“Ordinary Time”
Mark 1:29-38
Allen Huff
Jonesborough Presbyterian Church
2/4/18
29As
soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew,
with James and John. 30Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a
fever, and they told him about her at once. 31He came and took her
by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve
them.
32That
evening, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with
demons. 33And the whole city was gathered around the door. 34And
he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons;
and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.
35In
the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted
place, and there he prayed. 36And Simon and his companions hunted
for him. 37When they found him, they said to him, “Everyone is
searching for you.”
38He
answered, “Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the
message there also; for that is what I came out to do.” (NRSV)
We are currently in the liturgical season
known as Ordinary Time. Each year has two intervals of Ordinary Time, a short
interval occupying the several weeks between Christmas and Lent, and a longer
one spanning the months between Pentecost and Advent.
Ordinary Time is just that – ordinary. The color is this lukewarm
green. During Ordinary Time we plod along with Jesus as he travels about the
countrysides of Galilee, Samaria, and Judea. It follows his interactions with his
disciples, with Jewish leaders, and with the impoverished and forsaken people to
whom Jesus pays the most attention. Sometimes the stories are interesting and
compelling. Other times they’re, well, ordinary.
Maybe today’s text contains your favorite scripture passage. And that’s
wonderful. To me, though, it’s one of those all-too-ordinary texts. Tell me if
this summary is basically accurate:
Jesus heals Peter’s mother-in-law,
and she gets up and gets to work.
By evening, the street outside
Peter’s house is lined with sick folks. Jesus helps as many as he can.
Early the next
morning, Jesus slips away to pray. His disciples hunt him down and tell him that
folks are looking for him. And Jesus says, We
have to keep moving. So they do.
The word of the Lord. Thanks be to
God.
How numbingly ordinary…
A true story: Sam was eagerly
involved in the life of his congregation. He came to small group studies. He
served as a deacon. He got excited about learning and growing as a Christian.
Then came a moment of foreshadowing.
Sam’s pastor became aware of a
nearby family who was experiencing an acute need for warmth. He asked a study
group if they’d like to help this family by getting a space heater. Sam jumped
at that. He contributed money and volunteered to help purchase and deliver the
heater.
During the delivery, Sam and his
pastor talked with the woman who had a young son. They lived in a small house
that was sealed about as tight as a screened porch. While describing other
issues her family faced, the woman was clearly asking for more help. The pastor
told her about other resources, then he and Sam wished her well.
Driving away, Sam was bewildered by
the experience. “She barely said Thank
you!” he said.
“No,” the pastor said, “but they’ll
be warmer.”
That didn’t mollify Sam. He seemed
to need recognition more than that family needed heat. Or, maybe when expecting
an extraordinary experience, he found it ordinary and unsatisfying.
Over the next couple of years,
Sam’s church attendance and participation grew sporadic. He said it was getting
monotonous. He climbed on the contemporary worship bandwagon, and while he
found the music livelier, he said it was still “just the same old same old.”
In his early forties, Sam had more
discretionary money and time than most people his age. Discipleship became no
match for the allure of shiny things and opportunities to use them. He spent
more money and time satisfying his desires. He got divorced, again. Within
three years, Sam had completely abandoned his communal faith practice.
I can understand Sam’s struggle.
When something that’s supposed to be transforming and life-giving feels numbingly
routine and imprisoned by the way we’ve
always done it, it feels dead.
It seems to me, though, that the
real problem was Sam’s sense of entitlement to being entertained, to being
constantly excited and stimulated. He lost interest in a church that spends
most of the year following Jesus on the plodding journey of Ordinary Time,
tending to commonplace needs piling up at the door. Jesus may take a few
minutes here and there to pray, but for the most part, he just keeps moving. Lumbering
ahead. Day-to-day. Town-to-town. Person-to-person.
It doesn’t take a linguistic savant
to recognize that the words disciple
and discipline are related. Discipleship
is the discipline of following a leader in the midst of tedium and stasis as
well as excitement and change. Aware of how ordinary life will be even after
Easter, Jesus says, “You will always have the poor with you.” (Mt. 26:11)
Following Jesus means tending to those whose needs often seem tiresome and interminable.
When Christian practice, which is
voluntary, begins to feel tiresome and interminable, why bother?
We all have to wrestle with that
question. And one reason I continue to bother is because I continue to find blessing
and purpose in the midst of the ordinary. I continue to recognize God in those reaching
out for acceptance, assurance, and healing in places like Family Promise, the
JAMA food pantry, Loaves and Fishes, and ASP. I experience the same-old
clamoring for holiness and hope right here in worship, Sunday school, committee
meetings, and on CL&M outings.
Now, if fewer and fewer people look
to the church for experiences of holiness and hope, that’s partly our fault. The
more the Church considers itself extraordinary,
the more Christians separate themselves from ordinary reality. The more the
Church turns inward, the less we go out to seek and help those who suffer. We
even blame them for their suffering. Spiritually, we reduce Jesus to personal savior.
He’s no longer our Lord who leads us into the world’s ordinary brokenness and
hurt with words of kindness and deeds of love.
“Do not think that love, in order
to be genuine, has to be extraordinary,” said Mother Teresa. “What we need is
to love without getting tired. Be faithful in small things because it is in
them that [our] strength lies.”1
When reflecting on his own life,
Frederick Buechner began to experience God’s presence in ordinary places he
never thought to look. And he summed up his understanding of Christian practice
this way: “Listen to your life. See
it for the fathomless mystery that it is. In the boredom and pain of it no less
than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way to the holy
and hidden heart of it because in the last analysis all moments are key
moments, and life itself is grace.”2
On the table before us is grape
juice from a grocery store, and bread baked in someone’s home this morning.
Now, those gifts sit in shiny silver trays that date back to the mid-1800’s.
Such heirlooms are more expensive and needy than they ought to be when offering
what Jesus offers in his ordinary, human hands. That means we have to
distinguish between the gift and the giftwrap we put around it. The gift feeds
us, and it sends us out to recognize the presence of holiness and grace in the
ordinariness of life, and to share the redeeming love of the risen Jesus.
So, come to the table. And come
what may, let’s keep moving.
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