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By: The Rev. Joseph Graumann

Altars are like people: they come in all kinds, and some people concern themselves far too much with how they are dressed.

One altar that made quite the impression was that of my year one field education parish. This church was large and beautiful, and the entire chancel, including the wine-glass pulpit, were made of marble. There was a “Waltar”^[1] made of marble and a very large wooden free-standing altar, upon which was carved “In remembrance of me.” Two marble steps up from the rest of the nave and a marble altar rail separated these two holy tables from the rest of the sanctuary. And yes, the altar wore designer clothes. A Tiffany stained glass window of the resurrection overlooked the whole affair, as if the morning sunlight could use some improvement.

Worship at this parish was beautifully done. The music stirred the soul and glorified God. The pastors preached with integrity and verve. The sanctuary overflowed of happy families, and the needs of the community were lifted up in prayer, and the announcements engaged the congregation in mission. The congregation leveraged about one million dollars a year into a vibrant mission and much help for their neighbors. God was—and remains—certainly at work in this big, beautiful, successful church.

James and John could be forgiven for thinking that discipleship was always going to be a “marble chancel” kind of work. They rather audaciously asked Jesus for places of honor at the divine banquet. I’d imagine they thought of themselves resplendent in rich brocades, with a heavenly Tiffany light cast upon them, having heard much of the glory of the Lord. After all, their teacher had been transfigured, and he was going about healing people and multiplying bread. Surely, Jesus brought with him joy and reconciliation. Who wouldn’t want a part of that?

Jesus has strong words for his ambitious disciples. He reminds them that he’s going to the cross, in fairly strong terms: “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”^[2] He pledges that they will share in both, and he’s talking about his death. And also the sacraments.

Both Baptism and Holy Communion are cruciform. In Baptism, we die with Jesus, drowning to sin and rising again to new life. In Holy Communion, we remember that “Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again,” and we take that paschal mystery into our bodies. We celebrate the forgiveness of sin in both sacraments, and with forgiveness there is eternal life. Yet, it can be easy to forget that in each of these sacraments, there too is death: the death of sin and the death of death itself.

Jesus reminds his disciples that this cruciform pattern defines the Christian life. To follow Jesus is to daily die and rise again. The topsy-turviness of following Jesus overpowers death, and it overpowers social convention along with it. To die to sin is to die to the sin of pride and position. He rightly identifies the Roman customs of status and patronage as contrary to his reign. To become great, he says, you must be a servant. To be highest is to become the most lowly. Jesus does this on the cross.

As church leaders, we find ourselves gathered around the Lord’s supper quite often.  It’s easy to believe that the mahogany altar standing on marble steps is the pinnacle of Christian practice. Make no mistake: God’s banquet is worthy of our best. Yet, my most cherished memories of feasting on Jesus feature much simpler furniture.

How often has a hospital tray become the holiest of holies! The words, “Given for you,” and “Shed for you,” mark the transformation of simple bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus. Similarly, a kitchen or a waiting room can become the grandest of churches. All this is possible because of the presence of the Most High, who became the lowliest of all on a cross and who rose in glory to bring us eternal life.

The church, with its great diversity, gathers around many tables each Sunday. Some are grand, and others much more simple. At each of these tables, the risen Christ holds out his wounded hands so that we could hold out our hands to a wounded world. We leave this banquet with bellies full of the Bread of Life, eager to feed others.

^[1] An East-Facing altar or altar attached to a wall. You’re welcome!

^[2] Mark 10:38, NRSV.

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By: The Rev. TJ Tetzlaff

***Editor’s Note: This essay was originally published in 2018***

As the Rolling Stones once said, “You can’t always get what you want. But if you try, sometimes you might find you get what you need.” That’s certainly the case for this man with many possessions who runs to Jesus and kneels asking how to inherit eternal life. He leaves grieving after being told to give away all his possessions while Jesus continues on with the disciples, warning them of the spiritual risk that comes with wealth. This man does not hear what he wanted and expected, but he does get something much needed: an invitation to travel with Christ.

I wonder what this man wanted from Jesus and why he approached him. Why did he need Jesus to confirm he was doing the right thing if he already knew the commandments and had been keeping them since his youth? Is this an example of humble-bragging? Is he hoping Jesus to praise his efforts in front of the crowd and disciples? Perhaps he is simply an anxious personality looking for encouragement, hoping to be told he’s doing everything right and just keep doing what he’s doing. Whatever the motivation, his encounter with Jesus confronts him with a dilemma and leaves him shaken to the core (as encounters with the Holy usually do). 

I know many people (myself included) who have been like this; running to Jesus (or church) filled with excitement and enthusiasm, only to be left in shocked surprise when we find the reality is quite different. But following Jesus is not easy, and as any 5-year-old can tell you, life isn’t fair.  We don’t get what we deserve (at least not in this world). 

One of the most unattractive parts of faith is that it doesn’t make life easier. In fact, committing yourself to a life of faith will likely make things far more difficult. Following Christ means possessions and relationships will always be at risk. We commit ourselves to speaking truth and following Christ even when he takes us somewhere we don’t want to go. 

It’s doubly difficult for clergy who serve at the pleasure of their congregation; it’s one thing to talk about following Jesus in an abstract way but it’s quite another when you risk your career and your family’s income. We all come to a point where we have to decide how far on the journey we can go, with the understanding that as long as we remain on this side of heaven, we aren’t likely to see the outcome. Prosperity is not the result of faithfulness, just as cancer is not the result of sin. Our behavior may influence it, but spiritual justice is not a kind of science that operates through cause and effect. Decades of hard work and faithful living might leave us aged and impoverished with nothing to show for it, but no sacrifice is forgotten in the heart of God, and if you’re in the Christian life to get material security, then you’re in the wrong place. Baptism is not a contract which guarantees an easy life without struggle.

If prosperity was always the result of hard work, then immigrant laborers who work 12-14 hours a day 7 days a week would be millionaires and a single mother holding down three jobs while raising her kids wouldn’t have to worry about having enough to cover the bills this month. The Disciples gave everything away and were persecuted for it. They spent their lives as homeless wanderers, and most of them ended up dying painfully, but they followed regardless. They continued on with Jesus even when, like James and John, it meant leaving family behind (Matthew 4:2). Jesus tells the young man with many possessions to give it all away, and he walks away shocked and grieving. Perhaps he left because he was overly attached to his possessions and he couldn’t leave them to follow Christ, but I can’t help but wonder if he might also be grieving a long-held belief about how the world works.  By telling him to give away all his possessions, Jesus may really be telling him that prosperity was not the result of keeping all the commandments since childhood. Perhaps what this man grieves isn’t just the loss of material wealth, but also years of believing that his possessions were proof of his faithfulness. As a result of his encounter with Jesus, he may have just lost his entire world view and how he has related to it, but that’s the risk we run by approaching Christ; the answer he gives us might not be what we want to hear and might leave us shaken.

That is the price of Discipleship.  

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By: The Rev. Anna Shine

To give some context to our Gospel passage from today, it is helpful to note what has happened leading up to our part of the narrative. Jesus has been rejected in his hometown of Nazareth, and so he leaves and continues his ministry of teaching elsewhere. He then sends out his twelve disciples in pairs to cast out unclean spirits and to heal the sick. From there Mark inserts a vignette about the death of John the Baptist, which has happened at some point in the past, but is being recounted now. Immediately following this vignette is where our passage begins, with the twelve apostles returning from their being sent out and reporting back to Jesus what they have done and taught. Although the vignette about John’s death is not included in our passage for today’s reflection, it bears mentioning that its placement between Jesus’ disciples being sent out and then returning is a common rhetorical device used in Mark’s writing of the Gospel, suggesting that there is an important connection to consider with those stories.

But for today, our story begins with the apostles returning from their mission and updating Jesus on what they have done. And Jesus’ response is such an important one. He said to them, ‘Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while’ (Mk 6:31). We often forget that fourth commandment to remember and keep holy the Sabbath day (Ex 20:8). It bridges the three commandments before it that pertain to our relationship with God, and the six that follow it that concern relationship between human creation. The meeting of the vertical (relationship with God) with the horizontal (relationship with others) – the crux of the cross. A whole sermon could be preached just on this verse and the implications of a command to rest. What might it mean to take that commandment seriously? Especially within the consumeristic and workaholic culture we find ourselves in these days. And how has rest shown up or disappeared in your life during this pandemic? Where are our deserted places, etc.?

Continuing with the narrative, the disciples get in a boat and go to a deserted place, whereupon they find it not deserted, but filled with a crowd that hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them (Mk 6:33). So perhaps the boat served as the deserted place for the disciples since they were greeted by a crowd on shore. Jesus, upon seeing this great crowd had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things (Mk 6:34). I love the Greek word for “to have compassion for.” Splagnizomai. It literally means “to be moved in the inward parts,” [1] which depicts a visceral and physical component to the emotion Jesus feels. There is discomfort, a discomfort that moves a person to action. And that makes sense. Because the translation, “compassion,” means “to suffer with.” Jesus is moved in his innermost being, he feels the suffering with the people he is among, and he acts by beginning to teach them.

What normally would follow is the narrative of the feeding of the five thousand – where Jesus, having fed the crowd with his teachings, then provides a meal of bread and fish to sustain that learning. Next comes the story of Jesus walking on the water. But all of this is missing from today’s Gospel selection, leading from Jesus’ compassion for the crowd of people in the deserted place, to the healing of the crowds that followed him wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms (Mk 6:56). While I do not know why the lectionary chooses to leave out these portions of Mark’s Gospel, perhaps one reason is to emphasize the elements of the story that are less spectacular in their miracles, giving them the opportunity to be studied more closely. What we are left with is a command to rest a while, a display of compassion moving Jesus to action, and the gift of Jesus’ healing touch.

Of note is the word used for “touch.” And wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed. The Greek word, haptomai, means to touch, but in a way that involves modification. It is a kind of touch that influences and/or alters.[2] Through touching Jesus, people are healed.

Perhaps, by leaving out the stories of the feeding and the walking on water, we are able to see a different connection that would be hard to discover with all the action in Mark’s Gospel. Because, in a way, the compassion Jesus feels for the crowd is an inward kind of touch – a way of being touched – that leads to his being altered, changed, moved. Moved to action. And the crowd, having witnessed Jesus’ compassion through his teaching and healing, are moved in return to reach out towards him, to the act of touching him. To be altered, changed, moved by him. And through that they are healed. How marvelous and miraculous is that!

Questions for further thought might be:

What causes you to have compassion? What gifts might you have that can be used as the action compassion moves you toward? Are you a good listener? Storyteller? Craftsperson? Musician? Gardener? Cook? We all have gifts and skills that can help to alleviate suffering in the world – reflect upon yours, recalling that, as the Body of Christ, we need a diversity of gifts, and none are greater than the others. In what ways do you reach out to touch Jesus, allow yourself to be touched by him, and find healing in those acts?

[1] https://biblehub.com/greek/4697.htm

[2] https://biblehub.com/greek/680.htm

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By: The Rev. Caleb Tabor

The story of Herod the Tetrarch (not the same King Herod of the birth narrative) having John the Baptizer beheaded is one that has always sort of captured my attention. It is an oddly detailed story for Mark, given that so many other things are rushed through in his gospel. In this account of a political assassination, I see bits and pieces of so many other stories from Scripture. The first and most obvious parallel here is that it is a continuation of the king/prophet relationship established at the start of the monarchy of another tragic king, Saul, and another shabby looking but important prophet, Samuel (there are also parallels between Samuel and John and Jesus’s birth narratives). When verse 18 tells us of John skulking about, reminding Herod of his misdeeds in taking Herodias as his wife, I can’t help but think of Nathan confronting King David over Bathsheba. Images of Ahab and Jezebel as an antagonistic power couple against a beleaguered prophet Elijah also spring to mind.  

The strange thing about Mark’s account here is that Herod isn’t actually portrayed as an actively antagonistic or malicious person towards John. He may not like what John has to say, but Herod actually sees the prophet as a sacred, holy man who should be protected. I find myself having a little bit of a soft spot for Herod here. Herod is doing something that a great many other people would not – he protected someone who was openly denouncing him because he knew that person was holy. In a political and social culture where we often won’t even listen to people who disagree with us, much less stick up for them or protect them, Herod’s example here is something of a startling jolt to one’s ethical system.

This is, of course, overshadowed by what happens next, and what happens next is even more tragic. Herodias asks for John to be assassinated. Not just assassinated but killed in such a way and with such pageantry that he will be made an example of and disgraced. The story tells us that at this point that Herod can no longer protect John. Not because Herod agrees with Herodias, not because Herod is tired of protecting John, and not even because Herod wants to impress Herodias, but because Herod wants to do what would be considered right and keep an oath he made. He promised Herodias, in front of guests, that he’d give her whatever she wanted as a show of gratitude for her beautiful dance. This put him in a bit of a rock and a hard place. Does he break the commandment saying that we should keep our oaths or does he break a commandment and have an innocent person murdered? I know which one I’d pick, but I’m not an ancient king who made a rash promise in front of my whole court. If I look like a fool in front of my friends, it’s just another Tuesday around here. This brings to mind the tale of Jephthah’s daughter (Judges 11), in which another innocent person had to be killed because of a rash promise made by one ruling over Israel. Even though Herod may be named after his father, he seems more like an amalgamation of the tragic rulers Jephthah the Judge and King Saul. Ultimately, Herod goes with keeping his oath and killing a prophet (a bit cowardly, if you ask me, but I wasn’t there).

To further serve the tragic figure motif, thee story says that Herod was “deeply grieved” by this. This is also demonstrated when Herod hears of Jesus working miracles among the people. Herod’s immediate assumption was that it was not a new teacher Jesus but actually that John the Baptizer had been raised and was out working wonders among the people. More specifically, he thinks that “John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.” Signs of a guilty conscience. I wonder if he’d have been so concerned over simply breaking an oath and looking foolish.

This is a story about a lot of things. One of the big ones is that it is about the real danger of people with power and privilege (not just “bad” people, but anyone with that much influence and authority over another life). John the Baptizer spoke a lot of words, and he won over a number of hearts, but not once did he give a quick order and have his goal accomplished so swiftly as Herod did when he took John’s head. A word, a request, an action, in the hands of powerful and privileged people can become quite deadly quite quickly if their motives are off or their courage is weak. Herodias is a prime example of a person of privilege (though not the most privileged in her society) harboring a prejudice against someone that turns out to be deadly. Herod is a prime example of what happens when people of decent conscience just go along with it. The words of another murdered prophet, Martin Luther King Jr, come to mind in this instance. He spoke out against the silence of the children of light and of the danger of the white moderate who allows injustice to stand in the name of keeping the peace or maintaining the status quo. These words, warnings, and culpabilities lay on all people in positions of power or privilege who, out of some confused sense of misplaced virtue or perhaps just cowardice, let hate and violence continue to claim the lives of innocent people, a number of whom may well be prophets.

There is a final comparison I want to make, but it is by no means the last one could engage in this rich story, and that is between Herod and Pilate. Herod doesn’t show up again in Mark to judge Jesus. It is a solo job for Pilate, and he ends up playing the role in the killing of Jesus that Herod plays in John’s murder – the powerful person presiding over injustice. They both seem to have a lot of internal problems about their respective executions, but Herod at least seems to understand and assume his responsibility in John’s murder, rather than just trying to shift the blame as Pilate is famous for doing. Both people reach out through the pages of Scripture and force us to consider our culpability in the social evils all around us. 

As I contemplate this story, it brings important and unnerving questions to mind. Am I being John the Baptizer, speaking truth to power, come what may, cost what it will? Am I Herodias hating a person who dares to disagree with or criticize me? Or am I Herod, who lets my mouth get ahead of me, doesn’t learn from past mistakes, and facilitates evil in the world, with my only defense being excuses and my only consolation being my broken conscience?

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By: The Rev. Patrick Faulhaber

When I was commissioned as an Elder in the United Methodist Church, I sent a letter of thanks to the pastor of my church growing up. I wanted him to know how grateful I was for his kindness, compassion, and care for me in an awkward stage of my own development. Bob had been a coach for my soccer team, a confidant for my development, and had even been the one to pick me up from the floor with my dad after overindulging in a celebration after a lacrosse championship. He was a good man. 

I sent the letter and put it out of my mind. A few weeks later, I got an email from him, thanking me for the note. It was exactly as kind, thoughtful, and gracious as I had remembered him to be. So, I went searching to find any recorded sermons from his current church, simply out of nostalgia. 

When I found his current church’s page, I found a list of audio links for sermons, I clicked the first one– the most recent one. And, wouldn’t you know it. It was a sermon about how God had worked miraculously in a former youth parishioner of his. The basic message was that there is no one that God cannot use for the Kingdom work we are all called to. Of course, he remembered who I was. 

As it turns out, no one really forgets who you were. Our identities are a unique combination of who we were, who we are, and who we might be. Each decision we make, each interaction we have continues to shape the people that we will be. The best people can hold each of those aspects of us lightly. They can see the past, the present, and the potential together without judging who you might be based on who you once were. 

That is a gift. It is a rare gift. 

As Mark illustrates for us, it is really difficult for people to let go of old memories and expectations. In the best of circumstances, those expectations help create potentially healthy norms in society: the oldest child should always be the one caring for his mother, the neighborhood handyperson should always be a phone call away. And, of course, those expectations can be really limiting and isolating: the “crazy” bastard son of Mary will always be “crazy” and unworthy of any reverence. 

And, of course, Jesus breaks each of those expectations. This isn’t even the first time. The last interaction Jesus had with his family was only three chapters earlier. They came to bring him home because he had stepped so far out of his expected role that the people were calling him crazy, and the religious folks were equating him with the embodiment of temptation itself. 

Expectations always get in the way. It seems that expectations can even limit the power of God. 

Mark tells us explicitly that he was “unable to do miracles” and that he was “appalled by their disbelief.” (Mk 6:5a, 6) 

Jesus’ own community stands in stark contrast to the stories that bookend this encounter in his own hometown. In Mark 5, we see two miracles. One marginalized woman who had been bleeding for 12 years–making her ritually unclean, reached with faithful hands to touch Jesus’ clothes and was suddenly free of her affliction. And one 12-year-old girl who was declared dead was given new life. Each of these women was given a new life, literally– because of their faith. 

And in the remainder of today’s passage, we see how quickly and easily Jesus’ message and power multiply in the parts of the world that are open to the life-changing invitation of God’s Kingdom. 

The only people who seem to be left out of this work are the people who let their assumptions get in the way of God’s work. Whether they are relatives, friends, neighbors, scholars, pastors or leaders, they are left out of the redemptive story of God’s Kingdom when they try to relegate God to the narrow confines of their expectations. 

My former pastor has modeled that kind of openness for me in my life. I’m sure you can think of people in your life who know who you were, but who also remain open to who you might be. As it turns out, their faith creates the space for transformation– at least that is true in my life. 

I wonder how God is calling you to hold your expectations lightly in order to see transformation in your own life. I wonder what expectations you have for your life that might need to be let go of in order to live a new life. I wonder how your congregation might hold expectations, assumptions, traditions, and customs lightly enough to witness Christ walking just beyond our sight. 

May Christ never have to wipe the dirt from his feet in your presence. 

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By: Chris Clow

“Shut up! Stop talking! You’re hysterical! That’s crazy talk! We know who you are, so stop this madness and come back home! Be quiet!”

Quite a response, huh? Jesus is trying to teach about the love of God and healing those in need, having to fend off the scribes and religious officials who are challenging him and saying he’s possessed by the devil, all while trying to keep this massive crowd under control, when he starts hearing people tell him to stop and try to hold him back. But it’s not the scribes, and they didn’t tattle to the Pharisees. It’s not the Romans either; and it’s not the crowd.

It’s his family. His own family are unwilling to listen to what Jesus has to say. Imagine what this would have felt like to him: to be trying to do what you were put here to do, only to look up and see your relatives going “Yeah, ok, carpenter boy. Big talk here. It’s about time you come on home, huh?”

A prophet is not welcome in his own house, indeed.

There are harsh lines at the end of this gospel: “Who are my mother and my brothers?” Can we really be surprised, though? Jesus—while trying to do some good, contain the mob that is following him, and answer the religious nuts who hate him—is now having to fend off his own family who are trying to silence him. I’ve typically heard these lines discussed as opening up the concept of family beyond just biology and the unity of the community of believers—that Jesus is saying all of us who do God’s will are his family—and that may still be true. But I suspect this is also Jesus’ frustration rightly boiling over: “You say you’re my family, yet you are trying to get in my way and stop me. Is that really what my family would do?” You can understand Jesus’ relatives being concerned; this is behavior they haven’t seen from him and getting into theological arguments with the religious officials seems a bit beyond a poor carpenter’s son.  They might feel embarrassed, or concerned, or even outraged at his behavior. Yet Jesus, and in hindsight we, know that he is proclaiming the Gospel. We are able to see the change that his relatives couldn’t at the time. “See, I am doing something new,” it echoes in Isaiah 43. Yet they refuse.

Some of us are lucky enough that we haven’t ever had large blow ups like this with our family members, but I’m willing to bet far more of us have had something like this happen. Times when we felt a call to do something that others wouldn’t understand—maybe our family, our friends, or our coworkers. This moment certainly is a troubling time in our country. From the institutionalized racism and police brutality that people of color experience on a daily basis, to the immigration crisis at our border, to simply whether wearing a mask and getting a vaccine to a global pandemic is a good idea or not. And yet, instead of giving us a common goal to move towards, we continue to see more division, some speaking out, while others tell them (in essence) to be quiet. A common refrain is that we all have to “come together,” away from the extremes, back toward common ground, and be united again. It is a nice idea to have, and working for unity is not itself a bad thing.

However, it can be tempting to hear Jesus say, “If a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand” and then conclude that unity is some supreme virtue which we must always strive for. Jesus’ relatives were united in wanting him to shut up and stop calling attention to himself. But unity which is against the good is not virtuous at all. Jesus’ preaching and witness here is a threat to the unity of his time. Both the religious officials and his own family would rather he stay quiet, not bring these crowds of people out, and not threaten the status quo that they prefer. His family may or may not have liked the religious officials; they may have even agreed with what Jesus said, but by wishing that he just stayed quiet, they wound up standing in opposition to his message.

Similarly, I think we must be very careful when we hear (and participate in) calls to “meet in the middle.” It is one thing to learn how to better listen to those we disagree with. It is another thing entirely to decide that simply finding a balanced “middle” position is automatically a good thing.  If a scale is tilted to one side, you do not balance it by putting weight in the center of it. The problems in our country, such as the racism and police brutality experienced by people of color, the continued plague of gun violence, growing inequality, and the ever-widening wealth gap, will not be solved by waiting and half measures that appeal to a simple unity. It will take real, substantial change, and that change will upset some people. But silence is not the same thing as peace, and if in our desire to bring people together we sacrifice working for justice for those in need, then we become complicit in the injustice we claim to fight, and the silence that we have substituted for peace will not last for long.

Harsh words, perhaps, but I think we’ll hear harsher if we consider ourselves a part of Jesus’ family of believers and do not act like it. “Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.” Even when it gets difficult, may we find the strength to not back down from proclaiming the Gospel in our actions and words, so that we may rightfully be able to call ourselves brothers and sisters in Christ.