RonBlog

Sunday 29th January 2012 Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

Sentence
Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the Kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness. Matthew 9: 35

Collect
O Lord, You have taught us that all our doings without love are worth nothing; send Your Holy Spirit and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of love, the true bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whoever lives is counted dead before You; grant this for Your only Son, Jesus Christ’s sake. Amen

Old Testament Lesson Deuteronomy 18: 15 – 20

The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own people; you shall heed such a prophet. This is what you requested of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly when you said: "If I hear the voice of the LORD my God any more, or ever again see this great fire, I will die."
Then the LORD replied to me: "They are right in what they have said. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their own people; I will put my words in the mouth of the prophet, who shall speak to them everything that I command. Anyone who does not heed the words that the prophet shall speak in my name, I myself will hold accountable. But any prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, or who presumes to speak in my name a word that I have not commanded the prophet to speak--that prophet shall die."

Psalm 111

O praise the Lord. I will praise the Lord with my whole heart: in the company of the upright and among the congregation
The works of the Lord are great: and studied by all who take delight in them
His deeds are majestic and glorious: and His righteousness stands for ever.
His marvellous acts have won Him a name to be remembered: the Lord is gracious and merciful
He gives food to those who fear Him: He remembers His covenant for ever
He showed His people the power of His acts: in giving them the heritage of the heathen.
The works of His hands are faithful and just: and all His commandments are sure
They stand firm for ever and ever: they are done in faithfulness and in truth
He sent redemption to His people, He ordained His covenant for ever; Holy is His name and worthy to be feared.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and of good understanding are those who keep His commandments: His praise shall endure for ever.

Epistle 1 Corinthians 8: 1 – 13

Now concerning food sacrificed to idols: we know that "all of us possess knowledge." Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge; but anyone who loves God is known by him. Hence, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that "no idol in the world really exists," and that "there is no God but one." Indeed, even though there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth--as in fact there are many gods and many lords-- yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.
It is not everyone, however, who has this knowledge. Since some have become so accustomed to idols until now, they still think of the food they eat as food offered to an idol; and their conscience, being weak, is defiled.
"Food will not bring us close to God." We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do.
But take care that this liberty of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak. For if others see you, who possess knowledge, eating in the temple of an idol, might they not, since their conscience is weak, be encouraged to the point of eating food sacrificed to idols? So by your knowledge those weak believers for whom Christ died are destroyed. But when you thus sin against members of your family, and wound their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food is a cause of their falling, I will never eat meat, so that I may not cause one of them to fall.




GOSPEL Mark 1: 21 – 28

They went to Capernaum; and when the Sabbath came, he entered the synagogue and taught. They were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes. Just then there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be silent, and come out of him!" And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying with a loud voice, came out of him.
They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, "What is this? A new teaching--with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him." At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.

© New Revised Standard Version of the Bible
Copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the
Churches of Christ in the USA, and used by permission. All rights reserved

NOTES ON THE READINGS

Old Testament
This book of Deuteronomy (Lit Second Law) is almost certainly a later edition or redaction of the earlier Torah, and tends to trace the story of Israel from Moses on. Here, too, Moses is the focus, and – perhaps a little oddly to us – is described as a prophet. What is to be noticed, surely, is the nature of the emphasis being placed upon any future prophet or attempted prophet to remain totally true to Israel’s God in whatever he (or she) declares to be the Word God speaks. Obviously, there is no room for straying from the truth. The penalty for such - as described here – in extinction. One does not muck about with God in those Old Testament times – nor even now, come to that, but for different reasons.

Psalm
If you like to see it this way, here we have a view of the faith and if Israel’s God from a slightly different angle. There is no imposition of fear of repercussions, but a celebration of what is regarded as obvious truth. The psalmist is celebrating the clear and obvious value of the divine revelation of commandments and statutes. The last verse of this psalm should be quite well known, and the value of it is obvious, surely.

Epistle
As the new faith spread into what was clearly Gentile territory, adherents encountered all sorts of issues and problems far less likely in Israel. There the kosher food laws tended to be kept by everyone; but the food laws did not apply in Corinth. (In fact, it may have been hard to find any laws that were kept there. Corinth was – is! – a sea port and they are notorious places for law-breaking (or at least avoidance.)
If you were in a position to afford meat, the only place such an item was available was at the local (pagan) temples. That meant that the food had first been offered to idols! For many Christians that was an enormous no-no, and obviously the division between the sterner folk and those less affected was becoming hardened. Such matters easily become an issue of division between those truly faithful and those somewhat on the edges. And that was the real problem.
Notice how carefully and lovingly the Apostle helped people around the problem. Whilst this issue is a non-event these days, the process is one well worth attention and acting upon. There is often the need to activate this process in situations that arise these days.

GOSPEL
Before we get anywhere, please notice something of interest. Would you not have described this incident as ‘miracle?’ Yet Mark mentions it as ‘teaching.’ It is important to see that miracles are not so much something to be believed, as they are to be learnt from, understood, and taken hold of. Here, in the synagogue (where he should not have been if the purists had had their way) was a man who because of his ailment was considered totally unclean and not worthy of anyone’s attention. As far as I am aware, any ailment, disease or disability considered outside the range of current medicine was considered evil. By association, the sufferer was likewise evil. Ostracism was the only outcome.
That Jesus should have ignored such well-known prohibitions would have raised the ire of the authorities – which was only to be expected. But for our Lord, the plight of the poor man was something that cried out for attention and correction. That is the nature of the Lord Whom we serve.


NOTES FOR A SERMON

In our own day and age, illnesses are seen not as a result of people sinning, but rather as an outcome of viruses or other intrusions into the human body. As a result, there is far less likelihood of assumptions that people deserve the ailment or disease from which they suffer. Certainly it has to be said that certain courses of action are likely to provide self-inflicted illness. When my wife was nursing quite some decades ago, sunburn was regarded as self-inflicted, and sympathy was not likely to be offered by other Hospital staff.
But place yourself in the position of those to whom Jesus ministered, and you had not only a largely ineffective medical understanding of illness, but a profoundly moral (or should that be immoral?) outcome for the victim. As mentioned above, to top it all off, anything considered to be outside the range of normal medical intervention was classified as demon-possession, which would rate the sufferer as beyond the pale, and deserving of whatever difficulty can their way.
Two issues arise for me in all this: the first is that there remains a large number of Christians still convinced that illness is God’s punishment on sin. The second is a wider issue, and that is the strange business of Christians being rather too unaware of the ramifications of their faith. The Kingdom is one of these issues.

About the first, may I ask you to come with me on an exploration of Scripture, starting not in the New Testament but the Old. I do not know at what time in Hebrew history that ancient Book of Job was written, but it has to be a very long way back. In fact the existence of the book is an early and powerful statement that the Hebrew Faith is the result of people looking at life issues and trying to find answers in order that the picture of God, of JHWH, may be truer and more complete.
The story of Job, it would seem, is only partially known and even less partially understood. But there – in a very long-drawn-out debate and discussion, - is the clear perception that the central person in the story came to the conclusion that illness and sin had no connection whatever. His so-called ‘comforters’ were terribly holy and convinced otherwise, but God their come-uppance from God Himself. So did Mrs. Job, - who tended to be part of the problem! Instead of trying to write a commentary on Job here and now, I suggest that you get a good Commentary (not easily done!) and study the book for yourself.
I have reported before the experience with my uncle, during my College years, of trying to find God’s answer to his mouth cancer, which took his life not long after. It was a strained and searching business, and while there was no answer to ‘why,’ like Job in that book, we both came to the situation where before that, Uncle had ‘heard of God by reputation, he now saw Him face to face and was content.’ I could offer other tales of learning curves from that old book, so get in touch if you wish.
Not only is that clear statement in the Old Testament, there is of course also that stunning episode in John’s Gospel Chapter 9. This particular issue was faced then with stunning directness by Jesus, Who refuted the then (and still!) current perception that ailments and illness was punishment for sin. Once again I suggest that this passage be read and pondered – and interestingly the real focus of this cameo has to do with responding to the truth .... about anything.

And that is another factor concerning which the Kingdom issue is highly significant.