As I read over the rest of chapter one, it occurred to me that the author was trying to set a tone. He was wanting to make a point, but didn't want to just come out and say it. Perhaps the point was so well ingrained in his own experience that he didn't feel the need to articulate it. We will probably never know.
But two big issues seem to be setting up for a showdown in this story.
First was his teaching. We don't really know what the author meant by "teaching with authority" It could be any number of things. Perhaps he spoke with certainty. We know from our own experiences that a group can get bogged down over the details and miss the big picture. I suspect he spoke to core truths and the application of those truths in a such a way that the people in the synagogue and the river's edge all felt that God was speaking to them. It is very refreshing, and rare when a preacher can stick to the core truth and explain it in a way that it can applied. Jesus must have had a great deal of that simplistic theology that we all crave.
Secondly, he seems to have an axe to grind with the demons. Three times in the first chapter it is either told in a direct way or mentioned that he was casting out demons. Casting to them to where I don't know, but they were being dealt with in a manner that apparently the people had not seen before.
Here is my point. The teaching of Jesus was not a script for sin-management, it was a battle cry to a spiritual war. Jesus fully understood that his mission would come into conflict with the one-who-destroys. Do you wonder why it says that Jesus was "indignant" that the leper came to him? It was because the leper represented the decay of the spiritual forces on the other side.
The early teaching of Jesus is the opening salvo from the side of righteousness that had been silent for a very long time.
God, help us see the conflict for what it is, good vs. evil, spiritual vs. temporal. Open our eyes and lead us into the fray.
Don
My thoughts from Mark 1:21-28. It appears you are covering more than that this week. Anyway...
ReplyDeleteWhat would happen - or rather, what does happen - when Jesus shows up in our midst? Are we "astonished" by his teaching? Or, are do we question his motives and purpose, and perceive him as a threat to our agenda and status quo?
The religious leaders and teachers of Jesus' day were very learned men. They knew - or at least they THOUGHT they knew - virtually everything that could be known about God, and they presumed to be his sanctioned representatives on earth. Yet, when Jesus spoke to (taught) the people, he engendered a level of respect among the common folk not afforded to their experts. The confidence, the certainty, the humble matter-of-factness of his communication framed the character and presence and purpose of God in the world as STORY-in-process - "THIS IS what IS happening, THIS IS what God IS doing. THIS IS who God is. THIS IS what He hopes FOR you. There was no arrogance, no equivocation, no uncertainty.
Why is it that beings (unclean spirits) who were deliberately opposed to God recognized Jesus Presence and Authority, while those who purported to be God's representatives failed to recognize Him? They deliberated to silence, segregate, and slay him.
When we become deeply invested - even when our deep investment is deeply sincere - in faulty theology and doctrine, the exposure of the faultiness of our theology and our doctrine, and the fear of (or reality of) the exposure of ourselves as mistaken or foolish, is a convulsing event. It is an internal earthquake. It is a (public?) crucifixion. It is the death of the persona we have constructed to make ourselves appear acceptable, or even admirable, to others. When Jesus shows up, that which we have constructed may be exposed as something that will be burned up (1Cor 3).
Jeff
ReplyDeletethere is a little more here this week, but class does not meet this Sunday due to some big announcement. We will be in Amarillo, which by the way has taken up all my meditation and prayer time.
I like your points about our grasping of faulty theology. I think it was Jesus' ability to bring the message close and clear.
Don