That's a plan
Commentary
The best laid plans of mice, men, and ministers often go astray. We seem to have fallen
somewhat short of the scientific expectation of my youth. Not every home has a heliport,
all food has not been reduced to a once-a-day nutrition pill, we are not using the medical
wand from Star Trek for diagnoses quite yet. On the other hand, I do not recall
anyone anticipating anything along the lines of the impact that the internet would make or
the role that the personal computer would have in our lives. Who would have ever
thought that as a result of global warming we could anticipate that beach front property
would extend so far inland? I was not raised with the hope there would ever be an end to
the international communist menace. Neither was there anything in my upbringing that
anticipated that in the minds of many, the Arabic people would become a replacement for
our former nemesis.
Certainly there was little that prepared me for how human sexuality would become a source of such deep divisions in the faith community. None anticipated the extent to which the culture of the evangelical movement would come out of the closet of American thought into such prominence. Few foresaw the degree to which the mainline would be sidelined, or the development of megachurches that mimic shopping malls, and I have not even mentioned the impact in the change in the role of women and the degree to which America would become a multicultural feast.
You get the pattern. I have limited enthusiasm for presidential state of the union messages: not being able to remember what was prominently featured last year, or unanticipated in the coming year.
The lectionary readings for this Sunday deal with the never-ending cycle of plans made and lives rearranged when plans must be altered because of unintended consequences. Each, in their own way, reminds us that the source of difficulty here may be that we are not the only authors of a plan. God has a habit of becoming a player in human history in surprising ways and in whatever the schemes are of human beings. Of course, one can feel the theological ground shaking and potential chasms of controversy opening up. One should not make this claim lightly or easily. The texts do not do so, but they clearly point to the divine intention that, anticipated or not, human beings will have to wrestle with this change.
David's attempt to centralize worship through consolidating liturgical activity at a national center runs up against God's "not yet." The Ephesians are clear as to the foundation but seem to be reminded that the superstructure will contain more rooms than they had anticipated. Diversity, manifest at meals, and in the smells emanating from the kitchen, and in the way "they" raise their kids, can be the source of some mighty interesting moments in church life. In many congregations it remains to be seen what will be the cement that holds up the edifice of church life. What lies behind Mark's account of the ministry of Jesus and the disciples is an unanticipated success. How could one find that problematic? Most churches I know would be more than ready to handle the scenes that Mark describes. It is just not paranoid fear that leads New Englanders to look up at a perfectly clear blue sky and remark. "That is good storm-brewing weather." Often the unintended consequences of success can bring churches to the brink as power shifts and agendas change.
In all these reversals and advances there might be less "gospel" than we had hoped. Sitting at the counselor's table in David's court, pulling up to the table at an Ephesian potluck, or tabling the motion on the new additions in Mark's church must have been quite an eye opening, daunting experience. However, there is a plan that in all these things we might grow in wisdom and stature, enter into the fullness of life, and find our joy complete. We recognize then that there is room for some hope. From time to time, my experience in church life has shown that there is a sign of a larger plan than my own and a greater planner than any of us can envision.
2 Samuel 7:1-14a
David does what good kings and responsible executives do. Looking to the long term needs and the stability of the nation, it is a good thing that worship be centered at the national capital. It is not a good thing that the king be living in a well-appointed detached home of cedar while God camps out in a tent. Not only is this a bit embarrassing but it also has the potential of being a threat. A God in a tent has the mobility to up and do holy things in any old place imaginable. What happens if the people find this God making holy places that would lend credence to sources of authority outside the royal line? What happens if people begin to believe that the power of God could show up anytime, anywhere, in an unregulated fashion? A God that could do that could do just about anything and anything might prove a problem to the royal realm. Is it a good thing to have a constant reminder that there is an alternative history to the current national direction?
Do the people need a graphic reminder that the national ethos was defined in the camps and under the tents of those who have been set free by the hand that defeated and deflated the Egyptian monarchy? Monarchs tend to be supportive of the monarchial system in general. None of this can be good for the crown. Smart politics suggest that it is the wise thing to have everybody under the same tent, to paraphrase Lyndon Johnson, facing out rather than any one soiling the tent from the outside. Since David is not about to live in a tent, it is time to bring God in from the cold.
The inclusion of Nathan in the story perhaps indicates how the religious community thought of all this. "Nathan said to the king, 'Go, do all that you have in mind; for the Lord is with you.' " It is evident that this insight is not the product of any conversation with or word from the Lord. I suspect that the thinking process here has much to do with the awareness that this will bring the religious community to the table in a very formal and significant way. Here comes a new day: jobs, careers, national prominence. Now how could the almighty be against anything like that? The Lord must be with the king on this one. Not only will everyone be under the same tent but there is going to be significant upgrade in status and housing. This could be a very good thing.
Of course there is one flaw to the plan. God will have none of it: not now and not this way. It is time for some history here. This idea of a king is not client driven -- the client being God. This has come up in this context not by divine imperative but human impetuousness. Nathan's role as a religious leader is to go over some national history with David: "Now therefore thus you shall say to my servant David: Thus says the Lord of hosts: I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep to be prince over my people Israel; and I have been with you wherever you went, and have cut off all your enemies from before you; and I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth. And I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them, so that they may live in their own place, and be disturbed no more; and evildoers shall afflict them no more, as formerly, from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel; and I will give you rest from all your enemies. Moreover the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house."
Leadership has come not from centralized bureaucracy but from the people of the pasture. God has had a significant role in foreign policy cutting off enemies. God has appointed judges and therefore is the source of justice. This is a bit unnerving for kings, presidents, and prime ministers.
Committed advocates of democracy that we are, we cannot be entirely comfortable with God's plan to create a dynasty. However, with which part of that are we most uncomfortable -- the dynasty part or that it is God's choice that we must come to terms with as basis of national leadership? Of course, we know that eventually there will be a temple and a centralized religious bureaucracy. Of course, it does not turn out quite the way that God wanted, at least according to Jesus' observations and experience. It was not in David's plan or anyone else's to have this in the corporate memory as a source of reflection.
Ephesians 2:11-22
The text proclaims the fulfillment of God's plan. "He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it. So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near." No doubt, in the end, this is good news. Who could not want and long for an end to the kind of fractured living that we experience in a "red state, blue state, Generation X, self- fulfillment vs. self-sacrifice, neo-liberal neo-con, and Clear channel vs. Air America world? A little sense that we are all on the same page as human beings would not hurt.
However, I wonder if we are quite ready to have the kind of unity that passage is talking about. "But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ." Often I am hoping in the scheme of things that those who are different from me will either be brought around to my way of thinking or be brought down from places of authority, or brought to their knees so that they will be seen to be innocuous and infective. Brought near me, however, I am not so comfortable with. Does this mean that they will be brought into the fold? Lord knows what ideas, habits of being, eating, and raising their children they will bring along with them.
"Being brought near" without being brought around to my way means that they might bring down my settled way of living. If we allow them to bring this off, Lord knows what is going to happen. They just might find themselves being made deacons or elders without having observed the usual ten-year apprenticeship of membership that many of our churches seem to wisely require. Brought near? Do you have any idea of what some of them think is a suitable candidate for ordination?
I just interviewed a candidate for licensed ministry in my denomination. Do you know that he couldn't even name the first president of our denomination and had never read a word of any of the Niebuhrs? He has been a whole year in seminary for God's sake and never heard of the fundamentalist modernist controversy. And another thing, get this; he didn't even begin his religious life as a Christian. How reliable can that possibly be?
All right, I am feeling a little better now. I bet you have heard versions of those words. Maybe even you have had the kinds of feelings that generate such outspokenness. Bringing folks near will bring no quarantines of what might be brought off here: changing standards of ordination, changing conversation in the hallways, changing the kitchen accommodations so that vegetarian meals can be served (vegan and non-vegan). Does it never end? Well, yes, that is the point -- the risk and the challenge. This being brought near by the blood of Christ never ends and there are no guarantees as to where this might go. Despite our plans to live a more settled existence it seems that in the scheme of things we will have to enter into the experience without any guarantees. We enter in only with the reminder that if we have not love we are going to sound like a noisy gong as our fears reverberate through the household that God is creating.
When we start talking blood as the binder that keeps us together, moderns are bound to be put off. It seems that too much blood has been spilled in our world already. Blood ties and blood oaths have led to mayhem. If anything it seems that too many in too many places are ready to sacrifice their own and others' blood. Yet here we are talking of the blood of Christ, "But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us." Yet the hope here is that where things cross there can be redemption and healing. Crossed wires, crossness, cross-ups can be places where growth takes place, peace that passes all understanding but that brings understanding may come, and new life might open up. Sometimes it happens in the "sweating of blood" through the growth of a marriage relationship. It can come in the bleeding out of heart and soul of a school teacher trying to breathe life into a troubled child. It can come in the actual shedding of blood.
The late civil rights leader, James Farmer, has written that he knew the struggle would achieve many of its goals following the Sunday school bombing that killed four black girls. The hate in America could no longer bear that kind of burden after Americans were brought together in that horror and the sorrow. If nothing else the "blood of Christ" runs in ways that will surprise those who seek to build walls and maintain barriers to human unity!
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56
Mark recounts an aspect of church life that for many of us has proven elusive -- massive, undeniable success. "For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat." Now, is that not the epitome of the kind of church that earns kudos and plaudits? Too many to do business as usual, too busy to eat. There is a congregation that is not letting any grass grow under its feet. Many of us in the mainline do not anticipate such success in our life times. It is not that we plan to fail, or even that we fail to plan. It is just given the way things seem to be trending -- we should plan on giving some thought to the theology of failure. Who would have ever thought that this would happen? As it has some of us are not quite ready to deal with it or trust it.
So, Jesus calls for a time out. "He said to them, 'Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.' For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat." Mark's Gospel in particular is wary of such unbridled, successful, feel-good moments. Well, some people, I suppose, can't give it a rest even when things are going well. We want to say to the Marks among us, "Chill out and enjoy the ride."
Yet, Mark is on to something here. He is not just being a downer spoilsport. His entire gospel is a reminder that God's plan for us, to quote Calvin, is "not just success but faithfulness." We often experience faithfulness as something less than a feel good moment. The gospel calls us to gain a feeling for what the kingdom of God is like even in the midst of something less than a feel good moment -- even failure. The Gospel of Mark builds to the moment when the Roman centurion pronounces the words, "Truly this man was God's Son." The cross certainly does not feel like a plan for us but it is the place where we can gain a feel for what is God's plan. Here is God's love and power to bring life out of death.
Application
Well, what can we plan on? All of these texts point in the direction that human beings can plan on -- having their own plans and calculations challenged and interrupted by the incalculable power of God. God has a way of limiting royal pretensions. It seems that when these pretensions are carried out in the name of God they are particularly liable to being upset. Walking the line in church/state conversations becomes very important in light of a God whose ways are not our ways.
We can try and build walls to manage just who is in and out of our church life. However, the plan seems to be, as the book of Revelation testifies, that the gate to the heavenly city is never closed. Plan on people showing up who will challenge and both stretch your wineskins and get under your skin. In welcoming others into your shared common life you will be welcoming in change. The others having been brought near but not entirely brought around to your way of thinking: You can count on being brought to your knees in prayer. However, from such a posture people have a way of rising up to more life than they had thought possible.
Count on success not being the only measure of kingdom centeredness. Indeed some successes can divide and ruin churches, separating those who have experienced the golden years from those who come after. Success wears grooves that make it difficult to respond when "New occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good uncouth." When churches can stand at the crossroads and say, "Truly Jesus was the Son of God," then they are most open to God's plan for them.
Alternate Application
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56. "And wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed." Mark's rhetorical reflection intrigues me. Villages, cities, farms, and the sick laid in the marketplaces. I walk slowly here, considering what this might mean. Jesus invites people to bring the wounded and hurting into a public setting of the market. Jesus' healing power invited and makes possible a gathering and awareness of the wounded and hurt that otherwise would not happen. Could there have been buying and selling in the marketplace that day in the face of all the sick laid out in the center of commerce? Certainly it could not be business as usual. Can it ever be business as usual in the face of those usually kept out of sight?
Mark is fairly specific about where the sick come from. There seems to be no place where the ills of the world are escaped; rural bucolic, urban hip, industrial, or farm -- Jesus seems to have had the power to address the ills that came from all these places. The people did not get to the place of healing by themselves. The begging seems to have been done not by the people themselves but by their advocates. Reading this text, I find myself wondering how avid my faith community is in making public the sickness and the hurting that comes from these places. To what degree have we permitted our marketplace to be disrupted so that it cannot be business as usual when there are so many from so many places that are hurting?
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 89:20-37
What a beautiful thing is rendered here. A covenant made and kept. A promise uttered and maintained. God's faithfulness to the line of David is unalterable. Promises kept are powerful things, aren't they? It's been told to many a child by parents and caregivers that a person's word is their bond. Think about the people we trust the most in our lives. They are inevitably the ones who keep their word. The need to keep our promises is one of the things that literally makes life possible. The glue of culture, in fact, is the ability to trust that people will do what they say they will do.
The mechanic who says he will fix your car, the person who says they will pay you for services rendered, the employer who promises a pension plan and health insurance. We need to trust in promises such as these, or none of us are going to do very well. Indeed, it can be said, with little fear of contradiction, that the sense of faltering we feel in our culture today is linked in no small way to the dissolution of this concept.
It could be argued that we have, as a people, abandoned the notion of commitment. No longer must we do what we say we will do. From the vapid promises of politicians to marriage vows to workplace commitments and back again, we have fallen into the murky shadows of situational ethics. We have heard it before. "I meant it when I said it ... but ... well ... things have changed." The fact that a promise was made didn't change. The reality of a covenant made in marriage isn't changed because a man in mid-life turmoil seeks a younger woman to try to beat back the march of time.
This abandonment of commitment seeps into relationships where people refuse to make a "commitment." It even pervades the life of the church, where few people commit these days to leadership roles or things that mean they will have to follow through and be present.
A sociologist may well argue the point, but for people of faith this much remains. We exist as a people because of a promise made and kept. Consider the words of Jeremiah: "I will be their God, and they shall be my people" (Jeremiah 31:33). This covenant, or contract, followed up so marvelously by the new covenant in Christ, makes us who we are. It is promises made and kept that give us our very identity. So read this psalm with reverence. Absorb these words as signpost and reminder that we are who we are because of promises made and kept.
Certainly there was little that prepared me for how human sexuality would become a source of such deep divisions in the faith community. None anticipated the extent to which the culture of the evangelical movement would come out of the closet of American thought into such prominence. Few foresaw the degree to which the mainline would be sidelined, or the development of megachurches that mimic shopping malls, and I have not even mentioned the impact in the change in the role of women and the degree to which America would become a multicultural feast.
You get the pattern. I have limited enthusiasm for presidential state of the union messages: not being able to remember what was prominently featured last year, or unanticipated in the coming year.
The lectionary readings for this Sunday deal with the never-ending cycle of plans made and lives rearranged when plans must be altered because of unintended consequences. Each, in their own way, reminds us that the source of difficulty here may be that we are not the only authors of a plan. God has a habit of becoming a player in human history in surprising ways and in whatever the schemes are of human beings. Of course, one can feel the theological ground shaking and potential chasms of controversy opening up. One should not make this claim lightly or easily. The texts do not do so, but they clearly point to the divine intention that, anticipated or not, human beings will have to wrestle with this change.
David's attempt to centralize worship through consolidating liturgical activity at a national center runs up against God's "not yet." The Ephesians are clear as to the foundation but seem to be reminded that the superstructure will contain more rooms than they had anticipated. Diversity, manifest at meals, and in the smells emanating from the kitchen, and in the way "they" raise their kids, can be the source of some mighty interesting moments in church life. In many congregations it remains to be seen what will be the cement that holds up the edifice of church life. What lies behind Mark's account of the ministry of Jesus and the disciples is an unanticipated success. How could one find that problematic? Most churches I know would be more than ready to handle the scenes that Mark describes. It is just not paranoid fear that leads New Englanders to look up at a perfectly clear blue sky and remark. "That is good storm-brewing weather." Often the unintended consequences of success can bring churches to the brink as power shifts and agendas change.
In all these reversals and advances there might be less "gospel" than we had hoped. Sitting at the counselor's table in David's court, pulling up to the table at an Ephesian potluck, or tabling the motion on the new additions in Mark's church must have been quite an eye opening, daunting experience. However, there is a plan that in all these things we might grow in wisdom and stature, enter into the fullness of life, and find our joy complete. We recognize then that there is room for some hope. From time to time, my experience in church life has shown that there is a sign of a larger plan than my own and a greater planner than any of us can envision.
2 Samuel 7:1-14a
David does what good kings and responsible executives do. Looking to the long term needs and the stability of the nation, it is a good thing that worship be centered at the national capital. It is not a good thing that the king be living in a well-appointed detached home of cedar while God camps out in a tent. Not only is this a bit embarrassing but it also has the potential of being a threat. A God in a tent has the mobility to up and do holy things in any old place imaginable. What happens if the people find this God making holy places that would lend credence to sources of authority outside the royal line? What happens if people begin to believe that the power of God could show up anytime, anywhere, in an unregulated fashion? A God that could do that could do just about anything and anything might prove a problem to the royal realm. Is it a good thing to have a constant reminder that there is an alternative history to the current national direction?
Do the people need a graphic reminder that the national ethos was defined in the camps and under the tents of those who have been set free by the hand that defeated and deflated the Egyptian monarchy? Monarchs tend to be supportive of the monarchial system in general. None of this can be good for the crown. Smart politics suggest that it is the wise thing to have everybody under the same tent, to paraphrase Lyndon Johnson, facing out rather than any one soiling the tent from the outside. Since David is not about to live in a tent, it is time to bring God in from the cold.
The inclusion of Nathan in the story perhaps indicates how the religious community thought of all this. "Nathan said to the king, 'Go, do all that you have in mind; for the Lord is with you.' " It is evident that this insight is not the product of any conversation with or word from the Lord. I suspect that the thinking process here has much to do with the awareness that this will bring the religious community to the table in a very formal and significant way. Here comes a new day: jobs, careers, national prominence. Now how could the almighty be against anything like that? The Lord must be with the king on this one. Not only will everyone be under the same tent but there is going to be significant upgrade in status and housing. This could be a very good thing.
Of course there is one flaw to the plan. God will have none of it: not now and not this way. It is time for some history here. This idea of a king is not client driven -- the client being God. This has come up in this context not by divine imperative but human impetuousness. Nathan's role as a religious leader is to go over some national history with David: "Now therefore thus you shall say to my servant David: Thus says the Lord of hosts: I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep to be prince over my people Israel; and I have been with you wherever you went, and have cut off all your enemies from before you; and I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth. And I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them, so that they may live in their own place, and be disturbed no more; and evildoers shall afflict them no more, as formerly, from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel; and I will give you rest from all your enemies. Moreover the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house."
Leadership has come not from centralized bureaucracy but from the people of the pasture. God has had a significant role in foreign policy cutting off enemies. God has appointed judges and therefore is the source of justice. This is a bit unnerving for kings, presidents, and prime ministers.
Committed advocates of democracy that we are, we cannot be entirely comfortable with God's plan to create a dynasty. However, with which part of that are we most uncomfortable -- the dynasty part or that it is God's choice that we must come to terms with as basis of national leadership? Of course, we know that eventually there will be a temple and a centralized religious bureaucracy. Of course, it does not turn out quite the way that God wanted, at least according to Jesus' observations and experience. It was not in David's plan or anyone else's to have this in the corporate memory as a source of reflection.
Ephesians 2:11-22
The text proclaims the fulfillment of God's plan. "He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it. So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near." No doubt, in the end, this is good news. Who could not want and long for an end to the kind of fractured living that we experience in a "red state, blue state, Generation X, self- fulfillment vs. self-sacrifice, neo-liberal neo-con, and Clear channel vs. Air America world? A little sense that we are all on the same page as human beings would not hurt.
However, I wonder if we are quite ready to have the kind of unity that passage is talking about. "But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ." Often I am hoping in the scheme of things that those who are different from me will either be brought around to my way of thinking or be brought down from places of authority, or brought to their knees so that they will be seen to be innocuous and infective. Brought near me, however, I am not so comfortable with. Does this mean that they will be brought into the fold? Lord knows what ideas, habits of being, eating, and raising their children they will bring along with them.
"Being brought near" without being brought around to my way means that they might bring down my settled way of living. If we allow them to bring this off, Lord knows what is going to happen. They just might find themselves being made deacons or elders without having observed the usual ten-year apprenticeship of membership that many of our churches seem to wisely require. Brought near? Do you have any idea of what some of them think is a suitable candidate for ordination?
I just interviewed a candidate for licensed ministry in my denomination. Do you know that he couldn't even name the first president of our denomination and had never read a word of any of the Niebuhrs? He has been a whole year in seminary for God's sake and never heard of the fundamentalist modernist controversy. And another thing, get this; he didn't even begin his religious life as a Christian. How reliable can that possibly be?
All right, I am feeling a little better now. I bet you have heard versions of those words. Maybe even you have had the kinds of feelings that generate such outspokenness. Bringing folks near will bring no quarantines of what might be brought off here: changing standards of ordination, changing conversation in the hallways, changing the kitchen accommodations so that vegetarian meals can be served (vegan and non-vegan). Does it never end? Well, yes, that is the point -- the risk and the challenge. This being brought near by the blood of Christ never ends and there are no guarantees as to where this might go. Despite our plans to live a more settled existence it seems that in the scheme of things we will have to enter into the experience without any guarantees. We enter in only with the reminder that if we have not love we are going to sound like a noisy gong as our fears reverberate through the household that God is creating.
When we start talking blood as the binder that keeps us together, moderns are bound to be put off. It seems that too much blood has been spilled in our world already. Blood ties and blood oaths have led to mayhem. If anything it seems that too many in too many places are ready to sacrifice their own and others' blood. Yet here we are talking of the blood of Christ, "But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us." Yet the hope here is that where things cross there can be redemption and healing. Crossed wires, crossness, cross-ups can be places where growth takes place, peace that passes all understanding but that brings understanding may come, and new life might open up. Sometimes it happens in the "sweating of blood" through the growth of a marriage relationship. It can come in the bleeding out of heart and soul of a school teacher trying to breathe life into a troubled child. It can come in the actual shedding of blood.
The late civil rights leader, James Farmer, has written that he knew the struggle would achieve many of its goals following the Sunday school bombing that killed four black girls. The hate in America could no longer bear that kind of burden after Americans were brought together in that horror and the sorrow. If nothing else the "blood of Christ" runs in ways that will surprise those who seek to build walls and maintain barriers to human unity!
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56
Mark recounts an aspect of church life that for many of us has proven elusive -- massive, undeniable success. "For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat." Now, is that not the epitome of the kind of church that earns kudos and plaudits? Too many to do business as usual, too busy to eat. There is a congregation that is not letting any grass grow under its feet. Many of us in the mainline do not anticipate such success in our life times. It is not that we plan to fail, or even that we fail to plan. It is just given the way things seem to be trending -- we should plan on giving some thought to the theology of failure. Who would have ever thought that this would happen? As it has some of us are not quite ready to deal with it or trust it.
So, Jesus calls for a time out. "He said to them, 'Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.' For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat." Mark's Gospel in particular is wary of such unbridled, successful, feel-good moments. Well, some people, I suppose, can't give it a rest even when things are going well. We want to say to the Marks among us, "Chill out and enjoy the ride."
Yet, Mark is on to something here. He is not just being a downer spoilsport. His entire gospel is a reminder that God's plan for us, to quote Calvin, is "not just success but faithfulness." We often experience faithfulness as something less than a feel good moment. The gospel calls us to gain a feeling for what the kingdom of God is like even in the midst of something less than a feel good moment -- even failure. The Gospel of Mark builds to the moment when the Roman centurion pronounces the words, "Truly this man was God's Son." The cross certainly does not feel like a plan for us but it is the place where we can gain a feel for what is God's plan. Here is God's love and power to bring life out of death.
Application
Well, what can we plan on? All of these texts point in the direction that human beings can plan on -- having their own plans and calculations challenged and interrupted by the incalculable power of God. God has a way of limiting royal pretensions. It seems that when these pretensions are carried out in the name of God they are particularly liable to being upset. Walking the line in church/state conversations becomes very important in light of a God whose ways are not our ways.
We can try and build walls to manage just who is in and out of our church life. However, the plan seems to be, as the book of Revelation testifies, that the gate to the heavenly city is never closed. Plan on people showing up who will challenge and both stretch your wineskins and get under your skin. In welcoming others into your shared common life you will be welcoming in change. The others having been brought near but not entirely brought around to your way of thinking: You can count on being brought to your knees in prayer. However, from such a posture people have a way of rising up to more life than they had thought possible.
Count on success not being the only measure of kingdom centeredness. Indeed some successes can divide and ruin churches, separating those who have experienced the golden years from those who come after. Success wears grooves that make it difficult to respond when "New occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good uncouth." When churches can stand at the crossroads and say, "Truly Jesus was the Son of God," then they are most open to God's plan for them.
Alternate Application
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56. "And wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed." Mark's rhetorical reflection intrigues me. Villages, cities, farms, and the sick laid in the marketplaces. I walk slowly here, considering what this might mean. Jesus invites people to bring the wounded and hurting into a public setting of the market. Jesus' healing power invited and makes possible a gathering and awareness of the wounded and hurt that otherwise would not happen. Could there have been buying and selling in the marketplace that day in the face of all the sick laid out in the center of commerce? Certainly it could not be business as usual. Can it ever be business as usual in the face of those usually kept out of sight?
Mark is fairly specific about where the sick come from. There seems to be no place where the ills of the world are escaped; rural bucolic, urban hip, industrial, or farm -- Jesus seems to have had the power to address the ills that came from all these places. The people did not get to the place of healing by themselves. The begging seems to have been done not by the people themselves but by their advocates. Reading this text, I find myself wondering how avid my faith community is in making public the sickness and the hurting that comes from these places. To what degree have we permitted our marketplace to be disrupted so that it cannot be business as usual when there are so many from so many places that are hurting?
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 89:20-37
What a beautiful thing is rendered here. A covenant made and kept. A promise uttered and maintained. God's faithfulness to the line of David is unalterable. Promises kept are powerful things, aren't they? It's been told to many a child by parents and caregivers that a person's word is their bond. Think about the people we trust the most in our lives. They are inevitably the ones who keep their word. The need to keep our promises is one of the things that literally makes life possible. The glue of culture, in fact, is the ability to trust that people will do what they say they will do.
The mechanic who says he will fix your car, the person who says they will pay you for services rendered, the employer who promises a pension plan and health insurance. We need to trust in promises such as these, or none of us are going to do very well. Indeed, it can be said, with little fear of contradiction, that the sense of faltering we feel in our culture today is linked in no small way to the dissolution of this concept.
It could be argued that we have, as a people, abandoned the notion of commitment. No longer must we do what we say we will do. From the vapid promises of politicians to marriage vows to workplace commitments and back again, we have fallen into the murky shadows of situational ethics. We have heard it before. "I meant it when I said it ... but ... well ... things have changed." The fact that a promise was made didn't change. The reality of a covenant made in marriage isn't changed because a man in mid-life turmoil seeks a younger woman to try to beat back the march of time.
This abandonment of commitment seeps into relationships where people refuse to make a "commitment." It even pervades the life of the church, where few people commit these days to leadership roles or things that mean they will have to follow through and be present.
A sociologist may well argue the point, but for people of faith this much remains. We exist as a people because of a promise made and kept. Consider the words of Jeremiah: "I will be their God, and they shall be my people" (Jeremiah 31:33). This covenant, or contract, followed up so marvelously by the new covenant in Christ, makes us who we are. It is promises made and kept that give us our very identity. So read this psalm with reverence. Absorb these words as signpost and reminder that we are who we are because of promises made and kept.
