Mark #11

WELCOME TO THE HOUSE OF PRAYER

When is a church not a church?

            In May of 2007 Sharon and I had the opportunity to visit the oldest church building in the world, Hagia Sophia. After Christianity was legalized by the Roman Emperor in the fourth century church leaders were free to construct buildings for worship. Hagia Sophia was dedicated in 360 in what was then called Constantinople, now Istanbul, Turkey. The surviving structure was built in 537.

            This great structure was a center of Christian worship for centuries. Then came the Islamic wave and in 1453, this grand building was converted to a mosque for the worship of Allah. Many frescos depicting Jesus and stories of the Bible were plastered over – which inadvertently ended up preserving the frescos. But Islamic worship dominated the building for five more centuries.

            After World War 1 Turkey became a secular nation – that is, they were not ruled by religious ideals – and Ataturk, the president of Turkey, declared that Hagia Sophia would now be a museum. Ataturk recognized the value of tourism.

            So a building dedicated the worship of Father, Son and Holy Spirit in the Christian tradition became a mosque for Islamic worship traditions, and then a museum. There is something ominous about this progression.

            Palm Sunday celebrates the Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem a week before his death. However, as Mark wrote his gospel he deliberately points to something that overshadows the coming of Jesus to the Holy City. The structure of chapter 11 as a unit aims like a bull’s eye to the temple and what Jesus has to say about that place of worship.

            What comes into question is God’s intention for his house of prayer versus the Jews understanding of the temple. The heart of this discussion today is this: What is God’s purpose for his house of prayer?

1. Jesus investigates the House of Prayer

We celebrate Palm Sunday each year and are familiar with palm branches, cries of “hosanna,” and all that goes with the celebration of King Jesus. Because of this we may have grown too familiar with the details so that they are blurred.

            One of the key features of this story is the revelation of Jesus’ authority. He is no longer downplaying his role as Messiah but comes out boldly as the king. Jesus deliberately uses an animal unfamiliar with being ridden in keeping with Zechariah 9:9. There is no more powerful symbol for claiming one’s rights to be the king than this prophecy.

            His authority is further impressed when he orders his disciples to claim the animal saying, “The Lord needs it and will send it back here shortly,” (11:3). He only uses this term “Lord” of himself two others times: 2:28 “Lord of the Sabbath” and 5:19 when he tells the demoniac to go home and tell what the Lord has done for him. There is power and authority in this carefully used term.

            Jesus is a man of singular authority. He spoke and set things in motion, a series of events insignificant in themselves but put together made a huge impact. Jesus entered Jerusalem on his own terms – he was not arrested or dragged there. He predicted his reception, that he would be rejected, betrayed, accused, condemned and killed in Jerusalem. But this is what had to happen and Jesus was not avoiding it in the least.

            That his authority is a key feature is balanced and supported by the final verses of the chapter. In verses 27-33 the chief priests, teachers of the law and elders approached him and asked, “By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you authority to do this?” (11:28). So we know that this is a major issue for what happens next.

            As Jesus enters Jerusalem, Triumphal Entry is more of a tragedy, at least for Jesus. This crowd that cuts branches and lays them out before him is a Galilean crowd – they are not from Jerusalem. They have seen the miracles and heard the teaching and are convinced that Jesus is the king. That this is a Galilean crowd is supported in Mark by the words, “Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted ‘Hosanna!” (11:9). It is a Jerusalem crowd that shouts “crucify,” but this Galilean crowd will have abandoned him by then. Luke 19:41 tells us that in the midst of this Triumphal Entry, Jesus wept with the knowledge that his own Holy City would reject him.

            The most important verse in this section is the last one: “Jesus entered Jerusalem and went into the temple courts. He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve,” (11:11). Jesus was making plans. He checked out the temple and knew what he would do the next day. His authority was about to be flexed.

2. Jesus enacts a parable about the House of Prayer

Jesus typically told parables. In this case he acts one out.

            This disturbing little story appears to be the one situation where Jesus indulges in a little selfishness. We might even say that he appears to abuse his power. Satan tries to tempt him earlier to make bread out of stones but he won’t do it. Now when he wants a little tree candy, Jesus throws a hissy and condemns the tree. Something’s not right here.

            Look at the details. It’s March or April, a time when fruit is not usually in season. The fig tree he spies is in full leaf, green and healthy, but there is no fruit on the tree. Mark even adds the very telling phrase, “…because it was not the season for figs,” (11:13).

            Jesus knew all this and cursed the tree anyways. “May no one ever eat fruit from you again,” (11:14). Why would Jesus alienate all the tree-huggers out there? Why would Mark include such a strange story in his gospel?

            As Jesus heads to the temple he sees this tree and he sees an opportunity to teach his disciples about the temple. The fig tree story is concluded later on with the temple event in the middle. That’s how we know there is a connection.

            Think of the Jewish mindset for a moment. All their feasts, all their festivals, all their traditions were a celebration of national pride, they were a flashpoint of patriotism. They were a glimmer of hope that one day Israel would be an independent sovereign nation again.

            At the center of this was the temple. It was the one place where they were in control. Caesar permitted them to practice their religion unhindered by Roman politics. In Ephesus the temple of Artemis housed statues of Roman gods. In Athens, Corinth and Alexandria and temples throughout the known Roman world, houses of worship were forced to display tokens of allegiance to Rome. But not in Jerusalem. The temple in Jerusalem had no statues or idols.[i]

            Jews did everything they could to keep their temple pure of Gentile defilement. They were very strict about their traditions and temple laws so as to preserve the most important feature of their worship.

            But Jesus’ parable of the fig tree was about the temple. And what we understand from this comparison is that the temple worship was fruitless. God’s purposes for his house of prayer were not being met. The end result would be a dead tree – lifeless. In chapter 13, Jesus predicts that the temple will be demolished. The pride of the Jews, their house of prayer, would be gone.

3. Jesus reacts to the misuse of the House of Prayer

What was Jesus’ issue with the temple? The night before he took a peek at what was going on. What did he see that bothered him so deeply?

            We have always heard that it was the money-changers and sellers of livestock that drove him to extreme action. How dare they do business in the place of worship? Mark does not say that this is the problem.

            Money-changers were actually a necessity. If you were a Jew coming from Philippi to worship at the temple in Jerusalem, chances are that you would have Greek currency. Greek money had images of gods and goddesses on them and images of any kind were forbidden in the temple (you shall have no graven images…). So you changed your money for temple money that allowed you to buy a dove or a sheep to sacrifice.

            There’s the problem, we cry. Who brings a sheep into the house of worship? Well, a Jew would. But you don’t want to bring your sheep on the boat from Greece; you bring money to buy a sheep in Jerusalem. Both the money-changers and the sellers were doing a good service. Mark does not say that this is the problem.

            But the question is: where are they conducting their business? When Jesus walked into the temple courts he saw throngs of people buying and selling. During the week of Passover, Jerusalem swelled to six times the usual population (Imagine 50,000 people attending Honey Festival). Josephus tells us that in Passover week one year, 255,000 lambs were bought and sacrificed in the temple.

            Where was this taking place? In the court of the Gentiles. Think of how loud and confusing this throng would be, and here the Gentiles were supposed to find God through quiet reflection and prayer. This is what has Jesus fired up. Jesus says, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers,” (11:17). The nations had no access to the temple. What Jesus found wrong with this temple was the absence of the peoples of the world. They were not there praying.

            The stalls for the animals, the tables for money-changing took up the space where foreigners were permitted in the temple. The nations were denied access to worship God. This goes against the Isaiah passage that Jesus quoted that God wanted his house to be a place of prayer for everyone.

            The Jeremiah passage (7:11) referred to that prophet’s frustration with the people in his day. It had nothing to do with sacrificial animals or inflated exchange rates. Jeremiah denounced those who were guilty of oppressing foreigners and widows and orphans, shedding innocent blood and following other gods. They made the temple their robber’s hideout. They would do all these terrible things throughout the week and then run to temple on the weekend – like it was some kind of safe haven where their sins were ignored. Or so they thought.

            That is not what the temple was for, and it is not what church is for either. Jesus implied that God was robbed of the worship of the nations and the nations were robbed of their place in the house of prayer. That’s why Jesus says the temple is a den of robbers.

            Who is being robbed of worship in our church today? Is the commotion and frantic activity robbing some of the opportunity for quiet reflection? Have we denied access to some who want to seek God? Is the divorced single mother welcome here? Is the mentally ill unemployed man allowed to pray with us? If a homosexual person wants to worship God in our midst, is he or she welcome? Who are the Gentiles we have labeled as unfit for our temple?

            Jesus stopped the activity dead that day. People were carrying things through the courts and Jesus stood in their way. “Where do you think you are going with that?” he might have said. Jesus did not simply stymie commercial activity; he brought the whole sacrificial system to a halt.

            It is no wonder that the chief priests and teachers of the law sought a way to kill Jesus. His words and actions were a formidable threat to their administration of the temple. Jesus was provoking the establishment and hastened his death.

4. Jesus teaches his disciples how to pray

We return to the fig tree now and Peter is shocked to find that the tree is withered. Consider how long it takes for a plant to die in the Klassen house and even this seems quick.

            Jesus takes the awful example of the temple and the fig tree as its symbol and contrasts them with how the house of prayer should operate. He teaches them to pray, in other words.

            There are three parts to this lesson on prayer:

a) Have faith in God – That’s the first thing Jesus says. This is not a “how to” on cursing fig trees; Jesus teaches the secret of how not to be cursed. The nation of Israel was cursed because it had no faith in God. It maintained an empty procedure of attendance and ritual and outward appearances of life, but was truly dead inside.

            Having faith in God is to seek God and to trust God and to believe that he knows what he is doing. Without faith we dry up inside as a church and as individuals because we have stopped connecting to the God of life. Without him we wither away and become fruitless.

b) Believe what you are praying; pray what you believe – Jesus says, “…if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him,” (11:23). Whatever you ask for will be yours. This is not a magic formula for doing amazing things. When James and John ask for special seats in the kingdom they are denied; when Jesus prays that the cup pass from him, he is denied.

            We are not to go around throwing mountains into the sea. Jesus is telling us to have faith in God when it is sometimes difficult to have faith at all. There are mountains which oppose our faith and make life difficult for us. There are obstacles to faith. These are the mountains we pray against.

c) Make forgiveness a prerequisite to prayer – The great hindrance to faith and prayer is pride, the pride which refuses to forgive. This is a mountain that can fill up your whole life. All you have before you is this immense mountain of pain and guilt and regret and it is blocking the life that God wants to give you. You have the power to remove that mountain when you stand and pray and forgive those who have offended you. Forgiveness opens the door of prayer and blessing.

Forty years after the death and resurrection of Jesus, Roman soldiers came and destroyed the temple, the house of prayer, just as Jesus predicted. Not one stone was left on another, except for one wall which is called the “wailing wall.”

            Jesus also promised that house of prayer would be rebuilt in three days. He was referring to his body. Paul picked up on this in his letter to the Corinthians when he said that our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 6:19) and that we are the temple of the living God (2 Cor 6:16). But I like Peter’s rendition for our purposes: “You also, like living stones are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ,” (1 Peter 2:5).

            From this verse and this sermon I have developed five questions as a summary of our reflections this morning:

What is the House of Prayer? The House of Prayer is a place where all are welcome to seek God through Jesus Christ.

Where is the House of Prayer? The House of Prayer is wherever the believers gather to worship God. As Jesus said, where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am with them. The House of Prayer, in other words, is not brick and mortar; it is you and I, the spiritual stones that house the Spirit of God.

How do we enter the House of Prayer? We enter the house of prayer by faith in Jesus Christ, knowing that none of us is worthy except by the blood of Christ.

What do we pray in the House of Prayer? We pray that God’s will be done in our lives, casting aside mountains of hypocrisy, opposition and persecution, casting aside unforgiveness and prejudice, to find salvation in Christ.

What is required of those who pray in the House of Prayer? Forgiveness. To forgive and seek forgiveness of those we have wronged.

            This is God’s purpose for the House of Prayer.

                                                                        AMEN

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[i] Ronald J. Kernaghan, Mark, p. 216.

Mark #9

THE “WHO THEN CAN BE SAVED?” QUIZ

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be rich? Do you fantasize about what you could do with a million dollars? I have some ideas of what I would do. Some of my ideas require more than a mere million. What would you do?

            This week MSN posted the world’s richest people. When you see how much money they possess you have to wonder if there isn’t anything they can’t do. The richest person is Carlos Slim Helu, who made his money with Telecom – he’s worth 73 billion dollars. His income accounts for 7 % of Mexico’s GDP. That’s crazy.

            Following Carlos are Bill Gates (67 billion), Amancio Ortega (57 billion), Warren Buffet (53.5 billion), and Larry Ellison (43 billion).

            I was curious to see whether these men were men of faith, so I googled them. Carlos is a Lebanese Maronite Christian (a type of Catholicism), Bill Gates rejects the Sermon on the Mount and is not sure if there is a God, Ortega is a Catholic, Buffet is an agnostic, and Ellison is a Jew. I discovered that Evangelical Christians are not typically listed among the world’s wealthiest.

            I don’t know what to conclude from this last discovery. Does the Evangelical worldview understand wealth differently than the Mainline church’s worldview of wealth? I can’t say.

            If we consider what Jesus has to say about wealth and discipleship in Mark 10 we will indeed see a conflict. What is the relationship of wealth to following Jesus? That is the key question in this portion of scripture.

            To explore this I want to present to you a quiz based on the disciples’ feature question: “Who then can be saved?” There are seven statements that require a “true” or “false” response. The nice thing about this quiz is that I will give you the answers from scripture, so you don’t have to guess. Then, in conclusion, I will reveal the final answer to the first question: What is the relationship of wealth to discipleship?

1. Strict adherence to the Ten Commandments can earn you eternal life. True or False?

True. But who is capable of keeping every commandment? James wrote, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it,” (Js 2:10).

            A man runs up to Jesus and falls on his knees. We know this man is young and rich, but he asks for something he knows money can’t buy. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” (17).

            Jesus replies with the six behavioral commandments, how we should act, leaving out the ones about God. Jesus changes one commandment, “Do not covet,” and instead says, “you shall not defraud.” This is fitting for someone who is rich since coveting is not a problem but defrauding might be.

            There is a hint here that something more is coming. Jesus is getting ready to say something about wealth since the issue is not simply about keeping the law. Observing some commandments was not enough: being rich was to be part of a great social injustice in those days. The rich almost always oppressed the poor in first century Palestine.[i]

            The rich young man is sincere in his desire to gain eternal life. He has realized that there is an emptiness in his present life that will affect him in the life to come. Given the right circumstances this man would follow Jesus.

2. Wealth is a sign of God’s favor on Godly people. True or False?

False, though this was the understanding at the time. Even the disciples thought so, as we will see later.

            The young man replied to Jesus, concerning the commandments, “Teacher…all these I have kept since I was a boy,” (10:20). The common conviction of pious first-century Jews was that the wealth of the people who kept the law was actually a sign of God’s favor. This man was, in his own estimation, an example of that piety.

            There is irony in this picture. As the young man insists that he has kept the law since he was a boy, he casts himself in the role of a child who wants to receive the kingdom. He must have heard Jesus speaking about receiving the kingdom like a little child moments before (10:14-15).

            However, the requirement in Jesus’ words for receiving the kingdom is not obedience but attitude. Here is where the rich man stumbles. What is a little child like? Most children don’t worry about money, mortgages, or RRSPs. They have no concern for the cost of gas, food, or living expenses. The other day I mentioned to Sharon that gas had jumped to 1.29 – Ethan thought that sounded reasonable. Sharon replied, “…a liter.” Sixty liters later…Children don’t worry about money and they have a keener attitude of trust about where food and other necessities come from.

            The young man would have trouble adopting an attitude like that. On the contrary, even though the young man was pious in keeping the law, there was a good chance he would become an oppressor of the poor eventually. It was inevitable actually.

            Attaining wealth in 1^st century Palestine is different than what we understand in 21^st century North America. In our context there is an unlimited amount of goods and resources available to any member of society who is willing to work. In 1^st century Palestine there was a limit to what a person could attain. If someone was a “have” there had to be a “have not.” (see chart). In order for the rich to be rich, they had to oppress the poor in Jesus’ day.[ii]

            While some believed that the pious were favored by God for their obedience, there was another tradition that disagreed. Psalm 73 bemoans the prosperity of the wicked. Jeremiah (12:1) also wailed that the wicked prospered at the expense of the righteous. Jesus taught in this tradition when he said, “No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money,” (Mt 6:24).

            Jesus therefore taught that the tradition that pious or religious people were rewarded with wealth was wrong. In fact, he rejects this thinking very strongly.

3. Jesus was speaking specifically to the rich man’s weakness and not in a general way for all disciples. True or False.

False, though we like to think it is true. We have all heard sermons that excuse our present indulgence into the finer things of life by suggesting that this commandment was particular to the rich young man’s own obstacle to discipleship. But there is no escape clause.

            Jesus said to the young man, “One thing you lack…Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me,” (10:21).

            How do we know that this is for us and not just for those who struggle to possess “things” and obsess over the newest and the best? For starters, Peter, a poor fisherman, along with the other low class disciples, declares this, “We have left everything to follow you!” (10:28). Remember when Jesus called them to follow – the fishermen left their boats, their livelihood, the only means they had of ensuring they would eat tonight, and followed Jesus.

            Secondly, at the end of this chapter, a blind man is healed. Blind Bartimaeus hears that Jesus is going by and he cries out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” (10:47). He is rebuffed by everyone but he persists and Jesus calls him to come. This is what happened, “Throwing his cloak aside, he jumped to his feet and came to Jesus,” (10:50). This is no frivolous detail. Mark wants you to know that Bart threw his only possession aside to come to Jesus. Then Jesus says, “Go…your faith has healed you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road,” (10:52). Three things happened: Bart left his possessions….he received his sight (in Mark, that means something spiritual as well as physical), and he followed Jesus…to the cross.

            That’s how we know that giving up everything for Jesus is a universal requirement for discipleship.

4. The “eye of the needle” is a gate in Old Jerusalem. True or False?

False! Some have believed the old trick of the devil that was invented over a hundred years ago.

            You see, when Jesus told the rich young man to sell everything before following Jesus, we are told this, “He went away sad, because he had great wealth,” (10:22). This is ironic too: Isn’t wealth supposed to make us happy? He goes away sad because he had great wealth, and could not give it up to gain eternal life.

            So Jesus responds saying, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God,” (10:24-25).

            Someone conceived of a way out of this hard saying by inventing the idea that there was a small gate within a large double gate in the city wall. Without opening the large gate it was said a camel could go through, but only if it was stripped of its load and bending its knees. So if we humble ourselves we can keep our load – LOL. There is no historical support for any such gate.

            What Jesus said, Jesus meant. The rich getting into the kingdom of God was like a real camel going through the miniscule eye of a real needle. It’s impossible.

5. Wealthy people will never enter the kingdom of God. True or False?

           

False, Jesus doesn’t say that. But Jesus just said it was impossible. The disciples were stunned since they believed that the wealthy were wealthy because of their faith. If their faith is not good enough, whose is? “Who then can be saved?”

            “Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God,” (10:27). Can you be saved by obeying the law? No. Can you be saved by giving away all your stuff? No. There is only one thing that can save you and that is the crucified Lord. Only God can save you; only Jesus makes it possible.

            It is impossible for the rich to enter the kingdom of God. But God delights in doing the impossible. However, we cannot ignore the teaching of Jesus regarding the wealthy. Earlier in Mark Jesus told the parable of the sower and explained the seeds thrown among thorns: they are like those who hear the word, “but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful,” (4:19).

            Jesus said wealth is deceitful. It tells you that you never have enough; it beckons you to find more; it tells you that the sacrifice is worth it, even if the sacrifice is friendship. Those are not kingdom values and that is why the rich cannot enter the kingdom of God.

6. Following Jesus is an easy road. True or False?

You know it’s false. Jesus called on the disciples to leave home, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, children and property for the Christ and the gospel. That is not an easy thing to do.        Jesus told the rich young man to sell everything he had and give it to the poor. The implications of this demand are greater than we realize. The demand to sell what one possesses is to part with what was dearest of all possible possessions: the family home and land. So if they young man sold his land, land that had been in his family’s ownership for generations, land that every Jew considered Holy because God gave it as an inheritance, the sacrifice was enormous. The rich young man would be breaking with home, family, tradition, and everything that defined him until that point. That is not an easy road to follow.

            David Livingstone went to darkest Africa as a lone missionary. After some time his missions committee wrote to him saying, "Some people would like to join you. What’s the easiest road to get where you are?" He replied, "If they’re looking for the easiest road, tell them to stay in England. I want people who will come, even if there’s no road at all!" Sometimes the pathway of the Christian life appears to change from a smooth-surfaced road to a stony track or peter out altogether.

            Following Jesus is not total loss – it is total gain. It is giving up the temporary to gain the eternal. C. S. Lewis commented that our desires are too shallow if we are satisfied with the pleasures of this world as opposed to the eternal joy of having Jesus forever. There is a kingdom principle embedded in the loss of worldly goods – the return of greater treasures.

7. You should always strive to be number one. True or False?

False of course. To be the best anything means that someone is second best, or third, or worst. To be the richest person in the world ultimately relegates others to poverty. To gain the upper hand means someone was oppressed, stepped on, belittled or humiliated.

            Do you need to be the best? Do you need to be first? Do you need that promotion? If you win the lottery do you know how many people lost money so you could win?

            Though we live in a society of unlimited goods someone is still being oppressed so that we can live comfortably. The principle stands, as it did in 1^st century Palestine, that the only way to improve your social position or wealth is at the expense of others. So any improvement in someone’s position with respect to any good in life can be viewed as a threat to the entire community. Someone is being deprived somewhere in the global community, whether he or she knows it or not.

            This is why Jesus said, “But many who are first will be last, and the last first,” (10:31). Following Jesus invites us to allow others to be first in everything so that we who have eternity to gain can be true servants.

What is the relationship of wealth to discipleship?

            That is the original question we set out to explore. According to what we have heard Jesus say, wealth is a real obstacle to following Jesus. The call to follow Jesus involves turning our backs on worldly wealth to gain what is worth far more in the kingdom of God.

            In the “real” world in which we live there are some obvious issues with these discipleship principles. We need food, clothing, a place to live and a place to worship. That requires money. We who have are privileged to be able to give to those who need, be it missions or other charities. So we need money it seems.

            Something does not sit right in that word “need.” It sounds like we are dependent on money. That may be why we serve it so fiercely. The currency of our world is money. We don’t belong to this world, we belong to Christ. And his currency is love: love of God and love of others.

            Really it comes down to allegiance. Following Jesus demands the allegiance of the disciple to Christ alone. This means not aligning ourselves with the world, Satan’s domain, which uses wealth as its currency. No one can serve two masters…

            I cannot help but think of our need for a new sound mixer. What is the first thing we turn to in our need? Money. Fair enough. Did we ever turn to the Lord though and present him with our need? Not as a body. So we have relied upon our own devices to supply that which we need to worship God. Isn’t that ironic? Call me naïve, its okay. This is but one example of how we operate as disciples and it is not okay.

            How shall we be saved? With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.

            Do we believe this?

                                                            AMEN

           

           

           

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[i] James Crossley. “The Damned Rich,” (The Expository Times), p. 401.

[ii] Joseph Hellerman. “Wealth and Sacrifice in Early Christianity: Revisiting Mark’s Presentation of Jesus’ Encounter With the Rich Young Ruler,” (Trinity Journal), p. 149 & 151.