MARK 13:1-11

Marginally Mark…Pentecost + 26…Revised 2018

To preach we need to do our theological homework, not least when, as here, we have a complex passage of ‘apocalyptic’. Brendan Byrne¹ says, (it) ‘seems to send mixed messages to the faithful, oscillating in a rather disturbing way between reassurance & warning’? How can we preach both these notes, reassurance, &, warning, in a way that balances them without falling into either extreme? Some questions we might explore are: 

How do we set about living in ‘our time’ & ‘God’s time’ simultaneously? Can there be a better starting point than to encourage what the ‘Lord’s Prayer’ speaks of as: ‘God’s Name being hallowed, God’s Rule coming, & God’s will being done (all of these!)‘on earth as in Heaven’? Surely no-one knows better than Our Lord how ‘reassurance’ & ‘warning’ do oscillate in the realities of down to earth life? How does Jesus approach people & situations as they challenge or confront Him; or, as He challenges or confronts them in the many situations arising in Scriptural accounts? Approach them in our own strength & we will often find them too hard; a warning. Approach them in God’s strength, in the Spirit of Jesus & we will no doubt often still find them hard; but, reassuring. Even when life seems to be beating up on us. There is no way to compel what we discern to be God’s will happen ‘on earth as in heaven’. 

The alternative, putting off, pushing off God’s will into some apocalyptic future leads us only to practise (&, preach?) ‘apocalyptic escapism’. Like others, I wonder if the early churches did that from time to time, despite the witness of so many martyrs to the contrary. How many of them are rescued ‘in extremis’? Any more than Jesus Himself is? As humans, aren’t we always living ‘in extremis’?

The next chapter (14) leads into the events of ‘Holy Week’. Then, even when Jesus Himself pleads, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken me?” We only hear the sounds of creation protesting when Jesus is, dare I say, beyond rescuing by God or any human agency. An echoing warning & reassurance that, like what Jesus teaches us in today’s passage, Resurrection mustn’t become a doctrine of escapism either!

Afterthought: David Lose², writing on today’s passage in 2015 says, ‘Living with uncertainty was hard for 1st C. followers, & it’s just as hard for His 21st C. Disciples as well…..The antidote to uncertainty isn’t certainty, but courage….’  Do I need to add that no-one on earth has ever shown greater courage than Jesus - Man & God?

Brian

¹ A Costly Freedom, Liturgical, Collegeville, Minn., 2008, p. 196  ²  In the Meantime 

PS.: Sunday, Nov. 26th is the Feast of Christ the King, with its Johannine Gospel. For my blog on that see: jottingsonjohn.blogspot.com. Dec. 2nd will be Advent 1, starting the ‘Year of Luke’ & to be found at my laterallyluke.blogspot.com.  

MK 12:38-44

Marginally Mark…Pentecost + 25…Revised 2018

The ‘poor widow’ of the 2nd part of our text isn’t named, but let’s name her ‘Lepta’, after the tiny thin coins Jesus watches her deposit into the ATM at the temple. Jesus sees Lepta & others on God’s wavelength as far more important than those of whom He is dismissive in vv.38-40 for claiming the centre stage to which they think they’re entitled. (As James & John try to do awhile back.) Sense of entitlement is on the rise, is it not?

 I feel a strong personal connection with Lepta after an experience I have when I’m a young child in Sunday School. Let me share that now to illustrate how Jesus & those in His stories need to come out from our Bibles & to life in us as we live Jesus-like lives today. It’s not a matter of how Jesus’ stories might go on from where He leaves off back then. It’s about how our own stories go on from His in what we’ve learned from Him. How are we going to present this in our sermon? 

When I was young I went, rather unwillingly, to of all things an afternoon Sunday School. In mostly sunny OZ, who would want to go to an ASS?! This Sunday my mother tells me she’s put sixpence (equal, say, to 2 leptas) in my trouser pocket. Threepence (c.1 lepta) for the collection in SS, & threepence to buy an ice-cream on the way home. My dear mother would never have thought of this as being a bribe; simply a reward for doing ‘the right thing’. Come collection time, & disaster strikes. I put my hand in my pocket for the threepenny piece for God only to find that what my mum has given me is just one sixpence. Two leptas in just 1 coin, not 2! The plate for the collection is coming closer & my dilemma is eating away at me - like I’ve been imagining eating away at that ice-cream! Here I am in the house of God but I’m not sure whether God, or my ice-cream’s going to win out! As the plate is passed to me, the solution also comes. I put the sixpence in the plate, then quickly take a threepence out! A win-win situation. God gets His lepta, & I get my ice-cream! I’m not proud of what I’ve done, but to this day I admire ‘Lepta’ of today’s story for her deep faith & God-given generosity of Spirit that doesn’t look for change in her time of need!

The ‘religious’ side of me still occasionally makes me wonder, after all these years, whether I should have put my sixpence - my whole 2 leptas - in the plate, & gone without my ice cream! But another not so ‘religious’ side of me still inclines to think God enjoys that ice-cream with me each time I lick it. Even though it is a kind of ‘forbidden fruit’. One resolution of such issues may lie not in our humanising God too much, but in letting God divinise us more & more in His own image; sense of humour & all! 

Afterthought: I heard recently of a parish urging people to give using eftpos: "You won't even know it's gone!" Big pity? What might Lepta feel? What do you feel? 

Brian