Gathering Crowds

Mark 1:40-45

Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany ~ February 15, 2009

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ. Did you ever have one of these days? You are ready to go in the morning, you have your tasks in mind that you want to accomplish and you get set to begin, but you are interrupted. A co-worker comes in and wants to talk about their latest project. Then the phone rings and you spend a half-hour with a client. After getting off the phone you notice an important email that you read and answer and while you are at it you clear out the rest of the unanswered emails waiting for a reply. Now it is time for your scheduled lunch with your boss. When you get back you have three phone messages. After returning these calls you sit down to your to-do list and realize that with only an hour left there is not much you can get done, and you are tired already. So, what happened to your day and the plans you had set? Ever have one of those days?

In our text today from Mark chapter 1 I get the feeling that Jesus is having one of those days. In the first chapter of Mark's Gospel we see Jesus fame growing fast and the crowds with it. We go from spreading through a town to Jesus “getting away” to Him having to find a new venue for the increasing size of His following. But is this what Jesus wants, or is seeking – a larger crowd? I think there is a bigger goal in mind for Jesus and the fear in Mark chapter 1 is that maybe this bigger goal is going to be drown-out by the urgency of the crowd and their needs.

But we begin this text with another miracle of Jesus. A man with leprosy approaches Jesus and asked to be healed. That is what the crowds have been attracted to Jesus and have been following Him – they want to be healed and witness the miracles.

This is a great risk for the man and for Jesus. In the time of Jesus leprosy would be like AIDS or Ebola today, something people run away from and shun people for having. And for some good reasons. True leprosy is contagious and a horrible disease. To be fearful was not unwarranted. So, to protect communities people suspected of having leprosy were driven out and asked to remain in separate camps from the general population. Sometimes people with leprosy would form their own communities but often people would be left alone to fend for themselves. And without “modern medicine” to diagnose true leprosy, anyone with a skin affliction often would be asked to leave a community.

So, we have this man approaching Jesus looking for a way to end his suffering and maybe return to his community. He asks Jesus to heal him. And Jesus does. Now imagine this, a man with leprosy, who is an outcast, who probably has had not physical contact with the world, for maybe a long time, come to Jesus, and what does Jesus do? Mark makes it very clear – He touches him! If there was a crowd with Jesus I can imagine the gasps of horror as Jesus touches some one who is considered “unclean” in Jewish society. But Jesus touches him and heals him! I can imagine that touch was worth it's wait in gold; to actually have another human being make physical contact. And not only that, he is healed!

Now Jesus tells the man two things: 1) Don't tell anyone and 2) Go show yourself to the priest and make the necessary sacrifice according to the law of Moses. I will come back to the first, so the second command. Why does this man have to go to the priest? Well, again, in an effort to protect society from leprosy but to also allow for a person to come back the Law of Moses states that if someones illness goes away they will need to go to the priest to be deemed “clean” and able to return to society. Without modern medicine and doctors like today, the priest played a similar role in deeming a person healed or “clean” and able to return to the community. So Jesus is asking this man to restore his status in society, to be deemed clean, through the proper channels of authority.

But the man doesn't follow this or the other command of Jesus, to not speak about his healing. The man jeopardizes his chance to return to his community and goes out telling people about the miracle Jesus performed. And now Jesus is driven out of the towns to desolate places because the crowds are so large – crowds expecting miracles!

So, back to the first command of Jesus to this man, “Don't tell anyone”. Why this command? This seems strange. Doesn't Jesus want people to know? I believe what is happening here and why Jesus warns this man to not tell everyone is what I talked about at the beginning of my message – the crowds are becoming distracted from the real reason Jesus came into the world – to be the world's Savior.

Now, don't get me wrong here – the miracles are not bad, or unwarranted. Jesus does have compassion on the man and all others that He heals. But you could say the miracles are just band aids to a much bigger problem. And the crowds are only wanting the band aid and not looking at the bigger picture.

You see the diseases, the demons, the other things that Jesus is performing miracles to make right are only symptoms of a much bigger problem. That is the problem of sin! Sin is the root cause of all that is wrong in the world. All diseases, troubles, demons, wars, conflicts, etc all are signs of the deeper problem sin. And what is sin? It is our willful rejection of all that God has done. It is to disobey God's commands and to break our relationship with Him. It is to stain our whole existence because we didn't want to follow God's good and perfect way. And sin has created horrible consequences in this world. And the greatest is death. The Bible is clear – the wages of sin is death. Sin has destroyed us. Sin has broken our relationship with God. Sin is at the heart of our awful condition.

And this is why Jesus came – to destroy the power of sin in our lives, in the world. Jesus' primary mission is to break the bondage of sin and restore a right relationship with God. While miracles, healing, etc are good, they are secondary to the task of redemption of the whole world. And Jesus fear at this point is that the crowds aren't getting it and can become a distraction to the primary task – redemption. The crowds have come to see a side-show healer. They have come for the quick-fix and the easy way out of the symptoms of sin. Jesus has come to take the narrow road to the cross, to take all of our sins on himself, to die and pay the penalty for our sins, and then rise again to restore our relationship with God. That is the primary thing of Jesus in in Mark chapter 1 we already see Jesus struggling to lead people onto the narrow path and follow Him, not because of the miracles, but because He is the very Son of God. It will require repentance on our part. We are called to take account of our deep down struggle of sin. To see past the symptoms of life that distract us from the real problem – sin. To fall to our knees before God and cry out, “God be merciful to me, a poor sinful being!” And then to hear the sweet words of Jesus, and take them to heart, “Your sins are forgiven!”

What is distracting you from seeing Jesus? What problems in this world have taken priority instead of seeing the real problem, our sinful condition? How are you focusing on Jesus – the only one who can free you from sin, death and the power of the devil. Not with band-aid fixes but reaching deep down into our souls and making us clean through and through. May the distractions of life fall away as we bring our very lives to Jesus to be made whole again.

Amen.

Pastor Michael Borgstede

Associate Pastor

Mount Olive Lutheran Church, Aurora, CO

mtoliveluth.org