Scripture: Mark 1:21-28
When I started working on this sermon, I thought it was going to be about authority and healing, two themes from the scripture reading this morning. I realized, however, about 1/3 of the way into the writing, as I was struggling with the question of authority, that I wasn’t going to get to say everything I wanted to say or needed to say about authority, much less say anything about healing, which I knew also was a theme that deserved some time and thought. So…I’m petitioning for a change in the sermon title. The new title is—I guess I’m not petitioning, I’m announcing—the new title is “Some Non-authoritative Words on Authority”. Healing will have to wait for next week.
The passage from Mark is the gospel lectionary reading for today. As you may know the lectionary is a set of readings for each Sunday taken from different parts of the Bible that are recommended for use in a wide range of Christian churches. Some preachers follow the lectionary consistently for their preaching. There are several different Sunday School curricula based on the lectionary, including the one we use. Many Bible study groups use the lectionary to focus their study of the Bible, including our own Sojourners Bible study that is led by Lee Walters and that meets here at 10:00 on Tuesdays.
When I decided for no very profound reason to preach on the lectionary gospel reading this week, I decided that although I had some thoughts percolating in my mind, I would benefit from going to our Bible study and hearing what other people had to say about the passage. I did. That is, I went, and I benefited. So I want to begin by acknowledging my debt to the discussion in the Bible study that left me in a different place at the end from where I had been before. But of course I also need to say that they are not to blame for whatever misguided, wrong-headed, un-Christian remarks I may make in the next few minutes.
Let’s begin with authority. That’s the word that jumps out at me immediately when I read this passage. As I recall, when Lee asked the Bible study group what jumped out at them, the answer of several people at least was “authority”. But of course this may say more about us than it does about Jesus or about this passage in the Bible. It may be that we tend to be “hung up” on authority, and so of course the word will stand out for us. It may be that we particularly at Sojourners more than other people tend to be “hung up” on authority. We may be in general a rebellious lot around here. I’ve had that thought cross my mind on more than one occasion in the time I’ve been here, and I usually think such things smilingly and with thanksgiving. By and large I think it’s a good thing. We’re maybe here, partly, some of us, because we have certain issues with certain kinds of authority anyway, and so when we encounter the word in scripture, it might well cause us to sit up and take notice.
In the Biblical context, in this passage anyway, it seems like authority is spoken of as a good thing. In our context, because we have experienced so much misuse and abuse of authority, we maybe don’t naturally assume that authority is a good thing. And frankly we don’t get much help from the scripture in sorting this out—what is a good kind of authority and what is not so good. I’ll assume that the description of Jesus speaking with authority does not mean that he spoke in an authoritarian manner, arrogantly, self-righteously, don’t you dare have an opinion of your own kind of way. But we are not given a lot of help as to what it does mean.
Still, it’s worth thinking about, this question of authority, not because it’s important to get to the bottom of what really happened at Capernaum that gave rise to the Biblical story, not because it matters very much at all what Jesus may have said or how he said it that would cause people to marvel at how he spoke as one with authority, not so that we can solve some Biblical puzzle, but because it is a matter of rather crucial importance, I would suggest, for all of us. At least I know it is for me. But let me circle around this question just a little more before I bring it home to myself by talking for a minute about a time more recent than Biblical times, though still not our own.
I am not particularly a student of Nazi Germany, not at all, but I think it is pretty well agreed that on the whole the record of the Christian church in Germany during those times is not one to be proud of. At its best, the church offered precious little resistance to Fascist ideology or practice. The exceptions to this were either a few courageous and heroic individuals, or they were people such as those who were involved in something called the confessing church movement, who believed they were compelled by their belief in God, by their belief in Jesus, by their Biblically grounded faith, believed that they were compelled to offer some kind of resistance to the claims of Nazism. They were able to resist not because it sounded like a good thing to do at the time, not because it would be fun to see what happened, not because it was an interesting intellectual exercise, but because this weight on their souls told them that they couldn’t just go along to get along; their faith compelled them to do something. They lived under a different authority capable of standing up to the totalitarian claims of the German government and leaving them no choice but to resist or betray everything they believed in.
In the aftermath of those times, the so-called liberal churches of Germany came in for some rather harsh criticism, which went something like this. If you had a kind of easy-going, tolerant take on Christianity, you were unlikely to have been in any kind of spiritual position to put up much of a fight against the Nazis. If God was a kind of remote concept who was the topic of some good discussions or some cozy source of comfort in times of distress, then God was not likely to be a power that would lead you out of your comfort zone even, and resisting the Nazis was definitely not in anyone’s comfort zone. If Jesus was someone to learn about and appreciate and admire, rather than someone you would risk everything to follow, then when the chips were down people were likely to choose an easier path, and generally they did, according to this point of view. If the Bible were just an ancient book with some pretty words and some interesting stories, interesting to some people, not so much to others, something we find some truth in—but then after all there are lots of other books with good stories and pretty words and some portions of truth—if the Bible is just a book pretty much like any other, then it is unlikely to lead anyone to go into exile or risk job or freedom or life.
That as I understand it was the criticism of the liberal churches in Germany, that they had become so easy going and tolerant in spirit, so willing to entertain all sorts of ideas, so willing to find truth in so many different places, so willing to adjust themselves to new realities, that there was no longer any foundation of faith that compelled them, or even gently guided or mildly encouraged them, to say no to the particular realities they found themselves in. Their faith was revealed to have not much substance. And remembering that example, many people over the last fifty or sixty years, have argued that this kind of open-minded, willing to consider everything and find truth in everything approach is not what the Christian faith should be all about or what the Christian church should be all about.
Now I say all this not because I want to revisit issues from another generation or because I want to give a lecture on theological developments over the last fifty years but because it helps me to put in focus the question of authority, the authority of Jesus if you will, the authority of the Bible, the authority of faith, and reminds me that the question of authority is real and important and personal, as real and important and personal as it was for Christians who, living in Germany in the 1930’s and ‘40’s had to decide what they were going to do. Granted that the times and the issues are different. Granted that we do not live in first century Palestine or in mid-20th century Germany. Granted that in our context the people who brandish the authority of the Bible or claim to live under the authority of Jesus often do so in the name of values that seem hurtful and unjust, values that I don’t subscribe to or recognize as Christian. When people who are not Jesus claim to speak with authority in the name of Jesus, it is very often not “good news” so far as I am concerned, and I have to say that people who speak in an authoritative manner tend to put me off, even if I happen to agree with what they’re saying. All that is true. And yet…
Much as I might be suspicious of different kinds of claims to authority, I also—and I do need to be reminded of this—I also at some point need to give up my suspicions. I need to recognize my legitimate need for authority. I need to recognize that some form of authority is food for my soul. It’s not because I want someone or something to tell me what to do, what to think, or what to believe. Not that kind of authority. But there are so many voices all around me that ask for my attention and indeed my allegiance, so many voices that bombard me with information and opinions, political leaders, radio and tv personalities, op ed writers, religious people, activists and advocates, advertising people who urge us not only to buy their product but to believe in their image of what the good life is, doctors, professors, movie makers, and more…all wanting us to pay attention to what they say.
But of course we can’t, can’t pay attention to all of them equally, and can’t tune out everyone, not for very long anyway, though that might seem like an attractive option sometimes. We are blessed if some few of those voices commend themselves to us as really, truly worth listening to. In any case, whenever we choose to pay attention to some voice or another, we grant it authority. We listen to it more than others, and as I say we need to have some voices that we feel are worth listening to more than others. If we don’t our lives would become a mess. We literally wouldn’t know which way to turn.
So we can hardly avoid granting authority to someone or something at this most basic level. And it occurs to me that if those things that command our attention, that ask us to sit up and listen and think and pray and act, if those voices that command our attention and in some way our allegiance have nothing to do with God or with Jesus or with the Bible, then it might be worthwhile asking ourselves what they do have to do with, what it is that we do grant authority to, because few people live without authority of some kind.
But beyond that, it’s a question of whether there is anything compelling in our lives—not just things we might do but things we must do, not just prayers that could be offered but prayers that need to be offered, not just thoughts that are interesting but beliefs that cannot be put aside. This is not a question of wagging fingers and suggesting that anyone who has not been able to say that God is in charge of their life or that Jesus is Lord and Savior and authority figure for them is a bad person, or a bad Christian. Too often when those kinds of words are used they suggest a kind of unthinking submission to dogma or a kind of literalism that reduces things to “the Bible says it, you do it” kind of mentality, and of course I don’t want you to think that I’m endorsing those kinds of attitudes.
But speaking for myself, I also know that the richness of my life, the meaning of my life, the lifeness of my life depend on there being inside me something that claims me, the seed of something that is compelling. And speaking for myself—I will say it this morning—Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord because he is the one my soul says I need to pay attention to, the one I keep coming back to and who keeps coming back to me, the one who plants the seed of something compelling inside me. It doesn’t mean that having said that all questions are answered. To the contrary, as I experience Jesus, he brings me all sorts of questions I probably wouldn’t ask without him, and so it is no wonder that a number of you kid me that I seem to offer more questions than answers. It is one of the things I believe Jesus does. It is his way of authority.
Saying Jesus is Lord is also not a claim to great faith or great anything. It simply says there is a seed of something compelling there, a calling if you will. It doesn’t mean I am necessarily very good at understanding what that calling is or that at any time I could put it very well into words. It doesn’t mean that I don’t resist it, prefer to do something more comfortable. It doesn’t mean that I will have the courage to follow it if put to the test, or if not put to the test for that matter. It doesn’t mean that I will make anything of it at all.
Still it is there, this calling, this seed of something compelling, and it has authority for me. I say Jesus is Lord because he is a figure who keeps stretching me, stretching every part of me—my mind, my understanding, my commitment, my faith, my experience of God, my sense of who I am. And he does call me to a life of resistance, not in the same way he called the German resisters to Nazism, but nevertheless resisting aspects of our society and culture in the name of a way of life that is more loving, a way of life that is more reverent, a way of life that is more “of God”. For all the questions he leaves me with, for all the uncertainties he leaves me to live with, Jesus does speak to me as one with authority. The words of scripture echo in my life. Amen.
Jim Bundy
January 29, 2006