Mark 1:21-28Jesus healing, restorative, freeingwork is still going on today because the truth is; we all need to have demonsin our life exorcised. Terri and I wereon our way home from a day of lounging and enjoying what is sometimes for us, aninfrequent, but blessed day off together. We decided to stop for a few things at Publix:dinner fixings, sodas, hair products, snacks, our favorite frosty beverage; youknow what I mean, the essentials. Wepulled our cart into the checkout line, and I noticed a young mother with threekids who seemed to be struggling with paying for her groceries. With limited cash in hand and half hergroceries still not yet scanned, she said, “I don’t have enough.” I sensed that there was more going on herethan what appeared. She was a well-dressedwoman, her kids were well groomed, but I could see in her eyes the despair and obviousburden that was weighing heavily on her. I felt compelled to respond and so, without even thinking I said, “Canwe do something nice for you today?” Itold the cashier, “We’ll take care of the rest of the groceries for this nicelady and her children.” She smiled andgave us a look of shock and a calming sigh of gratitude. She confessed, “I’m usually on the other endof this kind of situation, but my family is struggling right now.” I said, “Don’t worry, we all need helpsometimes.” I gave her my card and said,“If we can do anything to help you all, just call.” Her teenage son shook my hand and said, “Thankyou.” In this brief exchange, in thismoment of grace, God made it possible for the bonds of shame, despair, and fearto be broken. The demon of despair and unforeseenpoverty had for at least this moment, been exorcised and this woman and herthree children were set free. Not alldemons possess the drama and sensationalism we see on television or in themovies.
Jesus’ exorcism of demons wasnot merely a contest of opposing spiritual natures, but more likely adeclaration of the power of God in Christ to reverse the bonds of humandespair, brokenness, and estrangement. Godwants to break apart that which binds us and keeps us from being recipients of thegift of Grace. In Jesus’ day, thosedemons were sometimes disease, blindness, lameness, physical ailments, ormental incapacity. When Jesus called ademon out, he not only restored the person to full health physically, but thespiritual healing was just as efficacious. Do you remember the woman suffering fromprofuse bleeding? She because of herphysical ailment was considered a social outcast, someone unclean and rituallyunworthy of human contact. Jesus brokethe bonds of her estrangement and restored her to full humanity, and gave herback her place in the community. Jesusbreaks the bonds of our estrangement today as well, and calls us into right relationshipwith God and with each other. This istruly the good news which is “in Christ, we are healed.” In Christ, we are restored. In Christ, we can live in the hope of a full,grace-filled future. I imagine any oneof us can look back over our lives, and can name moments of healing that wehave experienced. Whether we strugglewith addiction, we are estranged in our relationships, we suffer from depression,we wrestle with anger or you name it, we have all at one time or another, beenhealed by God’s grace. This is good newsand it is good news that we should be compelled to share. The writer of today’s Gospel said that becauseof Jesus’ healings, “his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding regionof Galilee.” The message was so compelling,that the Good News did not sit idly on a shelf, the power of the message couldnot be contained, and I am convinced that it cannot be contained today.
The message of God’s grace is asrelevant and powerful today as it was 2000 years ago, but the church may haveto accept that we can no longer do evangelism as we did 20 years ago. We cannot just open the doors, run a few adsin the paper, have some wonderful fellowship events, and expect the people passivelyto be transformed by Christ. I have beengetting my haircut from the same person at the mall for several months now. I have gotten to know my stylist (I will callher “T”) and with every haircut, she has a new set of interesting questionsabout faith. Last week, as the finaltouches on my coif were made, she made a very poignant observation about the changesin our culture as it relates to religion. “T” said, “Ya know Eric, I believe in Jesus, but I don’t get that wholereligion/denomination thing that you are into.” How do you respond to something like that? For the next few minutes I felt like a carmechanic trying explain to someone who has never driven a car, how to changethe oil or fill it up with gas. We hadno common place from which to talk about religion, because she had never had theexperience of a faith community before, and I have been in a faith community myentire life. Spreading the good news inthis culture of ours that has changed so much over the last 20, 30, 40 years,will require us to reconsider how and in what context we continue our ministryof being spreaders of the Good News.
In the online forum “Episcopal Café,”I read recently these comments by a researcher (Daniel Abrams). Abrams wrote, “Being affiliated with adenomination is not the same as believing in God or believing in any aspect ofa religious ideology . . . being unaffiliated with a religion doesn't mean youdon't believe in God, but simply that you don't want to be a part of adenomination." Abrams added, “Trendsin American religion since the 1960s have actually moved away fromdenominational modes of self-identification and affiliation and toward a risein spirituality.” 1 The point of the article is not that we haveto live in fear about the future of the Christian faith, we simply need to beaware that maybe our dated modes of passing on the faith to the nextgeneration, needs to change. Does thismean that next month we are should run a full-page ad in the Sun, or setup acommunity tent revival, or maybe we should pass out gospel tracts out on776? No. The point is by virtue of our baptism and the vows, which that entails, weARE commissioned to pass on the faith to the next generation. Here, with a few precious and wonderful activegrowing folks, that next generation are not flocking to be here among us, andquite honestly, some folks may not understand the reason why the should be apart of a faith community in the first place. How do we speak to a generation who says, “I don’t get it?” I believe the key is authentic Christian loveenacted every day.
Folks will get it because theysee the healing, restorative, exorcising love and grace of Jesus present in andthrough his followers. Folks will get itbecause it is exercised (with an “e”) in our response to the bonds and prisonsof despair. The healing restoration ofJesus Christ, who opened the scroll of Isaiah and declared, “The Spirit of theLORD is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives willbe released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free, toproclaim the year of the Lord's favor." It is when this ministry continues in the world, that the faith willspread. When young and old alike are freedfrom the bonds of the injustices of poverty, racism, classism, and discriminationof all sorts and types, Jesus’ fame will spread throughout the region. When love wins, Jesus’ fame will spreadthroughout the region. When peaceprevails, Jesus’ fame will spread throughout the region. Jesus’ fame will spread because it will behis followers, his disciples, his gathered people that will carry the message notonly with words, catchy marketing, or great programs, but it through our veryown ministry of exorcising and breaking the afflictions that hold individuals inbondage from the grace of God and the love of each other.
1 http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/church_growth/numbers_worth_watching.html
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