What Pastor Jon Preached on Sunday, February 5, 2012

Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany

Isaiah 40:21-31
Psalm 147:1-11, 20c
1 Corinthians 9:16-23
1 Corinthians 9:16-19, 22-23
Mark 1:29-39

As soon as [Jesus and his disciples] left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.That evening, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. And the whole city was gathered around the door. And 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. In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. And Simon and his companions hunted for him. When they found him, they said to him, “Everyone is searching for you.” He 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.” And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.

Last fall several youth and parents from United Lutheran went to Lake View neighborhood to do a Night Walk with an organization called the Night Ministry. Before we broke out into teams to actually walk on the street and simulate what it would be like to be homeless, a Night Ministry staff person talked with us about what it means to be without a home. As part of this discussion, we were asked to say all the benefits that come with having a home. About 15 minutes later, there was a list of at least 50 things on the white board…and I’m sure we could have come up with 50 more. Some of the benefits were bigger things, like safety, protection, a place to cook food, eat, and hang out with family and friends, like many of us will do to watch the Super Bowl this afternoon. Some of the benefits were more hidden things that we take for granted: a mailing address, an internet connection, light to see and do things at night, a place to grow plants and vegetables. Put together, these all combine to give the over-arching benefit of a place that gives us identity. It was an eye-opening moment for us to see with new eyes all these seen and unseen privileges that come with living in a home.

That over-arching home benefit of receiving identity—a sense of self-worth, a sense of groundedness—is something that we may have come to see with deeper appreciation in recent years. Since the economic collapse of 2008, thousands upon thousands of homes in the U.S. have been foreclosed on. Many have found themselves without a job, without steady income, and without the resources to pay their mortgage. Even more than the economic impact this has had on these homeowners who had to walk away from their homes was the devastation of no longer having that identity, self-worth and stability that comes from living in a home. Not only did these people have to leave the place that gave them identity...they had to leave the whole web of relationships that surrounded their home—neighbors, their children's classmates, friends, their church community and nearby family members. Being torn apart from their homes meant rebuilding the whole foundation of their social lives...and rebuilding their connection to a new community.

It’s that kind of loss of connection that Jesus sought out immediately after his first act of public ministry in the Capernaum temple. If you’ll remember last week’s reading from Mark’s Gospel, Jesus healed an unclean, demon-possessed man right there in the temple—the very place where this man's uncleanliness had forbid him to enter. Now Jesus continues his campaign of renewal, his campaign of bringing the kingdom of God near to us, by going to one of the most ordinary places in our daily lives: our home.

Jesus did not begin his ministry by bringing his message of the good news of God’s renewal of God’s kingdom come near to the places of power in Israel. Jesus did not go right away to a city, where the richest and most politically powerful people and institutions in Israel were. Jesus went directly into a common setting, where everyday people lived everyday lives doing everyday kinds of work, in everyday kinds of homes. Jesus shows up in a home, a place that gave people as much an identity and connection to community as it does today.

But even moreso than blessing the structure of the home itself with his presence, by coming into a home so early in his ministry, Jesus gave his blessing to the relationships, the self-worth, and the grounded connection to the family and community that a home gives us.

When Jesus enter the home of Jesus' disciple Simon Peter, however, the health of the relationships there are being torn apart. His mother-in-law’s fever threatened to isolate her from the relationships in her home and community that were the lifeblood of her existence. Without her health, she could not function in the role that gave her an identity of who she was. Without her health, she was unclean, unacceptable and isolated to the rest of her community—a community that she had already been distanced from after her husband's death widowed her.

Jesus comes into this place and extends the reaches of his kingdom to this relationally void setting. Not only does he come there and heal this woman, he restores her calling within her home life. Immediately after her healing she builds on the relationship that has healed her, and begins to serve and minister to Jesus and his companions.

Last week, we heard that Jesus’ healing in the temple turned sacred spaces like this church into spaces where God turns us from unclean into acceptable in God's sight. Today, Jesus turns the ordinary space of homes like ours into spaces where God connects us to one another and to Jesus’ kingdom of restored relationship. Last week’s Gospel blessed us to re-imagine this place as a place where we can find healing. This week's Gospel blesses us to re-imagine the home as a setting where Jesus also longs to set up his kingdom in our lives. His presence there does not necessarily promise to fix whatever may try and isolate us from relationship to our community...but his is a presence that puts us in touch with his power that casts out the power that sickness, disease and death try to wield to keep Jesus and his kingdom at bay. This week Jesus sets up his kingdom in the most ordinary of places, to show that his transformation can turn any place—even a place of sickness—into a place of healing, a home and a community.

What could Jesus’ kingdom look like in the homes we live in? How can we take Jesus’ power over what keeps us from others into our homes? In what ways can Jesus' healing presence turn our homes into places of community and wholeness, just like it was for this widowed relative of Jesus’ disciple? Maybe Jesus' kingdom coming to our homes looks like a place where relationships with each other are surrounded and bathed by daily prayer, a practice that bathes us in closer relationship with God and one another. Even Jesus himself needed prayer, like when he goes alone to pray after healing his disciples' relative. Maybe Jesus' kingdom coming into our homes looks like a place where family bonds run deeper than blood, where strangers are welcomed as family, just like the Bread Breakers ministry at ULC that mixes up different people into homes for meals and fellowship. Maybe Jesus' kingdom coming into our homes looks like a place where Jesus’ Lordship dismantles our attempts to live for ourselves, and empowers us to instead serve one another. Maybe it looks like a place where no sickness, disease, stigma or fear keeps the compassion of others from coming in. Maybe it looks like a place where eyes are kept open for Jesus' healing to break in and mend the cracks that are bound to come between anyone living under the same roof.

Homes may be something that we take for granted. But Jesus’ second miracle in Mark shows his power equipping us to share his healing even in such an intimate and private setting as a home. Even there, being present to one another in our weakness—which is the definition of healing—becomes not just something Jesus gives us, but something Jesus gives us the power to be for each other.

Christian memoirist Sara Miles writes that Jesus’ healing “shows us how to enter into a way of life in which the broken and sick pieces are held in love, and given meaning…in which strangers literally touch each other, and [in] doing so make a community spacious enough for everyone…in which the deepest desires of our hearts draw us to health…” (Jesus Freak, 105) May each and every one of us discover Jesus’ healing way of life not just in this sacred space, but also in the ordinary that Jesus makes sacred through his healing presence that creates his kingdom in our homes.

Amen.