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Pentecost 3
June 29, 2003
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27
Psalm 130
2 Corinthians 8:7-15
Mark 5:21-43
Sorrow knows no season. Here on the Sunday before the Fourth of July, we cry out of the depth for Saul and Jonathan, for the Christians in Jerusalem, for Jairus’ daughter and a chronically ill woman. But, we don’t want to do this. Oh, we might sprinkle references to painful reality in our worship service, but nothing to take away the impression that we are like a beer commercial -- all young, healthy and having a great time. We want people to come back next Sunday, after all. If we dwell on the oppression of the Christians in Jerusalem, we might be labeled “bleeding heart liberals.” If we pause at the side of Timothy McVey’s father on Father’s Day, we might appear soft on crime. If we identify with people who are sick day after day -- even for twelve years -- we might seem to belie the healing power of Christ. To mourn the death of a loved one is right out -- not in public worship, not even at funerals. So, where do people go with their grief, with their loss and with their bodies of death? To a beer commercial? To a beer?
David is about to experience the loneliness at the top. He is king without rival, but he laments the death of his rival. There was shade for him beneath the shield of Saul even when it turned against him. Now there is nothing but the glare of the sun, the glare of the expectations of a million citizens. “How the mighty have fallen,” and one day he will fall too.
“I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan; greatly beloved were you to me; your love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.” (1 Samuel 1:26) There is so much human anguish beneath this sentence, I dare not look beneath. “Passing the love of women!?” What does one do with such a love, doomed as David’s was.
Shame on you, Paul, for suggesting that my bounty today might be an obligation to respond to my brother’s poverty! I got this money the hard way. I’m going to have some fun. I’ve earned it. Community is only important as the setting for enterprise. The very idea that resources ought to flow to the point of human need, and to say it so close to a national holiday -- where is your devotion to God and Country?
“He said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.’" (Mark 5:34) Was it only after twelve years of illness that she had faith, or was Jesus referring to her faith over the twelve years? Jesus says that her faith has made her well, but then adds his blessing “be healed of your disease.” Is this just poetic parallelism, or is more implied? Is there a distinction between “well” and “healed”? Her faith has made her well. Jesus’ power has healed her. Can one be well and not healed?
If you are not Jairus, and your child has died . . . If you called upon Jesus day and night both before and after the child’s death, what does the story of Jairus say to you? What does the preacher’s rush to celebrate the faith of Jairus and the power of Jesus elicit in you? The world rushes to instant gratification. Is there instant gratification in Jesus? If there were -- if we could convince the world that there were, we could have the world; but what does it profit a person to gain the whole world at the cost of his own soul? There was instant gratification for Jairus in the context of this story, but we don’t know how long the girl lived beyond that day. We don’t know if her life was joyous or tragic. This isn’t a story about a family that got lucky. This is a story confessing Jesus as the Lord of life. It is Jairus’ relation to God in Jesus, it is the daughter’s relation to God in Jesus, it is our relation to God in Jesus that is crucial here. I was looking for the return of my child when I called upon the name of Jesus, and what I got was Jesus. Am I disappointed?
"Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD. Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications! . . . I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning.” (Psalm 130: 1-2, 5-6)
Roland McGregor, Pastor
Asbury United Methodist Church, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA
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