The Healing Of Simon Peter's Mother-In-Law
Preaching
Preaching The Miracles
Series II, Cycle B
1. Text
As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John.29 Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once.30 He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.31
2. What's Happening?
The Gospel called Mark wants to set a tone of direct action and quick response in this story. Mark shows an absence of dragging feet and suggests a sense of urgency. Jesus gets things done. From Mark's perspective, whatever happens around Jesus, the response is always immediate.
"Immediately" is a favorite action word in the first chapter of Mark. After the baptism of Jesus, the Spirit immediately drives him out into the wilderness (Mark 1:12). When Jesus calls Simon and Andrew to be disciples, they immediately leave their nets to follow him (verse 18). Going a little farther, Jesus sees James and John. He immediately calls them (verse 20). When Jesus touches the leper and repeats the healing formula, immediately the leprosy leaves the sufferer (verse 42).
In the present story of positive expectations, as soon as Jesus and the disciples leave the synagogue, they enter the house of Simon and Andrew (verse 29). The disciples immediately tell Jesus about Simon's mother-in-law (verse 30). The woman's response is immediate (verse 31).
First Point Of Action
With James and John, Jesus leaves the synagogue and enters Simon and Andrew's house.
Second Point Of Action
There they find Simon's mother-in-law sick in bed. They immediately tell Jesus about her.
Third Point Of Action
Jesus comes, takes her by the hand and lifts her up.
Fourth Point Of Action
The fever leaves the woman.
Fifth Point Of Action
As if nothing extraordinary had happened, Simon's mother-in-law begins to wait on them as a host.
3. Connecting Points -- Conversations
Mark, in character, tells this story without delays in four direct and compact verses. Because talk is absent in this summary story, readers must fill the pieces. Time stands out as an important element. As soon as they left the synagogue, they went to Simon and Andrew's house (Mark 1:29). We do not know when the brothers became aware of their mother-in-law's illness. However, at the first available moment, they told Jesus about it (Mark 1:30). Jesus acted directly. The fever left the woman. She returned to her duties as homemaker. She was not even the mother of the head of the house. Although she held mother-in-law status, both Jesus and her family recognized her worth.
Unless she claims worth for herself, the aging American woman also holds little value in our society -- except possibly for her purse. Today, as in earlier times, a woman has little time to be sick. Typically, she ignores her own needs unless she is doggedly intentional about meeting them. The same call for efficiency by the householder to keep household rhythms in balance, as shown by Simon Peter's mother-in-law, still rings today. If sickness disrupts the rhythm of a woman's role as juggler, everything tumbles to the floor.
Interviewing Jesus
Asker: Jesus, the writers report that you also were silent in this quiet story. Is this because those close to you surrounded you? This is a clean story with no strings attached to the healing. You did not need to prove yourself or make a point. You were at home. You simply did the healing miracle because the relative of a friend had a fever that put her to bed.
Jesus: We often ignore or neglect the common person. We take laborers for granted until their inability to or choice not to work becomes an inconvenience for us. Unconditional love includes everyone. Unconditional love says you and I count.
When I am bone weary and come home to this refuge, this house of my friends and disciples, Peter and Andrew, I often return to Isaiah's words: "But those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint" (Isaiah 40:31).
I remember that the one who sustains me does not faint or grow weary. God's understanding is unsearchable. From the sparrows to the very hairs on our head, God numbers us and calls us all by name. So mostly, when I meet a suffering person, these words sound in my heart: "He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless" (Isaiah 40:29). (For further study, read the entire Old Testament pericope for Epiphany 5, Isaiah 40:21-31.)
It is my task and it is your task to remember whose we are and to respond to God's love by caring that much about our neighbor, whatever age, sexual preference, or condition of body and mind.
Asker: In this story, actions speak louder than words. The only report of words was that the disciples did not waste time letting you know Simon's mother-in-law was sick. The first free moment -- at once, the writer said -- they told you about her. Your disciples trusted you would take care of things. Was this because of the depth of your friendship?
You responded like the trusted physician whom we give the power to take one look at a problem and know immediately what to do. The disciples did not have to waste your energy with words or long explanations.
Jesus: One dimension of the silence is our familial ease together. It is similar to the comfortable silences between a long-married couple. To reach that level of communication requires the work and practice of trusting. Beyond that, as we become adept at listening with our whole self, we can learn much about another person. The expression on the face of Peter's mother-in-law spoke. The change from her ordinary habits also told me as much as my disciples' focus of attention toward her.
Another element involves the significance of the support of human relationship in restoring or maintaining health. Look at the longstanding sewing or quilters' groups in the rural churches of your day. Do not be fooled into thinking they exist only to make quilts! Your modern-day urban carpool also extends all sorts of supportive possibilities.
Knowing that people care deeply about us and trust we also care about what is happening in their lives helps raise the quality of our living. Isolation can lead to an increased vulnerability to disease and to a shorter life span. Support of others contributes to disease resistance. Opportunity to let off steam among trusted friends is a valuable tool for health. The sick woman was in the right place. The house of Simon and Andrew is probably the most supportive, health-restoring home around.
Asker: Goals and ideals aside, Jesus, when it comes to the whole health of a person, perhaps we should temper your words, "Be perfect" (Matthew 5:48), with these words: Given reality, be in your best possible state of health.
Jesus: Perhaps we should. To be perfect is a goal for our relationships. It is not a command for the condition of the body, over which we have incomplete control.
Asker: Jesus, what do you mean for this miracle to tell us about God?
Jesus: Members of families can give support to each other. In addition, God cares for the seemingly least significant people. Our Sustainer is so aware of us and close to us that very little passes by God. Events of the world, events of nature, and life accidents may pound us down. God comes as a spirit extending a handhold we can depend upon.
God is both approachable and approaches us. That is, God takes the initiative just as I modeled by taking the woman by her hand. Without additional fanfare, without words, God has a way of taking us by the hand. This may be quietness or an inner calm that comes to you in the midst of agitation. It may be the absence of isolation or loneliness when you are alone. It might be the unexplainable clearing of your head when you have been muddled.
Asker: Anything else?
Jesus: Yes, but I'll let Peter's mother-in-law speak for herself about the role we are to play in healing.
Interviewing Simon's Mother-in-law
Asker: You, also, never said a word in this story, or at least it was not reported. Why? Were you embarrassed about being found ill? Did you not know how to respond? Did surprise leave you speechless? Was your faith so automatic and true that you simply accepted the healing as if Jesus had greeted you? Were the words of women in your day considered unworthy? Even so, Jesus thought you counted enough that he healed you. It did not matter to him if you were a man or a woman. Does that not say something important?
Mother-in-law: I suppose my silence could be interpreted as submissive. On the other hand, we were a close, supportive family. I consider Jesus as family. He was at the house often enough. My expectations for recovery were high. Have you not immediately felt better when someone you knew would help came through the door? Jesus is perceptive. He almost can tell what is happening with a look.
The Psalmist says God's job description includes gathering the outcasts of Israel, healing the brokenhearted and binding up their wounds. God lifts up the downtrodden and casts the wicked to the ground. So it is with Jesus. His understanding is beyond measure. So it is with my savior. (See today's pericope, Psalm 147:1-11.)
Asker: You were sick in bed with a fever. You must have been quite ill to go to bed because the woman had to work all day to keep the household going. This role must have been foremost on your mind. The first thing you did upon rising was to get back to your work, your duty, of serving those who had come into the household.
Mother-in-law: You speak accurately about my household duties, but my returning to work was more than duty. Whenever we are freed from what ails us, our first instinct is to return to doing whatever we love most. This is the freedom of health. I guess I would also say it is honoring God's creation of us, of the holy within us. You may also see my actions as a directive, that is, we should put an illness behind us as soon as possible.
Asker: I live in a different age. What are you trying to tell me about what is most basic for me as a woman? For me as part of a family? My family mostly has to take what is left over -- not just in meals but of my energy, my emotion, and my love. Was your rising from the bed so automatic that you did not give a second thought to resting a bit? Were you embarrassed again for falling down on the job?
Mother-in-law: What women do share in Jesus' time and in the new millennium is the call to define and redefine who we are, whose we are, that is, that God has made us, and what God calls us to be. I use the word redefine because society continues to evolve. Life brings many accidents and other changes. I would challenge women of your time to study both the negative and the positive connotations of service and being servants. Explore the simple, obvious ways we fulfill what God means for us to be.
Asker: What was it like when Jesus came over to the bed and took you by the hand and raised you up, and you felt the fever leave? You gave the best response of gratitude by immediately returning to your life work.
Mother-in-law: When you are the recipient of the healing touch, the best response is through your own action. My feeling was of deep, unspoken love. It speaks of the closeness coming from familiarity, from family. Jesus did not enter our home, kick off his sandals and say, "Leave me alone, I'm off duty. I'm all done working for today." His directive was kindness and immediate attention toward the members of the family.
Keep the needs of those closest to you in the urgent category. At times, family members use the words or the actions of busyness as a camouflage for their suffering. Extend a symbolic or literal hand.
Interviewing The Disciples
Asker: James, John, Simon and Andrew, who does the telling here? It is all in third person narration without dialogue. Somehow, we assume a disciple is telling the story. The storyteller did not say that Simon and Andrew were present, but only that it was their house. We know only that "they" entered the house and that Jesus and some others, probably disciples, entered with James and John (Mark 1:29).
A Disciple: I was there. Any one of us could have told the story. I told it as I did. I spoke briefly and to the point. I spoke as if it were nothing unusual for Jesus to care for us and for members of our family. It is not that I take Jesus or his healing for granted. Jesus' capacity to heal always surprises me. I hold this person in awe. Jesus has shown me that he is not the ordinary healer of my day. Everything that he does points toward God and God's peace toward us.
4. Words
Woman
Society in the Palestine of Jesus' day demanded respect toward one's mother and, by extension, mother-in-law. Disrespect was punished. Jesus treated women as persons, offering to them the same consideration he gave to men.
The main function of women of Jesus' day was as wife and mother. The ideal woman was trained to love her husband and children. In the patriarchal form of family life, wives belonged to men. Husbands could freely divorce their wives. Subordinate to their fathers or husbands, women held inferior status. A daughter was less desirable than a son. A father could sell his daughter for debt or prostitute her.
A grown woman had considerable freedom to act within her status and role of a wife. Despite the barrier of a husband's ruling over his wife, the woman remained a person. She kept her own name and individuality while being called by her husband's name. She shared in the harvest, manufacture and sale of cloth products. Participating in the arts, she preserved ancient forms of dance and song.
Women performed the rituals of mourning for the dead. Women were present at funerals and weddings. In religious life, they participated in the activities of the great festivals and attended religious gatherings. However, they could not serve as priests because of their ritual uncleanliness.
House Of Simon And Andrew
During his days in the city, home for Jesus was at Capernaum. Readers may infer that Simon Peter took care of his mother-in-law. She in turn served as housekeeper and homemaker.
Simon Peter, the first disciple called by Jesus, was also the most prominent disciple. He is Simon, called Peter, not Simon the Cananaean who was also a disciple. He usually acted or spoke for the group of disciples and is named first within the inner circle of Peter, James and John. Peter, at least, was married. He and his brother Andrew were partners in a fishing business on the Sea of Galilee and lived together at Capernaum.
In the Gospels, Andrew's name is generally used with Peter's. He is identified either parenthetically as Peter's brother or in combination with Peter's name. Jesus called Simon Peter and Andrew as the first two disciples. Next, Jesus called James and John. Gospel reference to these four disciples names them in the order of Peter, James, John and Andrew. Such reference might suggest the order of their closeness to Jesus. Only in the Johannine passage discussing the Greeks who approached Philip wanting to see Jesus is Andrew given individual status (John 12:22). Philip told Andrew of the request. Then Andrew went with Philip to tell Jesus.
Healing
Traditionally, healing means the curing or restoring to health of a sick person. All functions work in harmony, but all parts of the body need not be absolutely free of disease to be in a state of positive clinical health. Consider expanding the definition of healing. Healing can also mean being able again to celebrate life with enthusiasm.1 Then health becomes a condition of optimal well-being under the best circumstances possible.
Lifestyle, how we manage our life, influences our health. We take environmental elements into our bodies by mouth, nostrils and skin. We see and hear. Whether they pollute or nourish body and spirit, these elements make a difference in the balanced posture of the whole person.
Consider how healing relates to taking sabbath. We take sabbath by ceasing physical effort, recreating both mentally and spiritually and making time for God. All assist in giving honor and restoration to the whole body. All dimensions of the body -- mental, physical and spiritual -- require a periodic rest to avoid a breakdown. The aim is to balance physical vigor with consistent, functional efficiency. One day off in seven helps us to manage our degree of well-being. Building a few minutes or an hour of sabbath into each day encourages a health-giving balance to our lives. While the miracle of the healing of Simon's mother-in-law is one among the sabbath miracles, for a fuller discussion of the role of sabbath and healing see Miracle 5 of this volume.
Jesus And Healing
The approach Jesus took toward healing brought an advance in thought about sickness and disease. Whenever Jesus met sickness, he made every effort to heal, even and especially on the sabbath. He healed everyone, especially the outcast. He gave no support to the Old Testament idea of disease as a punishment sent by God. In his preaching ministry, Jesus told hearers to repent, that is, to change their wrong ways. His healing ministry did not suggest the suffering were guilty of doing anything wrong. Their action was not to repent but to have faith to become well.
In the Old Testament, the faithful considered health a divine gift. They expected good health. The practice of medicine as we know it had not yet developed. So when disease struck, people had only God to look to for aid. They saw sickness as a spiritual matter. They linked it somehow with sin. Jesus carried forward the Old Testament notion that healing involves revitalizing a right relationship between the person and God. One meaning of "redeem" is to return to ownership. Jesus' redemptive ministry returned people fully to themselves by freeing them from their ailments.
Counselor
Counselors offer advice or guidance. While "counselor" is not a word in this miracle, counseling is implicit in the actions of Jesus. This word returns us to the song giving his purpose: "For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6).
Jesus' approach to health and healing showed that his earthly ministry was closely bound up with human frailty and weakness, whether of body or soul. He offered kindness to the sick and weak. Jesus paid close attention to the mind and spirit of a sufferer. When he related to a suffering person, he looked at the whole person as if he saw disease as an imbalance within the personalty, not only of the body.
Jesus' actions conveyed his understanding of God's purpose for humankind as salvation and human wholeness. Jesus must have been particularly sensitive to the inner conflicts that brought those who needed healing to their present state of "dis-ease." Were they in some way ill at ease with themselves or with others? Jesus was aware of the possible bearing of emotional conflicts on the beginning of a disease. The healing ministry of Jesus was as much to the mind and spirit as to the body. Part of his healing power was his ability to transform casual talking into a time of healing. He could pinpoint the problem and initiate healing. God gifted him with the ability to listen and hear. In the vocabulary of psychology, he was skilled in non-directive counseling. One might ponder if religion and psychology are not essentially two different ways of perceiving similar processes of moving toward health and wholeness with parallel vocabularies and terminologies.
Mediator
Like counselor, "mediator" is not an uttered term in this miracle story. However, Jesus' role and the friendship role we might share with other members of the church family and beyond as mediators are implicit and deserve mention.
How are we mediators for each other? Suffering is evidence of brokenness and the need for someone to stand with us as mediator and guide. Mediation means the establishment and maintenance of a right relationship between two people. Mediation brings people into communion with each other. It supposes some alienation, an absence of communication or some fighting or conflict. It helps in settling what is unsettled and building bridges that span gulfs.
Gulfs grow between a person and God. Gulfs appear as what is unsettled between two persons. They form as internal divisions within an individual. We learn this assumption from studying the miracle stories: The gulfs in our lives are bridgeable. Something in people's hearts encourages us that we can rework broken feelings. The Christian faith is a religion based on this hope. The goal is atonement. Atonement returns us from a predicament of alienation to a state of wholeness or "at-one-ment."
From time to time, we become so bound up with brokenness that we need a mediator. The people of a church can stand with others as mediators. On a calling card representing a church in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is a cross surrounded by several concentric circles and the words, "circles of healing." Members of that congregation understood they could carry their mediating faith as far as the need exists. Like a pebble breaking the surface of a pond, the healing, mediating arms of one person can reach in circles whose radii span many lengths.
5. Gospel Parallels
Telling
As if they were speaking later to an outside observer, writers of all three versions tell the actions of this pronouncement healing from a distance without any direct quotations.
Setting
Matthew's story summary begins with the action of Jesus' entering Peter's house (Matthew 8:14). Both Mark and Luke give setting to the story that happened after Jesus and the disciples left the synagogue (Mark 1:29 and Luke 4:38).
Disciples And Jesus
For Matthew, Jesus is the focal point. "Jesus" enters the house. "He" sees the mother-in-law. "He" touches her hand. She rises and begins to serve "him" (Matthew 8:14). Of the disciples, Matthew names only Peter. In Luke, Jesus and the disciples interact more than in Mark and Matthew. Luke mentions Simon's name twice. "They" ask him about Simon's mother-in-law. Later, the mother-in-law begins to serve "them." For Mark, the disciples play an important role. Mark names Simon, Andrew, James and John.
Urgency
Prefacing the setting with "as soon as," Mark suggests the importance of going directly to the house. The disciples tell Jesus about the ailing mother-in-law "at once" (Mark 1:30).
In Matthew, Jesus' attention moves directly to the mother-in-law. Jesus immediately surveys the situation and knows what to do. Luke presents a more casual narrative: "After leaving the synagogue" and "Now . . . was suffering from" and "they asked him about her" and "Then" (Luke 4:38-39).
The Healing
Mark and Matthew emphasize the healing touch. In Mark, Jesus comes, takes the woman by the hand, and lifts her up. Then the fever leaves her (Mark 1:31). The healing action includes both taking her by the hand and lifting her up. In Matthew, Jesus touches her hand, the fever leaves her, and then, apparently by her own power, she gets up (Matthew 8:15). See Miracle 7 for a discussion of touch.
Only Luke suggests that Jesus uses words in the healing. He directs his words to the fever. Jesus stands over the woman, he rebukes the fever, the fever leaves her and then she gets up (Luke 4:39). He addresses the fever rather than the woman. He shows power over the fever. He silences the fever. Is the fever the demon whom Jesus does not let speak because the demon knows who Jesus is? Whatever the fever represents, it is an entity separate from the woman. The fever takes the action of leaving the woman.
Mother-in-law
Mark and Matthew describe the woman's trouble as a fever (Mark 1:30 and Matthew 8:14). The physician Luke amplifies this, saying she is "suffering" from a "high" fever (Luke 4:38).
As implied above, according to Matthew and Luke, the woman takes more direct action in her healing by getting up herself when the fever leaves. In all three versions, she wastes no time returning to her work. According to Luke, she rises "immediately" and returns to her task as homemaker and host (Luke 4:39).
Mark 1:31 and Luke 4:39 tell that she begins to serve the disciples as if she were focusing upon her homemaking role. All in one continual sentence, Matthew says Jesus touches her hand, the fever leaves her, she rises and she begins to serve Jesus as if in response to the healing (Matthew 8:15).
____________
1. For a fuller discussion, see Brauninger, Talking With Your Child About Change (United Church Press, 1994).
As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John.29 Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once.30 He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.31
2. What's Happening?
The Gospel called Mark wants to set a tone of direct action and quick response in this story. Mark shows an absence of dragging feet and suggests a sense of urgency. Jesus gets things done. From Mark's perspective, whatever happens around Jesus, the response is always immediate.
"Immediately" is a favorite action word in the first chapter of Mark. After the baptism of Jesus, the Spirit immediately drives him out into the wilderness (Mark 1:12). When Jesus calls Simon and Andrew to be disciples, they immediately leave their nets to follow him (verse 18). Going a little farther, Jesus sees James and John. He immediately calls them (verse 20). When Jesus touches the leper and repeats the healing formula, immediately the leprosy leaves the sufferer (verse 42).
In the present story of positive expectations, as soon as Jesus and the disciples leave the synagogue, they enter the house of Simon and Andrew (verse 29). The disciples immediately tell Jesus about Simon's mother-in-law (verse 30). The woman's response is immediate (verse 31).
First Point Of Action
With James and John, Jesus leaves the synagogue and enters Simon and Andrew's house.
Second Point Of Action
There they find Simon's mother-in-law sick in bed. They immediately tell Jesus about her.
Third Point Of Action
Jesus comes, takes her by the hand and lifts her up.
Fourth Point Of Action
The fever leaves the woman.
Fifth Point Of Action
As if nothing extraordinary had happened, Simon's mother-in-law begins to wait on them as a host.
3. Connecting Points -- Conversations
Mark, in character, tells this story without delays in four direct and compact verses. Because talk is absent in this summary story, readers must fill the pieces. Time stands out as an important element. As soon as they left the synagogue, they went to Simon and Andrew's house (Mark 1:29). We do not know when the brothers became aware of their mother-in-law's illness. However, at the first available moment, they told Jesus about it (Mark 1:30). Jesus acted directly. The fever left the woman. She returned to her duties as homemaker. She was not even the mother of the head of the house. Although she held mother-in-law status, both Jesus and her family recognized her worth.
Unless she claims worth for herself, the aging American woman also holds little value in our society -- except possibly for her purse. Today, as in earlier times, a woman has little time to be sick. Typically, she ignores her own needs unless she is doggedly intentional about meeting them. The same call for efficiency by the householder to keep household rhythms in balance, as shown by Simon Peter's mother-in-law, still rings today. If sickness disrupts the rhythm of a woman's role as juggler, everything tumbles to the floor.
Interviewing Jesus
Asker: Jesus, the writers report that you also were silent in this quiet story. Is this because those close to you surrounded you? This is a clean story with no strings attached to the healing. You did not need to prove yourself or make a point. You were at home. You simply did the healing miracle because the relative of a friend had a fever that put her to bed.
Jesus: We often ignore or neglect the common person. We take laborers for granted until their inability to or choice not to work becomes an inconvenience for us. Unconditional love includes everyone. Unconditional love says you and I count.
When I am bone weary and come home to this refuge, this house of my friends and disciples, Peter and Andrew, I often return to Isaiah's words: "But those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint" (Isaiah 40:31).
I remember that the one who sustains me does not faint or grow weary. God's understanding is unsearchable. From the sparrows to the very hairs on our head, God numbers us and calls us all by name. So mostly, when I meet a suffering person, these words sound in my heart: "He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless" (Isaiah 40:29). (For further study, read the entire Old Testament pericope for Epiphany 5, Isaiah 40:21-31.)
It is my task and it is your task to remember whose we are and to respond to God's love by caring that much about our neighbor, whatever age, sexual preference, or condition of body and mind.
Asker: In this story, actions speak louder than words. The only report of words was that the disciples did not waste time letting you know Simon's mother-in-law was sick. The first free moment -- at once, the writer said -- they told you about her. Your disciples trusted you would take care of things. Was this because of the depth of your friendship?
You responded like the trusted physician whom we give the power to take one look at a problem and know immediately what to do. The disciples did not have to waste your energy with words or long explanations.
Jesus: One dimension of the silence is our familial ease together. It is similar to the comfortable silences between a long-married couple. To reach that level of communication requires the work and practice of trusting. Beyond that, as we become adept at listening with our whole self, we can learn much about another person. The expression on the face of Peter's mother-in-law spoke. The change from her ordinary habits also told me as much as my disciples' focus of attention toward her.
Another element involves the significance of the support of human relationship in restoring or maintaining health. Look at the longstanding sewing or quilters' groups in the rural churches of your day. Do not be fooled into thinking they exist only to make quilts! Your modern-day urban carpool also extends all sorts of supportive possibilities.
Knowing that people care deeply about us and trust we also care about what is happening in their lives helps raise the quality of our living. Isolation can lead to an increased vulnerability to disease and to a shorter life span. Support of others contributes to disease resistance. Opportunity to let off steam among trusted friends is a valuable tool for health. The sick woman was in the right place. The house of Simon and Andrew is probably the most supportive, health-restoring home around.
Asker: Goals and ideals aside, Jesus, when it comes to the whole health of a person, perhaps we should temper your words, "Be perfect" (Matthew 5:48), with these words: Given reality, be in your best possible state of health.
Jesus: Perhaps we should. To be perfect is a goal for our relationships. It is not a command for the condition of the body, over which we have incomplete control.
Asker: Jesus, what do you mean for this miracle to tell us about God?
Jesus: Members of families can give support to each other. In addition, God cares for the seemingly least significant people. Our Sustainer is so aware of us and close to us that very little passes by God. Events of the world, events of nature, and life accidents may pound us down. God comes as a spirit extending a handhold we can depend upon.
God is both approachable and approaches us. That is, God takes the initiative just as I modeled by taking the woman by her hand. Without additional fanfare, without words, God has a way of taking us by the hand. This may be quietness or an inner calm that comes to you in the midst of agitation. It may be the absence of isolation or loneliness when you are alone. It might be the unexplainable clearing of your head when you have been muddled.
Asker: Anything else?
Jesus: Yes, but I'll let Peter's mother-in-law speak for herself about the role we are to play in healing.
Interviewing Simon's Mother-in-law
Asker: You, also, never said a word in this story, or at least it was not reported. Why? Were you embarrassed about being found ill? Did you not know how to respond? Did surprise leave you speechless? Was your faith so automatic and true that you simply accepted the healing as if Jesus had greeted you? Were the words of women in your day considered unworthy? Even so, Jesus thought you counted enough that he healed you. It did not matter to him if you were a man or a woman. Does that not say something important?
Mother-in-law: I suppose my silence could be interpreted as submissive. On the other hand, we were a close, supportive family. I consider Jesus as family. He was at the house often enough. My expectations for recovery were high. Have you not immediately felt better when someone you knew would help came through the door? Jesus is perceptive. He almost can tell what is happening with a look.
The Psalmist says God's job description includes gathering the outcasts of Israel, healing the brokenhearted and binding up their wounds. God lifts up the downtrodden and casts the wicked to the ground. So it is with Jesus. His understanding is beyond measure. So it is with my savior. (See today's pericope, Psalm 147:1-11.)
Asker: You were sick in bed with a fever. You must have been quite ill to go to bed because the woman had to work all day to keep the household going. This role must have been foremost on your mind. The first thing you did upon rising was to get back to your work, your duty, of serving those who had come into the household.
Mother-in-law: You speak accurately about my household duties, but my returning to work was more than duty. Whenever we are freed from what ails us, our first instinct is to return to doing whatever we love most. This is the freedom of health. I guess I would also say it is honoring God's creation of us, of the holy within us. You may also see my actions as a directive, that is, we should put an illness behind us as soon as possible.
Asker: I live in a different age. What are you trying to tell me about what is most basic for me as a woman? For me as part of a family? My family mostly has to take what is left over -- not just in meals but of my energy, my emotion, and my love. Was your rising from the bed so automatic that you did not give a second thought to resting a bit? Were you embarrassed again for falling down on the job?
Mother-in-law: What women do share in Jesus' time and in the new millennium is the call to define and redefine who we are, whose we are, that is, that God has made us, and what God calls us to be. I use the word redefine because society continues to evolve. Life brings many accidents and other changes. I would challenge women of your time to study both the negative and the positive connotations of service and being servants. Explore the simple, obvious ways we fulfill what God means for us to be.
Asker: What was it like when Jesus came over to the bed and took you by the hand and raised you up, and you felt the fever leave? You gave the best response of gratitude by immediately returning to your life work.
Mother-in-law: When you are the recipient of the healing touch, the best response is through your own action. My feeling was of deep, unspoken love. It speaks of the closeness coming from familiarity, from family. Jesus did not enter our home, kick off his sandals and say, "Leave me alone, I'm off duty. I'm all done working for today." His directive was kindness and immediate attention toward the members of the family.
Keep the needs of those closest to you in the urgent category. At times, family members use the words or the actions of busyness as a camouflage for their suffering. Extend a symbolic or literal hand.
Interviewing The Disciples
Asker: James, John, Simon and Andrew, who does the telling here? It is all in third person narration without dialogue. Somehow, we assume a disciple is telling the story. The storyteller did not say that Simon and Andrew were present, but only that it was their house. We know only that "they" entered the house and that Jesus and some others, probably disciples, entered with James and John (Mark 1:29).
A Disciple: I was there. Any one of us could have told the story. I told it as I did. I spoke briefly and to the point. I spoke as if it were nothing unusual for Jesus to care for us and for members of our family. It is not that I take Jesus or his healing for granted. Jesus' capacity to heal always surprises me. I hold this person in awe. Jesus has shown me that he is not the ordinary healer of my day. Everything that he does points toward God and God's peace toward us.
4. Words
Woman
Society in the Palestine of Jesus' day demanded respect toward one's mother and, by extension, mother-in-law. Disrespect was punished. Jesus treated women as persons, offering to them the same consideration he gave to men.
The main function of women of Jesus' day was as wife and mother. The ideal woman was trained to love her husband and children. In the patriarchal form of family life, wives belonged to men. Husbands could freely divorce their wives. Subordinate to their fathers or husbands, women held inferior status. A daughter was less desirable than a son. A father could sell his daughter for debt or prostitute her.
A grown woman had considerable freedom to act within her status and role of a wife. Despite the barrier of a husband's ruling over his wife, the woman remained a person. She kept her own name and individuality while being called by her husband's name. She shared in the harvest, manufacture and sale of cloth products. Participating in the arts, she preserved ancient forms of dance and song.
Women performed the rituals of mourning for the dead. Women were present at funerals and weddings. In religious life, they participated in the activities of the great festivals and attended religious gatherings. However, they could not serve as priests because of their ritual uncleanliness.
House Of Simon And Andrew
During his days in the city, home for Jesus was at Capernaum. Readers may infer that Simon Peter took care of his mother-in-law. She in turn served as housekeeper and homemaker.
Simon Peter, the first disciple called by Jesus, was also the most prominent disciple. He is Simon, called Peter, not Simon the Cananaean who was also a disciple. He usually acted or spoke for the group of disciples and is named first within the inner circle of Peter, James and John. Peter, at least, was married. He and his brother Andrew were partners in a fishing business on the Sea of Galilee and lived together at Capernaum.
In the Gospels, Andrew's name is generally used with Peter's. He is identified either parenthetically as Peter's brother or in combination with Peter's name. Jesus called Simon Peter and Andrew as the first two disciples. Next, Jesus called James and John. Gospel reference to these four disciples names them in the order of Peter, James, John and Andrew. Such reference might suggest the order of their closeness to Jesus. Only in the Johannine passage discussing the Greeks who approached Philip wanting to see Jesus is Andrew given individual status (John 12:22). Philip told Andrew of the request. Then Andrew went with Philip to tell Jesus.
Healing
Traditionally, healing means the curing or restoring to health of a sick person. All functions work in harmony, but all parts of the body need not be absolutely free of disease to be in a state of positive clinical health. Consider expanding the definition of healing. Healing can also mean being able again to celebrate life with enthusiasm.1 Then health becomes a condition of optimal well-being under the best circumstances possible.
Lifestyle, how we manage our life, influences our health. We take environmental elements into our bodies by mouth, nostrils and skin. We see and hear. Whether they pollute or nourish body and spirit, these elements make a difference in the balanced posture of the whole person.
Consider how healing relates to taking sabbath. We take sabbath by ceasing physical effort, recreating both mentally and spiritually and making time for God. All assist in giving honor and restoration to the whole body. All dimensions of the body -- mental, physical and spiritual -- require a periodic rest to avoid a breakdown. The aim is to balance physical vigor with consistent, functional efficiency. One day off in seven helps us to manage our degree of well-being. Building a few minutes or an hour of sabbath into each day encourages a health-giving balance to our lives. While the miracle of the healing of Simon's mother-in-law is one among the sabbath miracles, for a fuller discussion of the role of sabbath and healing see Miracle 5 of this volume.
Jesus And Healing
The approach Jesus took toward healing brought an advance in thought about sickness and disease. Whenever Jesus met sickness, he made every effort to heal, even and especially on the sabbath. He healed everyone, especially the outcast. He gave no support to the Old Testament idea of disease as a punishment sent by God. In his preaching ministry, Jesus told hearers to repent, that is, to change their wrong ways. His healing ministry did not suggest the suffering were guilty of doing anything wrong. Their action was not to repent but to have faith to become well.
In the Old Testament, the faithful considered health a divine gift. They expected good health. The practice of medicine as we know it had not yet developed. So when disease struck, people had only God to look to for aid. They saw sickness as a spiritual matter. They linked it somehow with sin. Jesus carried forward the Old Testament notion that healing involves revitalizing a right relationship between the person and God. One meaning of "redeem" is to return to ownership. Jesus' redemptive ministry returned people fully to themselves by freeing them from their ailments.
Counselor
Counselors offer advice or guidance. While "counselor" is not a word in this miracle, counseling is implicit in the actions of Jesus. This word returns us to the song giving his purpose: "For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6).
Jesus' approach to health and healing showed that his earthly ministry was closely bound up with human frailty and weakness, whether of body or soul. He offered kindness to the sick and weak. Jesus paid close attention to the mind and spirit of a sufferer. When he related to a suffering person, he looked at the whole person as if he saw disease as an imbalance within the personalty, not only of the body.
Jesus' actions conveyed his understanding of God's purpose for humankind as salvation and human wholeness. Jesus must have been particularly sensitive to the inner conflicts that brought those who needed healing to their present state of "dis-ease." Were they in some way ill at ease with themselves or with others? Jesus was aware of the possible bearing of emotional conflicts on the beginning of a disease. The healing ministry of Jesus was as much to the mind and spirit as to the body. Part of his healing power was his ability to transform casual talking into a time of healing. He could pinpoint the problem and initiate healing. God gifted him with the ability to listen and hear. In the vocabulary of psychology, he was skilled in non-directive counseling. One might ponder if religion and psychology are not essentially two different ways of perceiving similar processes of moving toward health and wholeness with parallel vocabularies and terminologies.
Mediator
Like counselor, "mediator" is not an uttered term in this miracle story. However, Jesus' role and the friendship role we might share with other members of the church family and beyond as mediators are implicit and deserve mention.
How are we mediators for each other? Suffering is evidence of brokenness and the need for someone to stand with us as mediator and guide. Mediation means the establishment and maintenance of a right relationship between two people. Mediation brings people into communion with each other. It supposes some alienation, an absence of communication or some fighting or conflict. It helps in settling what is unsettled and building bridges that span gulfs.
Gulfs grow between a person and God. Gulfs appear as what is unsettled between two persons. They form as internal divisions within an individual. We learn this assumption from studying the miracle stories: The gulfs in our lives are bridgeable. Something in people's hearts encourages us that we can rework broken feelings. The Christian faith is a religion based on this hope. The goal is atonement. Atonement returns us from a predicament of alienation to a state of wholeness or "at-one-ment."
From time to time, we become so bound up with brokenness that we need a mediator. The people of a church can stand with others as mediators. On a calling card representing a church in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is a cross surrounded by several concentric circles and the words, "circles of healing." Members of that congregation understood they could carry their mediating faith as far as the need exists. Like a pebble breaking the surface of a pond, the healing, mediating arms of one person can reach in circles whose radii span many lengths.
5. Gospel Parallels
Telling
As if they were speaking later to an outside observer, writers of all three versions tell the actions of this pronouncement healing from a distance without any direct quotations.
Setting
Matthew's story summary begins with the action of Jesus' entering Peter's house (Matthew 8:14). Both Mark and Luke give setting to the story that happened after Jesus and the disciples left the synagogue (Mark 1:29 and Luke 4:38).
Disciples And Jesus
For Matthew, Jesus is the focal point. "Jesus" enters the house. "He" sees the mother-in-law. "He" touches her hand. She rises and begins to serve "him" (Matthew 8:14). Of the disciples, Matthew names only Peter. In Luke, Jesus and the disciples interact more than in Mark and Matthew. Luke mentions Simon's name twice. "They" ask him about Simon's mother-in-law. Later, the mother-in-law begins to serve "them." For Mark, the disciples play an important role. Mark names Simon, Andrew, James and John.
Urgency
Prefacing the setting with "as soon as," Mark suggests the importance of going directly to the house. The disciples tell Jesus about the ailing mother-in-law "at once" (Mark 1:30).
In Matthew, Jesus' attention moves directly to the mother-in-law. Jesus immediately surveys the situation and knows what to do. Luke presents a more casual narrative: "After leaving the synagogue" and "Now . . . was suffering from" and "they asked him about her" and "Then" (Luke 4:38-39).
The Healing
Mark and Matthew emphasize the healing touch. In Mark, Jesus comes, takes the woman by the hand, and lifts her up. Then the fever leaves her (Mark 1:31). The healing action includes both taking her by the hand and lifting her up. In Matthew, Jesus touches her hand, the fever leaves her, and then, apparently by her own power, she gets up (Matthew 8:15). See Miracle 7 for a discussion of touch.
Only Luke suggests that Jesus uses words in the healing. He directs his words to the fever. Jesus stands over the woman, he rebukes the fever, the fever leaves her and then she gets up (Luke 4:39). He addresses the fever rather than the woman. He shows power over the fever. He silences the fever. Is the fever the demon whom Jesus does not let speak because the demon knows who Jesus is? Whatever the fever represents, it is an entity separate from the woman. The fever takes the action of leaving the woman.
Mother-in-law
Mark and Matthew describe the woman's trouble as a fever (Mark 1:30 and Matthew 8:14). The physician Luke amplifies this, saying she is "suffering" from a "high" fever (Luke 4:38).
As implied above, according to Matthew and Luke, the woman takes more direct action in her healing by getting up herself when the fever leaves. In all three versions, she wastes no time returning to her work. According to Luke, she rises "immediately" and returns to her task as homemaker and host (Luke 4:39).
Mark 1:31 and Luke 4:39 tell that she begins to serve the disciples as if she were focusing upon her homemaking role. All in one continual sentence, Matthew says Jesus touches her hand, the fever leaves her, she rises and she begins to serve Jesus as if in response to the healing (Matthew 8:15).
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1. For a fuller discussion, see Brauninger, Talking With Your Child About Change (United Church Press, 1994).
