them to work before there was light.    Jesus starts his day alone with God.  This is not solitary as a person is only by themselves.  This is a pre-dawn tryst between two people who share a deep affection.  Jesus maintains his primary relationship so that all other events in the day flow from it.    God is waiting for a tryst with us in quiet places.  Will we rush out before the dawn and start the day with him?

Secondly, knowing God allows us to set the boundaries for what is and is not our calling.  Jesus does not do everything that is asked of him.  He only concentrates on things that are in the will of the Father who sent him.  I believe Simon was chastising Jesus for going off on his own when there was so much work to be done.  Jesus’ healing ministry was starting with a bang in Capernaum.  However, Jesus know that he had to announce the arrival of the Kingdom in neighboring villages.  I find it interesting that he starts by using the pulpit in the various religious centers.  He becomes a traveling rabbi and teaches from scripture. 

This was a culture in which the synagogue was both the educational and religious center.  I think it would be good if churches once more integrated the life of the mind with its other practices.  No-one these days would think of the church as a center of learning where one could enter into a meaningful debate about local cultural issues, philosophical worldviews, or education.  However, that is exactly what Jesus is doing.  He is going to the think-tank that affected all of life in Israel and he is introducing new life into it.  Once the mind is transformed in these places of learning, the communities will never be the same.  This heady discourse with a biblically literate nation is coupled by works of transcendent power that gives a stamp of authority to his words.

Why is Jesus indignant in verse 41?  Is it that he has compassion and is annoyed that this leper is uncared for by the community?  Is it that he knows that healing this leper will lead to his not getting a moment’s peace.  He enters into the world of the leper none the less.  Leprosy covered a number of diseases at the time, not just what we would call leprosy.  To touch a leper was to become unclean and risk infection with whatever malady the leper actually had.  Jesus’ purity and life-giving power completely overwhelms the impurity and death of leprosy.  The disease can not endure Jesus’ touch.  Jesus tells the man strongly (perhaps linked with his initial anger) not to tell anyone about his healing.  However, the man doesn’t follow the Mosaic law and is so excited that he can’t keep his mouth shut.  People come to Jesus from everywhere, however the man healed from leprosy should not be seen as an example for us to follow as he directly disobeyed an indignant Jesus.  There are times, then, when we should keep the work of Jesus to ourselves as well as times to shout it from the rooftops.

Prayer

Jesus, I don’t know what made you indignant but I think that you were aware of how this man would disobey you and yet you had concern for him anyway.  I disobey you and you have concern for me.  You have healed me in so many ways and you continue to lead me in paths of healing from my fragile emotions.  I am not quiet about your healing, should I be?  I have a passion for seeing God glorified in education.  I want to see a strong move against secularism and sometimes I can’t keep my mouth shut because of where I see this generation headed.  Should I talk about it less?  Probably.

I have an overdeveloped sense of responsibility.  Let me know what is mine to address.  I was thinking today that I don’t have the emotional stamina to be the president of a healthy democratic government.  I was thinking of how Clinton and Bush aged in office.  I thought of myself as weak for not having that kind of stamina.  Then I woke up to the fact that the responsibilities that I have right now are of a far different kind.  Why would I admonish myself for not having the capacity to do what I am not called to do?

Jesus, help me to copy you in bringing a biblical perspective to public life.  I don’t know what opportunities I have, but help me to use my educational expertise in the public sphere.

Questions

1. Where does Jesus go before dawn and why?
2. What would others have him to do?
3. Why do you think Jesus is indignant in verse 41?
4. What would be a modern example of going to the synagogues in your community and speaking God’s truth?
5. What does God want you to talk more about or talk less about?

²¹ They went to Capernaum, and when the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach. ²² The people were amazed at his teaching, because he taught them as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law. ²³ Just then a man in their synagogue who was possessed by an impure spirit cried out, ²⁴ “What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”

²⁵ “Be quiet!” said Jesus sternly. “Come out of him!” ²⁶ The impure spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek.

²⁷ The people were all so amazed that they asked each other, “What is this? A new teaching—and with authority! He even gives orders to impure spirits and they obey him.” ²⁸ News about him spread quickly over the whole region of Galilee.

²⁹ As soon as they left the synagogue, they went with James and John to the home of Simon and Andrew. ³⁰ Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they immediately told Jesus about her. ³¹ So he went to her, took her hand and helped her up. The fever left her and she began to wait on them.

³² That evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon-possessed. ³³ The whole town gathered at the door, ³⁴ and Jesus healed many who had various diseases. He also drove out many demons, but he would not let the demons speak because they knew who he was.

Authority Over A Generation Of Fragile Gods

Jesus’ ministry was not centered on Nazareth.  Capernaum was his base and it is a town located on the northwestern corner of The Sea of Galilee.  I pictured Nazareth and other towns on the lake to be close together because they are in Galilee, and I assumed close to the lake.  The truth is that Nazareth is some distance away from the lake and located in the hills.  Jesus may have taken a special trip home, but he left Nazareth to preach and teach.  We find later that the people in his home town had become too familiar with him to accept him as anything special.

Notice how Jesus goes into the synagogue. The synagogue was both the religious and educational center of his day.  He would have gone there in both the role of the pastor and the college professor in today’s society.  I find this convicting because I teach in both school and church settings.  However, when Jesus teaches he does not rely on human tradition and scholarship.  When I teach, I am expected to site sources and give authority and credibility to what I say by appealing to the broader community experience.  Jesus has no mediators for his authority.  People today more and more set themselves up as self-referencing authorities and they are fools to do so.  Today people ignore their own lack of insight and worship themselves as gods.  It is true that a person can be limited by some of the ideas that others have had.  Too many ties to tradition can limit creativity.  It seems Disney and Hollywood have a point when they keep telling children to break with what others tell them and look to themselves.  Ironically, the child usually has an outside guide or guru who tells them to believe this.  Jesus is God and has absolute authority and even as a man has uncommon insight.  When he teaches from his own understanding, it is superior to his peers.

Did you notice how the man who cries out in the presence of this teaching is in the synagogue.  Being in a religious context does not make one exempt from demonic activity.  However, the authority of Jesus’ teaching sets itself up in direct contradiction to the authority governing this man’s life.  The man has not sinned.  He is not told to repent.  He may have passively or unwittingly become possessed but has somehow managed to go through the motions in his local religious community.  Now that he is faced with rival authority he is thrown forward by demons.  the demons inside the man either know that their game is up, or they counter Jesus by trying to name him and thus assert their authority over Jesus.  Of course, we know the result that awaits all those who set themselves up as an authority against Jesus.  Jesus quickly silences opposition that may distract him from his assigned task.

What news spread about Jesus across the region of Galilee?  It seems that it wasn’t the news of his preaching with authority but the news of his authority over unclean spirits.  In that age people more easily accepted that illness and troubles were spiritual in nature, at least to some extent.  We may think that our age is superior in its materialism.  However, the youth that I teach at Moody are well cared for physically, but they are more fragile over all with each passing year.  Jesus’ authority was welcomed in a world which could see the physical effects of sin and decay around them.  We have cleaned up the surface of our world, and the darkness within needs Jesus’ authority more than ever.

Jesus’ authority is established over fever as well as feverish demons.  Peter’s mother-in-law is healed immediately with healing only God could bring.  This leads to a tumult of people and Jesus has compassion for them and heals them.  However, just when the disciples and locals think they may have found a new faith-healer to do with as they wish, Jesus establishes his own ministry under the authority of the Father.

Prayer

Jesus, I am struck by your authority once again.  You have the authority to clean up lives and heal broken bodies and spirits.  You have authority to change the world.  However, you don’t demand that I submit to you, you ask.  I am resistant.  I think I am afraid for some reason.  I think that I will let you down, I don’t have the capacity, or I will just get something wrong and bring shame on myself and your cause.  Then I think of those in the biblical story who you brought along.  Not many were wise.  Often those you used were unaware of their ability to serve.  I do give you the authority over me.  However, I am afraid that it will hurt.  To rip out my selfishness, develop devotion, and to serve others sounds painful.  I fear people.  They seem to cause each other pain.  When I commit to something, they often don’t show up.  When I share something, they often don’t listen.  When I love someone, it often feels like they do not love in return.  I acknowledge my neediness and I bring all those needs to you.  May you satisfy my desires for support, as you always accept me without condition.  May I speak the truth in love and not worry about the response because I am speaking the truth for you.  May I love unconditionally because I know you.

Establish your authority in me and through me.

Questions

1. In what different ways does Jesus reveal his authority?
2. Why were people amazed?
3. Why didn’t Jesus allow demons to broadcast his true identity?
4. Does Jesus have complete mastery over all you do?
5. Pray now that Jesus would establish his absolute authority over each part of your day.