JESUS WAS NOT ALONE

On Sunday's lection from Mark, the heavens are torn or ripped apart during Jesus's baptism. In Matthew and Luke they are opened. A stark contrast.

The Spirit then drives Jesus into the wilderness in Mark. In Luke and Matthew, the Spirit leads Jesus. Being driven and being led are very different descriptions. The former conjures an image of Jesus going with hesitation, even reluctance. The latter paints a picture of readiness and willingness.

Wilderness conjures up a lot of ambivalent images for us who study scripture. God appeared to a hardheaded Moses through the burning bush in the wilderness. The Israelites wandered almost aimlessly in the wilderness for decades. Many of them died there, including Moses. John the Baptist was a "voice of one calling in the wilderness." The wilderness does not seem like a very hospitable place. Yet, God's surprises abound in the wilderness!

Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness. Matthew and Luke add that he fasted. This narrative is the basis for the 40 days of Lent.

Many among us imagine that Jesus was alone in the wilderness during those 40 days. He was not. Jesus had company. Wild beasts. Angels... and Satan. Non-human life. God's surprises do abound in the wilderness!

My friends, let us never forget. Satan did not betray Jesus. Judas did. Satan did not deny Jesus. Peter did. Satan did not plot to arrest and kill Jesus in secret. The chief priests and scribes did. Satan did not abduct, torture, and murder Jesus. The Romans did.

Satan is not behind world hunger, monopoly capitalism, Islamophobia, nor homophobia. Satan is not behind the genocide ongoing in Gaza, nor is he the architect of the dehumanization of the Palestinian People. We all know who are responsible and should be held accountable for all these.

Lent began last Wednesday. Who among us will spend 40 days in the wilderness with non-human beings? Jesus did. God's surprises await us there!


*art, "Jesus is Tempted," (JESUS MAFA, 1973, Cameroon) from Vanderbilt Divinity Library digital archives

METAMORPHOSIS

Moses, Elijah, and Jesus all experience mountain-top encounters with God. All three went through very trying and challenging times in their lives and their encounter with God enabled them to complete the tasks that God has called them to do. The three went up caterpillars, they came down butterflies.

Transfiguration. The original word, transliterated, is metamorphosis.

Not everyone who encounters God come back as butterflies. Take Peter. In the mountain Peter experienced something so special, so unique that we expected him to come out as a butterfly. He does not. He opposes Jesus’s journey to Jerusalem. He eventually denies Jesus.

Everyone who encounters God in God’s mountain needs to come down. When Moses came down he led in the birthing of a people whose love for Yahweh was expressed in love for neighbor, especially the poor, the orphans, the widows, and the strangers. When Elijah came down he continued the struggle against Israel’s oppressive kings and began a prophetic tradition that ended with John the Baptizer. When Jesus came down he followed the path that led to Jerusalem, to the cross, and, eventually, to the empty tomb!

Metamorphosis.

My friends, to believe in metamorphosis is to believe in God's power to raise Gaza up from the rubble, in God’s power to bring down empires, in God's power to transform caterpillars into butterflies. Yes, eventually even Peter. And, yes, even you and me.

To believe in metamorphosis is to believe that goodness will always triumph over evil, that hope is stronger than despair, that faith conquers fear, that love is always greater than indifference, and that life will always, always, conquer death!

*art, "Transfiguration" (2008) by Mary Jane Miller (taken from her book "Life in Christ 2021, Knowledge of God made visible in Jesus the Man"). Image from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives.

COMING OUT

Coming out is an important theme in the Gospel of Mark. If "Immanuel" can serve as bookends for Matthew (since this is the promise both in chapters 1 and 28), "Coming Out" frames Mark (in chapters 1 and 16).

The heavens are torn apart in the beginning of Mark, and the Spirit comes out. It stays out, and it is still out. Jesus goes all over the towns and villages of Palestine and commands unclean spirits to come out of the people they have occupied and possessed. The disciples at the end of Mark expected Jesus to be dead inside a box, a tomb, but he was not. He came out. He is risen. Jesus is never, ever, where we want him to be.

In Sunday's lection, the disciples and Simon Peter expected Jesus to be inside a box, Peter's house in Capernaum. But Jesus was not inside. No box can contain Jesus. He came out. Jesus is never, ever, where we want him to be.

No box can contain Jesus. Not then, not now, and not ever.

Right now, he is loose among the poorest, the most oppressed, the most marginalized, and the most demonized communities. Jesus is where most of us don't want him to be; where most of us do not want to be; where most of us are afraid to be.

He is in Gaza, he is among people living with HIV and AIDS, he is among sinners...

Jesus is waiting for us to come out of the boxes that keep us safe, indifferent, isolated, and insulated. He is waiting for us to come out of the boxes we have created to keep everyone in. Yes, even Jesus.

He is waiting for us to come out and join him.


*art, "Christ healing Peter's Mother-in-Law," (Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, 1606-1669), from vanderbilt divinily library digital archives.

THE EXORCIST

Savior. Lord. Friend. Healer. Messiah. These are the more popular terms we use to describe Jesus. "Exorcist" usually does not come up in the list.

Sunday's lection from Mark offers us a glimpse of Jesus as an exorcist. Exorcisms make up a significant portion of Jesus's ministry in Mark, in Matthew, and in Luke. In John, on the other hand, Jesus is accused of being demon-possessed.

In Antiquity, a lot of illnesses, unusual or deviant behavior, and unbelievable feats of human strength were ascribed to spirits. It was a common belief that these spirits could take possession of people, which resulted in physical or mental affliction. That these spirits were unclean, even evil, was a later development.

In Mark, these unclean spirits know who Jesus really is: The Holy One of God. Only in Mark do we find one explicit identification of these unclean spirits with Rome: Legion (in 5.9). A Legion was composed of six thousand soldiers and the Roman Empire had about 30 legions deployed all over its territories.

Do not forget this. Ever. The worst kind of possession is imperialism. True then, true now. The worst kind of possession is when the colonizer has "possessed" or "occupied" the colonized's heart; when the colonized speak the colonizer's tongues, reproduce the colonizer's ideology, worship the colonizer's gods, and fight the colonizer's wars.

The silence and indifference of most of the "Christian World," who confess to follow the Palestinian Jesus, on the ongoing genocide against Palestinians is proof of this continuing imperial possession.

My friends, we need an exorcism. Right now!



*art, "The Possessed" (JESUS MAFA) from vanderbilt divinity library digital archives.

GO FISH!

I am pretty sure that many among us used to sing a song that went, "I will make you fishers of men, fishers of men, fishers of men. I will make you fishers of men if you follow me."  I haven't heard this song sung in years. Probably because we have stopped fishing for people. 

Why is that? We have stopped FOLLOWING JESUS.

What have we done instead? We praise Jesus. We worship Jesus. We proclaim, "Christ above all!" We do everything in our power to make other people look like us; pray like us; act like us. We have stopped doing what Jesus actually told us to do in order to fish for people. FOLLOW HIM! 

Why is that? Because following Jesus is hard. It is dangerous. It means loving our neighbor, including our enemies. It means taking up the cross. It means going against empire. It means being red-tagged, vilified, and demonized. It means being crucified. It means offering one's life as a ransom for many. 

My friends, Jesus is  waiting for you and me to follow him to Galilee. Right now! 

*image, "St. Peter and St. Andrerw," by Peter Koenig (from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives)

COME AND SEE!

No king, no prophet, no priest ever came from Nazareth. Maybe this is why Luke and Matthew came up with Bethlehem birth stories. And the 'Joseph-from-the-house-of-David-was-the-father' tradition as well. And, of course, the demigod mythology. Mark's 'The carpenter from Nazareth, the son of Mary' (read: bastard) was a hard sell.

Yet to this day, the Nazarene who lived his life with and for those whose only hope was God-- who preached good news to the poor, who challenged the rich to sell everything they have and give the proceeds to the destitute, who defied empire and its life-negating systems, and who commanded everyone who followed him to offer one's life for a friend--his way of life remains a very hard sell.

Can't exactly sell a way of life that carries a high risk of being executed by the state, can you?

Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Can anything good come out of Gaza? Can anything good come out of Palestine? Philip's answer to Nathanael is as true today as it was then. COME AND SEE!

But these days, before we can go and see, we need to make sure that a permanent ceasefire is declared. We also need to make sure that the State of Israel and its allies led by the United States of America are held accountable for the evil they have unleashed on the Palestinian People.

My friends, today and tomorrow (January 11 and 12) at 10am (in Palestine and South Africa) the United Nation's International Court of Justice will hold public hearings on the case of genocide filed by South Africa against the State of Israel. Everyone dedicated to peace based on justice is enjoined to join the global Cyber Intifada on all social platforms (Twitter/X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, etc.) to share videos, pictures, statements, and other forms of evidence to demonstrate Israel's ongoing genocide against the Palestinian People.

We must all use the hashtag #EndIsraelsGenocide and post at the same time (10am in Palestine and South Africa, 4pm in the Philippines) and keep the campaign going for two hours. Today and tomorrow!

#EndIsraelsGenocide
#CeaseFireNow
#FreePalestine

*art, "The First Two Disciples" (JESUS MAFA), from Vanderbilt Divinity Library archives.

THE HEAVENS WERE TORN APART

Sunday's lection from Mark talks about the baptism of Jesus by John. Matthew and Luke have parallel versions. Only Mark reports that the heavens were torn or ripped apart when the Spirit descended upon Jesus.

There are so many people who are fixated on going up to heaven. There are those who do most of what they do in order to secure themselves a place up in heaven. There are also those who believe that investing their 70 to 80 earth years on "heavenly" endeavors--putting numerous bills in the offertory, donating land, and building air-conditioned churches--will get them a reward in the after-life that spans eternity.

Now, there are those who read their Bibles, pray everyday, and grow, grow, grow in the realization that many times in scripture, God does everything possible to live among God's people here on earth whether it is God descending on Sinai, journeying with the Israelites via the tabernacle, taking residence at the temple in Jerusalem, and fulfilling the promise of "Immanuel." Of course, our lection says that the Spirit descended, came down, like a dove. I would like to believe that the Spirit tore or ripped the heavens apart because the Spirit could not wait to leave heaven for earth.

And, do not forget this, ever: the Spirit that came down has not gone back up to heaven. And Jesus likewise. He is still down here on earth, particularly in places and spaces where we do not want him to be; in places and spaces where we are afraid to go; in places and spaces like Gaza, the West Bank, and Mindanao, "The Land of Promise".

He is waiting for us to join him as he works among the poor, the oppressed, the marginalized, the dehumanized, the occupied, and the silenced. Right now.


*art, "John baptizes Jesus," JESUS MAFA, 1973 (Cameroon), from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives. 🙏