A
Sermon Based Upon Mark 5: 1-20
By Rev.
Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin.
Flat
Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership
Second Sunday After Christmas, January 3rd,
2016
“They
came to Jesus and saw the demoniac sitting there, clothed and in his right
mind….and they were afraid ---Mark 5: 15
“I
became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity.” ― Edgar Allan Poe
When we
experience an ‘incredible’ moment in life, we just can't wait to tell about
it. This is what makes it news. It is exactly this kind of incredible,
unbelievable, remarkable news that sells newspapers, creates websites, makes
movies or writes books. Consider this: What's the first thing people do when they
leave political office? They write a
book? What happens after something
unbelievable happens? They get a movie
deal. Even the woman who helped those
convicts escape in New York prison, though she will go to prison, she’ll
probably get a book and movie deal.
Amazing
things do happen, bad and good.
Sometimes these things are real, other times they what we first
imagined. Abraham Lincoln once said, “You can fool some of the people all of the
time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the
people all of the time” (http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/27074.html). Remember that talking
dog or talking infant on the Internet last summer? The dog’s probably not really saying anything
but it sure sounded like it. The baby sounded
like she said “I love you”, but it wasn’t quite as obvious as the dog.
While
not all stories told or believed can be validated or proven, we do recognize a
‘good’ story when we hear one, don’t we?
I don’t mean a story like we are so accustomed to in the evening news,
but I mean an encouraging, positive, and redemptive one. In recent years, the evening news often concludes
with an uplifting story at then broadcast.
This kind of ‘good’ story doesn’t sell newspapers like bad news, but if
we had our choice, wouldn’t we like to hear more of them?
Today’s
Bible text from Mark gives us three incredible,
but good stories. Such positive, uplifting
stories are told about Jesus in all four of the gospels. In this message, I want us to think about
what makes these stories “good”? Could
you discern a good, uplifting, or redemptive story, when you hear one? What is it in ‘storyline’ of these stories that
makes still ‘good’ for us to hear? How
do we see truth in them for us?
The
first of these stories, the one which will be our primary focus in this message,
is about a demon possessed man who
was healed by Jesus. Some would say this
story ought to be absolutely meaningless
to our modern minds, since nothing like this happens today. But I hope that before this message is over
you will at least realize that it is exactly the ‘strangeness’ of stories that
make them both good and true. But to
discover this, since this story is over 2,000 years old, fitting the times
then, but not directly fitting our own times, we will have to ‘discern’ the basic storyline before we
can find truth in them for ourselves.
STORYLINES OF HURT AND PAIN
First,
we must observe that this 5th chapter of Mark has 3 miracle stories,
not just one. The first of these
‘miracle stories’ is about this poor fellow who ‘lives among the tombs’ and has many demons. Even though the demon speaks with one voice,
it says his name is “Legion” which
means he represents “many”
(5:9). How many? Well, in the ancient world, ‘legion’ was a military term, referring
to a few thousand soldiers. Why in the
world would the name of this demon be a whole army? Wouldn’t it have been story enough to say
this fellow had one demon?
The
story even gets weirder when all these demons are cast out of this one man
are sent into about ‘two thousand’
pigs that then commit suicide by jumping off a cliff into the sea. Jesus sure would be in trouble with animal control
today, wouldn’t he? I told you this
story’s ‘strange’! By the time we
finally get to the end of it, after this fellow is healed, the townspeople discover
this once-possessed man, now ‘in his
right mind’. We read that it is his
sanity, not his insanity that unnerves
everybody (5:15).
So,
it’s not enough just to call this story strange, but it’s a special kind of
strange that seems to have all kinds of little ‘hidden’ messages throughout. Is Mark only
trying to show us just how ‘strong’ Jesus is, or is there something else going
on? The ‘good news’ about Jesus’ amazing
power over evil is, of course, very much part of the storyline, but like the
70’s movie, The Exorcist, even when I
saw that head spinning around, you couldn’t fool me with that neck trick. Is this story only about the spiritual muscle
Jesus has, or is there something else?
Before
we try to answer this, let’s look at the other two miracles for some common
threads and similarities with this one. After
those demons have ‘pigged out’, we might say, the very next miracle is about
the healing of a woman with a 12-year hemorrhage. This miracle is ‘sandwiched’ right in the middle of another, third miracle, the
healing of a child, whom Jesus himself says was ‘sleeping’, but not ‘dead’ (5:39). It appears as if Mark is telling us, that Jesus
is a man of unforgettable ‘action’, as much as, he was a man of unforgettable words. Can you see a storyline taking shape?
Look
more deeply at this second story about a woman who is cured of a 12 year
disease only by ‘touching’ the ‘hem of
his garment’ (KJV, 5:27). Such healing ability would certainly be
incredible, being cured by touching the physicians coat, but what makes this
miracle even more interesting is that Jesus doesn’t know who touched him and
neither was she completely ‘healed of
her disease’ (5:34) in that moment.
This means that the story is as much
about this woman’s continued faith,
as it is about Jesus’ own power to instantly heal. Do you see how especially strange this is
getting?
Finally,
there is one more story that appears in this cluster. When Jesus finally arrives to bring healing
to this sick child, the people have come to this father and Jesus, reporting
quite frankly to him, “Your daughter is
dead” (5:35). “Don’t trouble the teacher any further,” they say (5:36). It's too late, they are implying, but Jesus looks
at the father, saying, “Do not fear,
only believe” (5:36). It’s as if
‘time’ means nothing.
Now, are
you ready for something even stranger?
When Jesus does arrive at the house, the people inside are already ‘weeping and wailing’ as if she is dead,
but again, Jesus says, “Why do you make
such a commotion….The child is not dead but sleeping (v. 39).” Hearing his words, Mark tells us that they
all immediately stop their ‘weeping and
wailing’ and start laughing. We’d
laugh too, wouldn’t we? But because they
laughed Jesus tells them all to leave the room. Jesus only allows only the parents and a select
few to come near the child’s bed side.
There, Jesus takes the child by the hand and gently says, “Little
girl, get up!” “Talitha cum” (v.
41). This phrase was so originally captivating
that it’s one of the few words left it in the original Aramaic language because
with this word, the little girl immediately gets up and begins to walk about. But
now, also get this, we are also told that this ‘little girl’ is 12 years old. She is exactly the same age as the time
illness as the woman with the hemorrhage?
Is this just a coincidence, or are there even more hidden messages going
on? This ‘strangeness’ gets enlarged as Jesus also says ‘no one should know this” (5:43).
In all
three of these very ‘strange’ stories, there is more going on ‘meets the
eye’. We’ll get to that, but what we
should already see is a common thread in these stories is also becoming very obvious: The man was possessed by an evil destructive power that took over his mind so
that no one would go near him. The woman was possessed a disease that made her not only sick for 12 years, so
that she was also ritually unclean, and not allowed to be around anyone. Finally, the little girl, was only 12 when
she also loses her ‘right’ to life and is snatched away beyond all power to
help or heal. Perhaps you can begin
to ‘feel’ the storyline being told. There is so much human pain, hurt, and agony
going on here, and besides that, each of them are forgotten, unnoticed, ‘untouchables’
in the world. But while they were unknowns
to the larger world, but they were not
unknowns to God.
How do
these stories intersect with the ‘pain’ and hurt of your life? If you haven’t had the kind of pain which helps
you feel the pain in these stories,
you might think you’re lucky and fortunate, but it also means you may not be
able to feel for others. If you can
relate to the pain in these stories, or you still have hurt and pain that you
are dealing with, there may be part of these stories that bothers you because the
story is so foreign to what you have known.
However these stories intersect your life right now, they are very
human, touching, tragic stories of hurt and pain that sometime, somehow,
somewhere, and some way, we all will come to know and share.
I’ll
never forget one of the first times I ever watch a person lose their ‘right
mind’, as happened to this man who was living among tombs. The wife of a man with Alzheimer’s requested
that I visit her husband, as I did monthly for almost a year. I watched at his mind and health slowly
declined. What made it most difficult
was that before his health declined, his mind left. He became violent. Angry.
The first time I visited him, all the furniture was in the room. Then with each visit, more and more furniture
was taken out, in fear that he might hurt himself, or someone. The last time I saw him, there was nothing
left in his room but a mattress lying in the middle of the floor, with him
lying on it. I will never forget the
despair and darkness of that room. He
still had strength, but he had no mind.
They never would let me in again after that.
Of
course, the man in this gospel story doesn’t have Alzheimers, but he is
mentally ill in a way so that his mind was self-destructive. If you ever been in a mental institution
you’ve seen ‘minds’ like his, but there is even something more sinister than a
mental illness going on too. The clue
we are given is in the demon’s name, “Legion”.
Can you imagine the mental pressure, the deepening darkness, and
devastating despair being placed upon a people who had just watched their own country
overrun by a “legion” of Roman soldiers?
This is exactly the background behind the writing of Mark’s gospel which
was written around the time of the Fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. There is something physical and spiritual taking
place, which is also very social, political and public. This story of demon possession from Jesus’ earthly especially connected with a
people who were surrounded by the dark powers, which had taken human form in
ways that overpowered them, brought them great pain so that they lived in
constant fear of losing their own ‘right’ minds or maybe also their lives.
The
storyline of oppressive dark forces beyond human control, may sound strange to
some of us, but maybe not. Have you ever
heard of Isis oppressing its citizens by chopping off arms and legs of those
who will not bow to them? Have ever
heard of refugees fleeing for their lives, because they know that ‘home’ now means
certain death? Or have you ever had
events in your own life, take from control of you, as sickness, disease, fear
or any negative situation can do? We’ve all heard of “sundowners syndrome”,
where the sick or elderly suffer the mental anguish with a fear of the coming
night. This kind of ‘demonic’ darkness
still challenges even the ‘strongest’ minds.
It’s a ‘storyline’ that remains as close as negative possibilities of
the very next moment. Think about it too
much, and we could lose it too.
A STORYLINE OF HOPE AND HEALING
The
story doesn’t stop with a person facing demonic powers, someone facing a debilitating
disease or even the devastation of death that can still strike the young, but
the storyline turns to a hope and healing, because this ‘teacher’ and ‘healer’ goes
where others will not.
For you
see, in these stories, while it is unmistakable that Jesus a healer, it is the
‘kind’ of healer he is should still astound us.
Jesus is the healer who is willing to face the most oppressive powers in human life. Jesus is the healer who will value the mind of one person over the worldly
monetary profits of big business which still thrives at the expense of others. Jesus is the healer who takes his healing art, not mostly to the wealthy, privileged and
advantaged, but Jesus takes his ministry straight to the poorest, the disfranchised
and to the most disadvantaged. He not
only allows them to touch him, but he reaches out to touch them. Jesus is the healer who challenges all the
darkness, especially when it threatens those who haven’t had a chance. Thus,
it is not just that Jesus heals, but it is also how and who Jesus heals
that amazes most.
Atul Gawande, a Harvard trained
medical doctor turned writer, has written an amazing book about how medical
care still has much to learn, and perhaps relearn, about bringing hope and
quality of life, even to people who can’t be cured. Gawande claims that the great problem with
medicine today is that it is trying to cure everyone, or trying to make money
on trying to, when it knows that everyone can’t be cured. Gawande
suggests that best way to practice medicine is not just to see a ‘cure’, but to
always to care and to promote quality
as much or more than quantity
of life. To illustrate this, he tells
an interesting story of an old man from India, who was in his 90’s who still
got on his horse every day to ride and inspect his 200 acre farm. He had fallen off his horse and injured
himself, so the doctors recommended that stop riding his horse. The family, knowing that he would die sooner
from this prescription, decided to go against the doctor’s order and they went
out to buy their father a smaller horse, so he was less likely to fall, but
could continue his life.
The
point of Gawande’s story is that quality of life is just as important, if not
more important than quantity. Which do
you think Jesus was promoting when he healed this demon possessed, this chronic
illness, or even when he raised this little girl? Do you think Jesus was only healing for the
sake of quantity, or also quality? If
you wondering listen to Jesus himself, who said: “Don’t think too hard about what
you eat, drink, or what you wear in life, but seek God’s kingdom first of
all. All those things people often go
after are secondary to what will give your life its value and worth.” (My
condensing of Matthew 6: 31-33).
So what
does Jesus care about? Of course, he
cares about us, but we must realize that these wonderful stories were not only
stories about God’s ‘deeds of power’ in Jesus Christ, but they were also
‘signs’ of God’s coming kingdom where Jesus will be the final ruling Lord and
King. Even though Jesus did cast out
these 2,000 demons, he did not stop them from coming back? Even though this woman was healed of her
this disease, chronic and acute diseases like hers still stalk and haunt. And even though this little girl awoke from
her sleep and got to grow up, she would to have died again another day.
What
I’m trying to say is that when you make these ‘miracle’ stories only about the
miracles themselves, they remain unbelievable to most people. They remain stories that can’t be proven,
can’t be relived, nor can be used as any guarantee that we will keep our own
health and life. I would even suggest
further, that these stories, and the hope for healing in them, has much less to
do with what God once did than they
have to do with what we can do, with God’s help and in Jesus’ name, by
dispersing love, grace, and mercy into the lives of those who still suffer from
demon-like mental, physical and spiritual diseases that all end in death.
So, the
question we should put to these stories of healing is not simply, why doesn’t
God still heal like this today, but the real question is: what kind of healing power is still released by those care and believe. Do
faith and love still have something to do with healing and good health? Was this healing of Jesus gave, only limited
to the few he could physically touch, or is this healing ministry of Jesus only
limited by those who will refuse to participate in this story of bringing healing
and hope into the world?
THE POWER OF GOD IN JESUS CHRIST
What’s
most strange about all these all of these ‘healing’ stories in the gospels, are
that they were never intended to be told as if they were ever just about the
people who were healed, nor were they ever just about the power that healed
them. These stories are about the
‘power of God’ that is available in the ‘faith’ of all or any who would trust and
believe. They are also much more about this
Jesus who gives the healing, than they are ever about the healings, the
miracles, or the power all by itself.
It is the power that comes through Jesus Christ that heals, and these
‘healings’ are all deeds of power that are signs of the greatest hope for
healing: the abiding presence of God’s love, now revealed in Jesus Christ.
Rodney
Stark tells the story, I’ve told before, but now must repeat again. Dr. Stark is a sociologist who studied the
rise of Christianity in the Roman world, even against all odds that were very
much against it. How did this faith that
was once only a minority of Jews in northern Palestine, become the majority
faith an empire? Stark says that
historical and sociological research thus far, has revealed one major growth
spurt in the beginning history of the church.
That growth spurt came, strangely enough, at a time when many more
people were dying from disease, than being heal of it. The growth of the church came at a time when
unknown plagues were stealing the lives of multitudes, which even caused
trained physicians to run for it, and governments to close their doors, and any
others trained in the art of healing and care to avoid contact for fear of
their own lives.
It was
during this great moment of confusion, fear, and distress and death, that
Christians and Churches, who were trained in nothing but their ‘faith’ in Jesus
Christ, walked straight into the homes of those multitudes of dying people,
left all alone with no one to care for them---it was the care, love, faith and
hope that was given by them, only in the ‘name of Jesus Christ’ that gave the
church promise. Even though many, if not
most of those people died of that plague, and even the plague took some Christians
with them, it was the hope and promise of ‘life’ in Jesus Christ that gave
‘life’ promise to the church.
Do you
know why this kind of storyline matters?
This is not just a storyline of miracles for the sake of miracles, but
to rightly discern the story is to realize that these healing miracles all
point to the an even greater hope of eternal life, the greatest healing miracle
of all?
Do you discern
this great miracle of healing and hope in these stories? If you can, then the power of Jesus Christ
is not just a memory of a miracle worker in the past, nor did Jesus really come
just give us physical miracles that had temporary impact. Jesus is the miracle-worker who came to point
to a ‘miracle’ that no other healer or health care provider could ever give,
nor dare ever promise. This is the great
miracle of ‘eternal life’.
If ‘eternal
life’ is not the miracle that all these other miracles were about, then, there's
nothing to these stories, because they then become only faint memories once remembered.
But if there is more---more which can still be known to us by faith, by
hope, and through love--- then the
greatest part of ‘discerning’ this part of the story is still a living hope in
us. It is a living hope that can bring
the greatest miracle of healing, because in these stories of healing, we can ‘discern’
a hope of healing that never ends.
Now, that’s a good story, if I ever heard one! Amen
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