The Gospel of Mark is known as the Gospel of Immediacy. The word, euthus, immediately, is used in the New Testament more than 60 times, and the Gospel of Mark itself uses it more than 35 times. So, immediacy has something to do with the message of the Gospel of Mark. In English, we aren’t always able to appreciate this because euthus gets translated variously as suddenly, at once, even the following day.
Last week, the text for the day was about the calling of Jesus’ disciples. We heard that Jesus called his disciples and they immediately followed him.
Today, we hear that Jesus immediately enters the synagogue to preach and teach. Jesus calls out the unclean spirit, and it immediately leaves. Jesus’ fame begins to spread at once, immediately, throughout the region of Galilee.
This immediacy in the Gospel of Mark brings about a kind of breathlessness. There is a sense that there is not enough time to do the things that need to be done. There is a certain sense of rushing around because the goal of the book of Mark is to witness and get through the ministry of Jesus in order to again hear of the trial, death, and resurrection, and then immediately follow where Jesus leads bearing witness to the amazing thing that God is doing in Christ.
God is determined to save the world from sin, death, and the devil. In Christ, God has determined to break down the barriers between heaven and earth, to let all of creation be lifted up into a new relationship with God, to conquer death so that we no longer need to fear death but rather we will be fully engaged in God’s gift of life and the relationship God wants for all people, that relationship which draws us always to the fullness of God’s presence and a more complete relationship with our neighbor.
This new expression of God’s commitment to creation is dramatically outlined in the passion narrative, that is the story of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem where he celebrates the Last Supper with his disciples, is arrested, tried, crucified, and buried. Then, early in the morning, before it is light, the women come to discover that the boundaries of death and life have been broken. Jesus is not among the dead. He is risen and goes before us to Galilee where we find him.
Today, we see Jesus suddenly in Galilee in the synagogue preaching and teaching. We do not see the resurrected Jesus, and yet we know that Jesus is risen because we would not be reading this Gospel if he hadn’t been raised.
Mark intends for us to see this Jesus as both human and divine. Mark intends for us to see the life and ministry of Jesus leading to and resulting from the true resurrection authority of Jesus. We hear that Jesus does not teach like the scribes, that is, he does not spend time trying to justify what he says based on the writings of Moses and the prophets. No, Jesus speaks with the authority of the one who has the power to overcome death and the grave. Yes, this is a new teaching with a new authority.
So, with this sense of breathlessness, we are drawn to consider the man in the synagogue with an unclean spirit. In Jesus’ time, the consideration could have only been about a man. Women were separated from men in the synagogue and would not have been thought to be part of the worshipping community. So, we should not be surprised that it is a man with an unclean spirit. Today we would be more likely to say that someone had an unclean spirit.
We may think of this as a unique exorcism, and yet we come each week claiming that we have an unclean spirit. Each week we are cleansed of this unclean spirit and hear God’s words for us that immediately cast out and silence those spirits in us, preparing us to go out into the world to proclaim what God has done for us.
Longing for this preparation, we gather, at the beginning of our time together, saying, ”We have sinned against you in thought word and deed. We have sinned by what we have done and what we have left undone. We have not loved God with our whole heart, nor have we loved our neighbor as ourselves.” We come claiming that we are brokenhearted, seeking healing and wholeness, and we receive that wholeness when we hear those amazing words that help us appreciate this new teaching authority that comes to us from the cross and the empty tomb, those words that give us immediate wholeness, “In the mercy of almighty God and by Christ’s authority, all of our sins are forgiven”. Our unclean spirit has been made clean. We are made right with God through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, and it happens just like that, immediately.
With that desire to have that change made in us and recognizing God’s authority to make that change, we come with our rusts, our sins, our unclean spirits to receive wholeness and peace because, you see, the person with the unclean spirit is us. This story is our story, and yet, we seem not to be as impressed today as we are about what Jesus did then so many years ago.
We continue to participate in God’s work of exorcising the unclean spirits in this world beginning with our baptisms. In our baptism service we are asked, “Do you renounce the devil and all the forces that defy God? Do you renounce the powers of this world that rebel against God? Do you renounce the ways of sin that draw you away from God?”
To all of these we answer, “We renounce them!” We renounce all those powers, all those unclean spirits, all those things that get in the way of our relationship with God.
With this renunciation and our commitment to be in relationship with God and one another, we are prepared to die and rise into a new life-relationship with Christ, a relationship that is ours immediately and for all time, a relationship that cleanses our uncleanliness and casts out our unclean spirits each and every day.
What is extraordinary in this week’s text is that the unclean spirit fully recognizes who Jesus is even though the people in the synagogue and many people standing at a baptismal font do not. Even when we are not able to find Christ in our lives, when we are tempted away from those places God calls us, where we should be, the authority of Jesus is there to cast those unclean spirits out and make us clean indeed. Ultimately, that is our shield and protection.
Today we gather in our gathering place, our synagogue, marveling again at this new teaching, this gift of forgiveness, and at Christ’s authority to cast out our unclean spirits, to share in the living body of Christ, made right with Christ through Christ’s work for us, even and especially in those darkest times when we betray Christ, remembering that it is in those dark times of old that Jesus stood among his disciples making a covenant of life and forgiveness for us all.
So, we are able to come with our addictions and our clinging to worldly things. We come spending too much time on social media networks. We come with our political views that consume us. We come with dependence on drugs and alcohol and television and energy and more. We come doing those things we would not and not doing the things that we would. We come depending on God’s grace and forgiveness. We come with the people of this story, and, like them, we wonder at Jesus’ teachings, and we wonder at Christ’s authority.
And so, as we go out into our world this week wondering, let us immediately share that wonder and amazement with the people we meet so that Christ’ fame is spread throughout our region of Galilee—in Albany and in all of those places we are called to go. And when we fail, let us return, to gather together and again hear and know that Jesus continues to forgive and cast out our unclean spirits so that we can try again, immediately. Thanks be to God.
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