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Sermon - Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost (B) - 27th September 2009
St Alban's Anglican Church Epping 7, 8 & 10am
Readings: Mark 9:38-50
At the end of Matthew’s gospel we have Jesus great commission to his twelve disciples, that they go into all the world making disciples for Jesus. This was their mission, to teach all that Jesus had commanded them. Making disciples meant teaching people to live more and more like Jesus himself. But the temptation is to do just the opposite. The temptation is to be more and more like ourselves, particularly our weaknesses. The temptation is to be less like Jesus and more like his disciples.
And this stage in Mark’s gospel, Jesus public ministry was drawing to its close. He was heading for Jerusalem where he would find betrayal and death. He tried to prepare his disciples for these terrible events. Yet the more he spoke about them, the more the disciples retreated into themselves, and made themselves the centre of their attention. Jesus came across a demon-possessed boy and mercifully released him. Yet the disciples seemed to have no concern for the boy. Their only question was, why couldn’t they heal like that. They were more concerned for themselves than for this afflicted child. We see this attitude again with the disciples discussing among themselves which one was the greatest. Jesus had been warning them about his death. But they were more concerned with their own status.
And then we get the same problem again in today’s reading. The disciples find a man who had been casting out demons in Jesus’ name. The disciples ordered him to stop doing it. They had no concern for the people being helped, they had no concern for the man other than feeling jealous that he could do what they had failed to do. Jealousy is evidence of a life turned in on itself, a life where we make ourselves the primary focus. We find some things in life that we can do well and we pride ourselves in those things until the day when we find someone who can do it better than us. And immediately, jealousy is inflamed. We might like to believe that the song “Nobody does it better” was written for us, and then we find someone better and jealousy leaps to life.
When I was young I took piano lessons. I thought I was making good progress until I heard others at school play better – and my response was not particularly godly. Jealousy of others can come at the most unexpected times and can make us miserable and turn us into a misery for others. Jesus advice to his disciples was not to worry about this other man and his miracle-working. If he was doing it in Jesus’ name then there wasn’t a problem. “Whoever is not against us is for us.” But then Jesus revealed a secret of Christian service. It doesn’t have to be spectacular. Some people have been given amazing gifts. Some are outstanding musicians. Some are great preachers. Some are very clever teachers. But we shouldn’t be worried if we don’t have those great gifts. We live in a society that worships the greatest, the fastest, the strongest. The invention of fame has been the curse of the twentieth century. Unless we can be somebody, then we don’t feel worthy of our existence. We hunger for greatness, for success, for wealth. W. S. Gilbert many years ago pointed out the futility of such yearning when he wrote, “When everyone is somebody, then no-one’s anybody.”
But Jesus points out that true Christian discipleship can be expressed in the simplest of acts. We don’t have to be the biggest or the best to serve Jesus. He points out that the simplest of acts done in his name is all that’s required. Even the giving of a cup of water, given as an act of Christian charity, is welcomed by Jesus. Now that’s a task that’s not beyond any one of us. Anyone can provide water. We know that by sending a few dollars to some African villages can provide water for the whole village. It doesn’t cost much, but its something we can all do.
When I worked at Braeside Hospital, I saw many sad things. I would support patients in a variety of ways during their last days. But then they would slip into a coma, and I wondered what I could do for them then. I decided what I could do was to sit by their bed, and pray for them and be with them so they didn’t die alone. It wasn’t spectacular ministry. It wasn’t going to grow a church. But it wasn’t difficult either. People just needed my time. Elsewhere Jesus summed up Christian discipleship this way, “I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in. I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”
This is what we are expected to do. But who are we to do it to? Jesus uses the same phrase several times in this chapter. We should be caring for “one of these little ones”. It’s a catch phrase that Jesus uses to describe the weakest and the most vulnerable in our society. We may not mind helping the rich and powerful. After all, it may be to our advantage. But Jesus directs our attention to the weakest, the powerless, the most vulnerable and warns us of the ghastly consequences if we don’t show them our care and protection.
But as he continues teaching he seems to be describing a process of self-mutilation and we may wonder what sort of teaching is this? Why are we cutting off feet and hands and plucking out eyes? It seems very strange. But Jesus has been describing the path of discipleship and that Christian discipleship is not just about what we believe, its about the kind of lives we live. And here Jesus refers to three penalties which were common in the ancient world. The penalty for theft was to cut off the hand. The penalty for a slave who ran away was to cut off their foot. The penalty for a prying eye and the invasion of one’s personal privacy was the gouging out of an eye.
But Jesus uses the foot, the hand and the eye to consider the kind of lives we live and the things we do. The foot is about where we go and in whose company we spend our time. The hand is about the kind of work we do and our faithfulness in work. And the eye is about the things we look at and the types of books we read, and the TV we watch, and the Movies we frequent. They sum up all the doing in our lives. And we have the choice of doing those things which will benefit others and doing those things which are of no use to anyone.
I find it sad to watch a person operating a poker machine. Its not about the evils of gambling. Rather, its that their life has been reduced to spending hours each day feeding a dumb machine. For some people it becomes their whole life. So the question for us is what are we doing with our lives? As Jesus welcomes people into his kingdom he says those remarkable words, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” Notice again the reference to serving the least in our community. Not much status there.
And of course, what Jesus taught he also practised. As great as all his teaching was, it was what he did that made all the difference. In obedience to his father, he set his face towards Jerusalem and gave his life as a ransom for many. This sort of life changes the world. This kind of service brings new life. And its to this life of discipleship that we’ve all been called to.