Category Archives: God

People: not so sharp

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Mark 7:14-15,17-20 (NIV)
Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. [15] Nothing outside a man can make him `unclean’ by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him `unclean.’ ” [17] After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable. [18] “Are you so dull?” he asked. “Don’t you see that nothing that enters a man from the outside can make him `unclean’? [19] For it doesn’t go into his heart but into his stomach, and then out of his body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods “clean.”) [20] He went on: “What comes out of a man is what makes him `unclean.’

Oh, the Jews were serious about their dietary laws. Asking if they were dull was a bit of a slap. But Jesus has impeccable aim.

I read recently that my own navel is swarming with bacteria. Yuck! But they are my bacteria and I remain surprisingly calm.

The devastating upshot of Jesus’ rebuke focuses on the ease with which we humans can obsess over our navels and bludgeon our neighbors.

Justice is coming. The long arm of the Lord will fall on each of us. At that point our kinship with righteousness will matter far more than our lunch.

Clean is clean
Holy is fierce
And we?
Are dull indeed without him.

Pruning Time

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Whoa! There are a lot of saints in February

How many do you recognize? I looked them up not because of Valentine’s Day. An experienced gardener once told me to prune my roses on a feast day in February. I think the 17th…

Sea’s birthday is the 16th. Time marked by anniversaries. Winter haunts.

Jesus rebukes the hypocrites for useless traditions–

Mark 7:9-10 (NIV)
And he said to them: “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! [10] For Moses said, `Honor your father and your mother,’ and, `Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.’

My erstwhile adoptees were cursers. I would point this admonition out to them. I understand that they never “got” the umbilical bond of love. I even “got” why. They were lost from the beginning. They needed to feel love and when it wasn’t there the whole world went dark for them.

The cost of light is consuming.

But I believe in a Rescuing God.. He’ll get them. Because He loves them. Because He paid. Because He sees their faces from when they were babies lost in the world.

His beautiful lullabies.

Lasting Valentines

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Mark 7:5-7 (NIV)
So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with `unclean’ hands?” [6] He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ” `These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. [7] They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.’

Today is the anniversary of the day that a Roman Christian named Valentinus was tortured and murdered for trying to convert the emperor.

Doesn’t really match overpriced bonbons.

The business of following Jesus is deadly. Isaiah himself was believed to be martyred by Manasseh.

But we all know a talisman of love is cheaper than real love.

God is about real love. His love letters to us are everywhere and He wants our hearts.

Most of us would prefer the hand-washed appearance of solidarity than the cost of true love.

But if we choose the narrow road and follow after True Love, the results are eternal, unmistakable and dear.

Borrowed House

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Years ago I lived in a beautiful old house. It had three stories and a creepy-ish basement, some mice, and a lovely wilderness of a backyard. It was the house I lived in on my wedding day.

I managed it for a friend. Some of my roommates were amazing. Some were annoying, and a couple were nuts. The crazy ones were no fun for anyone. They were paranoid and antisocial and they ended up in the house because I was a softy.

I am a little tougher now.

But mostly I think about Jesus. He tells these elegant, terrifying stories of rampant, evil tenants trashing vineyards and killing messengers.

We humans are stubborn like that. We like to ignore the Landlord.

Jesus is reminding us we live in a borrowed house. We don’t love it like the Owner.

But one day we will or…be shocked to find that this borrowed house was not just shelter.

It was our home

Hypocrite.

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Mark 7:3-8 (NIV)
(The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing, holding to the tradition of the elders. [4] When they come from the marketplace they do not eat unless they wash. And they observe many other traditions, such as the washing of cups, pitchers and kettles. ) [5] So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with `unclean’ hands?” [6] He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ” `These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. [7] They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.’ [8] You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men.”

When my children were still very young they knew two big words-psychological and hypocrite. The first was introduced by my adopted daughter’s precipitous mental slide.

The second was my adopted son’s favorite go-to epithet for any of us who opposed him.

I always thought his use of the word ironic. Now I think–more tragic and disfiguring. He was consumed by appearing one way and hiding who he was in secret.

The Pharisees and teachers of the law saw themselves as the good guys.. They were the power players. But they were so consumed by the appearance, the trappings of clean, they abandoned the pursuit of holy.

Holy should freak us all out. Holy is scary.

Until holy becomes a man and that man quotes Isaiah and then that man lives out holy all the way to a Cross. Perhaps then it should scare us more.

Lent is about the unclean hands and heart–lifted in honor of a sacrifice so unbearable that only it, only He can make us clean.

Making hypocrites into honest men? Same thing as resurrection.

Imagine–dead to life again. All things made new.

What only God can do.

Mad-lib Bible

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Mark 7:1 (NIV)
The Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus and

Isn’t that a great start? Guess what happens next. Do they get him to teach them? Worship? Make him breakfast?

I know that verse breaks in our modern Bibles are arbitrary. The book of Mark was a letter written to a body of people who lived their lives waiting for Jesus to come right back.

John Mark was young when he experienced this story and older when he sat down and recorded it.

And it would be years and years before someone numbered these stories. But God is a smart guy. He uses everything.

So let us pause for a moment and wonder at all the things the Pharisees could have done with Jesus…but didn’t.

What do you do with Jesus?

Stormaphobe

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Mark 6:50-54,56 (NIV)
because they all saw him and were terrified. Immediately he spoke to them and said, “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” [51] Then he climbed into the boat with them, and the wind died down. They were completely amazed, [52] for they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened. [53] When they had crossed over, they landed at Gennesaret and anchored there. [54] As soon as they got out of the boat, people recognized Jesus. [56] And wherever he went—into villages, towns or countryside—they placed the sick in the marketplaces. They begged him to let them touch even the edge of his cloak, and all who touched it were healed.

I have to get out of this chapter.

But I haven’t yet because I need the reminders-

Sometimes God does send us into deadly storms
But he never abandons us
He walks through them, abides with us, then commands the storms to cease
Because he is God.

The people Mark describes in this story have an almost comic energy–they run en masse to and around Jesus. Like a school of fish or a herd of sheep…only in this case their lack of dignity and frenetic searching make perfect sense. Jesus means God saves.

They run to an offer they would be silly to refuse.

And ultimately I am with them– no dignity left, desperate and silly, running to the God who saves.

Chapter 6.

The 4th Watch and the Ghost

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Mark 6:48-50 (NIV)
He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them. About the fourth watch of the night he went out to them, walking on the lake. He was about to pass by them, [49] but when they saw him walking on the lake, they thought he was a ghost. They cried out, [50] because they all saw him and were terrified. Immediately he spoke to them and said, “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

This passage reminds me of the beginning of Hamlet–it is spooky. Some guys on a boat, lost in a storm, see a ghost. No wonder they were terrified. They were in a scary place.

I remember reading Into Thin Air and marveling at the spookiness and privation of that story. Just stay off the mountain, people!!

But we all face death. If veteran fishermen can’t avoid a terrifying storm, then I should take comfort when my life is rocked by storm.

I am a stormaphobe. I want smooth sailing. But when each storm has threatened the boat of my life, I too have seen the Miraculous walking toward me on impossible waters.

Somebody else tells me to take courage and I might be inclined to snap. He says it and I listen.

Because his is the voice that can calm the storm.

Take courage
It is him
He is here.

Where the flip is Jesus?

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Mark 6:46-50 (NIV)
After leaving them, he went up on a mountainside to pray. [47] Later that night, the boat was in the middle of the lake, and he was alone on land. [48] He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them. Shortly before dawn he went out to them, walking on the lake. He was about to pass by them, [49] but when they saw him walking on the lake, they thought he was a ghost. They cried out, [50] because they all saw him and were terrified. Immediately he spoke to them and said, “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

I don’t know about you, but I can see them in the boat–bailing water, straining against the storm, really scared with little bubbles over their heads asking– Where the flip is Jesus?!

….when you need him.

We have those storms. We think we are perishing. We try our best to help ourselves and then start to feel desperate…because the wind is against us.

But he is always there. Not because he is omniscient, (check) or omnipotent, (check again). No. Because he has paid with his life a debt of sin for a treasure of love.

If he did not abandon us to hell, a storm or two is a cake walk. For him.

Immediately!

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Mark 6:44-46 (NIV)
The number of the men who had eaten was five thousand. [45] Immediately Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. [46] After leaving them, he went up on a mountainside to pray.

People have noticed the breakneck pace of Mark’s story. Jesus moves immediately. The pace is direct and efficient. He gets stuff done.

The people counted in feed up time were men. Most biblical historians suggest that there would be about 4 women and children for each man–so the meal may have been 25000 people.

Wow.

But the details are as interesting as the big stuff.

1. They cleaned and organized– leftovers are gathered and counted

2. Jesus sends his disciples on ahead immediately.

3. While he dismissed the crowd? Benedictions, personal instructions. What does it look like when the God who loves you tells you to return home?

Then he went home too. Jesus missed the close time with God, so he prayed. He prayed to maintain relationship. He prayed for rest and comfort. He prayed for us.

Glad he did. I need it.