Speaker: Caleb Schrock-Hurst
Bible Passages: Mark 6:1-13
Summary: Jesus’s ministry was, in addition to being a ministry of spiritual teaching, a ministry of healing, and our spiritual and physical wellbeing often go together. By caring for one another’s physical health, we can also care for one another’s spiritual health.
Greetings everyone! As always good to be with you, and fun to be with many of you for the health fair yesterday. Regretfully I have absolutely zero training in medical skills, but Steph makes up for that with both a nursing and public health degree.
Somewhat relatedly, I mentioned in a sermon not too long ago that in some ways, it strikes me as odd that physical wellbeing and health are so often in our prayer requests. On one hand, in our North American 2024 understanding, we tend to separate our physical health from our spiritual health — but on the other hand, when we have significant physical issues they are one of the things we’ll most certainly share with the church.
I think it’s perfectly appropriate to ask for prayer about injuries and physical needs, because the distinction we have, between physical and spiritual health, was not nearly as solid in Jesus’ day. When Jesus went around healing people physically, this was part of the good news — and we don’t need to separate that from Jesus’ healing people’s relationships, mental health needs, and whatnot — our physical wellbeing is definitely related to our spiritual and emotional wellbeing; there isn’t always a hard and fast separation between these two things.
To think about this more — healing, and how Jesus’ went about it — we’ll stick pretty closely to the Mark passage that the lectionary has served up today: Jesus being rejected in Nazareth and then the sending out of the 12.
Really, this passage is a bit of an odd one — barring holy week, there aren’t that many stories in the whole new testament about Jesus being ineffective, or not being able to reach people — for that reason it’s a story we should treat with a lot of care.
Also, the fact that Jesus’ rejection in his home town is paired with the sending of the 12 seems almost illogical — why does Jesus respond to failure by sending his closest friends out to do the same mission? What connects these two stories? What can we make of Jesus’s rejection by his kinsmen and friends? And how should these stories shape our lives?
Let’s start with Jesus’s rejection in Nazareth.
To begin, let’s take a step back and look at the context within the book of Mark. Mark, particularly the first part of the book until chapter 8, is all about Jesus’s miraculous powers, and particularly powers of healing. The chapter before this one is a story of Jesus raising the dead girl in Capernaum while simultaneously healing the bleeding woman. Then, right after the stories we’re working with today, Jesus feeds the 5,000 and then immediately walks on water.
So — the gospel writer is not overall trying to say that Jesus isn’t powerful; in fact a main message of the book is that Jesus is the miraculously powerful messiah — there is something specific going on in his hometown that is preventing him from succeeding.
Let’s set the scene — at this point, Jesus has been in ministry for awhile, traveling to various villages all over the countryside, healing and teaching in the synagogues on the sabbath. But now Jesus is entering his home turf — you can almost imagine him thinking this will be an easier sermon since it’s people who already know him and his family. As readers, we might be expecting the exact same thing with the way Mark sets up the story.
But rather, Jesus experiences the exact opposite — the fact that he has roots in Nazareth means his message is not accepted at all. To us, the crowd’s comments seem innocuous enough: they clearly aren’t accepting of Jesus’s teaching or pretensions at being the Messiah, but at least here in Mark they don’t try to throw him off a cliff as they do in Luke’s version of this story. But, the crowd lobs a couple fairly stinging jibes at Jesus that we might miss without some additional context. To help unlock them I’ll be relying on a great bible commentary, the Jewish Annotated New Testament, for the next section.
First, the crowd asks: ‘where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands!’ These are all pretty straight-forward criticisms. We don’t know much about Jesus’s training as a rabbi, but the gospels point to him having received a fairly-standard rabbinical education — and likely almost all of that education took place here in Nazareth; it’s quite possible Jesus’s teacher was present among the crowd that day in the synagogue, totally blindsided by Jesus’s message — this was very clearly not the message and interpretation he had given Jesus over many years of teaching.
Next, the crowd says — Is this not the carpenter, the son of Mary? This actually contains two interesting pieces we need to unpack.
The Greek word for Jesus’s, and Joseph’s, profession, that we typically translate as ‘carpenter,’ is τέκτων— a Greek word for a craftsman; it is much more accurate to think of, in our parlance, Jesus as a builder rather than as a woodworker; Jesus and Joseph were more likely out sweating in the sun building houses than they were sitting in a nice, well lit workshop making ornamental wooden toys, as they are often portrayed.
Bringing up that Jesus is a τέκτων is a sharp criticism of Jesus because this community knows Jesus as, in our modern wording, a contractor — and they are asking, aren’t you just a contractor? What are you doing interrupting our worship and claiming to work miracles? Who do you think you are?
This ‘who do you think you are’ is also implicit in the second half of the verse — again, the people have asked ‘Is this not the τέκτων, the contractor, the son of Mary?”
The second half of the verse is probably even more insulting than the first — the people are highlighting that he is the ‘son of Mary’ — they do not name him the son of Joseph. This would have been an extremely stinging insult; people in Nazareth knew Joseph, and yet here they don’t claim Jesus as his son; rather, they name him as the son of Mary, highlighting that they think Jesus was conceived before Joseph and Mary got together. It’s clear that this congregation thinks that Jesus, the contractor, born out of wedlock, is way too full of himself and needs to be brought down a peg.
But the criticism doesn’t even stop there: next, the crowd talks about Jesus’s brothers and sisters being among them; embedded in these comments is that Jesus, as the oldest male son, would have been expected to care for his mother and younger siblings — bringing them up was like saying: why are you running around the countryside making a fool of yourself, when you should be here in Nazareth, with a steady job, providing for your family? Hasn’t your family been through enough?
Amazingly, though, Jesus doesn’t push back that forcefully against any of these criticisms; he merely yields: “prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house.” Then, perhaps trying to defend himself, he tries to do some of the miracles that have made his ministry so successful that far, but he’s seemingly unable to do everything he’d like — and the crowd remains unswayed. Then, the passage ends with Jesus being amazed at their unbelief.
So, what can we take away from this story? Three things stand out to me:
First, we should not be blinded by what we know about people from our past, or based on their pasts — God works amazing things through people with less-than-ideal, and surprising, backgrounds. It is so easy, when we run into people that we know from earlier in our lives — or when we meet people we have preconceived notions about, because of stereotypes of race or class or other things — to dismiss that God is working in them. If we’re not careful, we fall back into old patterns and old ways of knowing each other, rather than seeing one another for who we truly are — called and sent children of God. It’s so easy, when we’re with family or people we’ve known since childhood, to revert to the ways of our youth, to being known solely by our, or even our parents, youthful mistakes, rather than being the full people we are, having grown and changed with God’s blessing.
Second, we would do well to respect people in trades, like contractors. Jesus’s training as a τέκτων, and his calling of fishermen, is so familiar to us in the Christian tradition that we can miss the significance of it — Jesus was not raised in a palace, or around the banking system, or government; instead, he and the apostles were blue-collar people. Even Paul was a tradesman in addition to a trained Pharisee — he was a tent maker. When we forget that God speaks through working people, we are in danger of missing Jesus among us.
Third, and perhaps the most significant takeaway from this story, is that in this passage Jesus’ ability to heal and do works in Nazareth seems to to be related to what people believe about him — the Jewish Annotated New Testaments says “the lack of faith [in Nazareth seems to] limit Jesus’ power.” This may seem strange at first — why would Jesus’s powers be dependant on people believing in him? But, at second glance, I actually think this fits well with Jesus’s message elsewhere in the gospels. Jesus taught often that when we have faith, miraculous things can happen; you only need faith the size of a mustard seed to change the world. But the inverse also seems to be true — when we lack faith, when we believe we cannot change things, we cannot change things;
We need to remember that when we believe we can make a difference, indeed we often can. We need to remember today, even in the face of complicated situations around the world that seem to be spinning out of control, that we can make a difference. If we believe, and pursue, the church making a difference in the world — in Gaza, in Ukraine, in our country — then we will find ways to serve — if we give in to hopelessness, we will fail to act. Our actions of love and resistance and healing, though small on a global scale, can be powerful, and will be made more powerful when we believe that they matter. If we give into despair and doubt — if we let previous setbacks to define us and who we are rather than hope — then our ability to impact the world for the better will be diminished, just as Jesus’s ability seems to be here.
Okay — time to move on to the Sending of the 12
We’ve just come from Jesus’s rejection in Nazareth, and rather than just retreating and licking his wounds, taking time to rest and rethink his strategy with the 12, Jesus’s immediately sends them out. This transition seems so strange — why does Jesus respond this way?
Ched Meyers, whose commentary ‘Binding the Strong Man,’ simply cannot be beat and which I quote from every time I preach on Mark, points out that this actually is a pattern in Mark — Jesus being rejected and then going immediately to a new place to continue ministry in a new way happens three times in the book. At the end of Mark one, Jesus responds to rejection in the synagogue system by immediately beginning broader ministry in Galilee, and in Mark three, after being reprimanded for healing on the Sabbath, Jesus gets in a boat, sails across the sea of Galilee, and starts driving out demons there.
Myers says this about these huge setbacks, “despite apparent failure, the narrative of the messianic mission can and must regroup and continue. This will of course become crucial at the end of the story, for there we will be faced with the apparent total collapse of the discipleship narrative — and a promise of “regeneration.”” (Myers, Binding the Strongman, page 212)
This is so important — we need to remember that failure and hardship and rejection will come, in many areas of our lives; if they happened to Jesus, as they clearly did, why wouldn’t we expect them to happen to us? We don’t do well teaching people or ourselves that failure and hardship won’t be a part of their Christian lives; instead, we need to stay engaged and hopeful through setbacks; to learn to ‘regroup and continue’ in pursuit of God’s kingdom.
For a bit of a left-field example, I want to turn to one of my main hobbies — European soccer. I follow Arsenal football club — definitely ironic that the pacifist cheers for a team with a cannon on the crest, but things happen. When I became a fan at the end of high school in 2013, Arsenal still had one of the longest-serving managers, or head-coaches, in English soccer history, Arsene Wenger, whose accomplishments are many, most notably he coached Arsenal to the only-ever undefeated season in the history of English soccer in the 2003-2004 season.
Anyhow — once, Wenger was asked what the most important quality in a soccer player is; one might think, endurance, for the tough task of playing an incredibly physical game for 90 minutes straight, or skill, or creativity in passing; but instead, Wenger says the most important characteristic which he always looked for in players — and in life — was tenacity. He says that, quote, “tenacity is the most underrated quality in life. We all speak about talent, intelligence, glamor, but tenacity is the common thing for every successful person in life and in football. Maintain that motivation to go from A to B, to keep your focus on that target, without any weakening, that is called tenacity — stamina in your motivation.”
Why do I share this quote? Because Jesus modeled and taught tenacity to his disciples. They needed tenacity — stamina in their motivation — as they suffered setback after setback in pursuit of a just world, in pursuit of right relationship with God, one another, and their neighbor. In the same way, we need to be after tenacity; when we face setbacks in our own lives, or hurdles in the world around us, we can take a page out of Jesus’s playbook, and find new ways to bring healing and hope to those around us. In the face of a changing world, we should not despair — we should do what Jesus did and what he taught his disciples to do — find places where we can still walk justly, where we can tenaciously keep our eyes on Jesus’s kingdom of justice and peace, in the face of whatever adversity comes our way.
Ok — enough soccer talk, back to the sending of the twelve. Last year, Matthew’s version of sending of the 72, which contains many of these same instructions, was the Virginia Conference theme scripture, so I think I preached on it about ten times, including once here — so we won’t go through it in nearly as much detail as we did the first part of today’s scripture; but let’s hit a few points before we move on.
First, we might wonder why Jesus sent his disciples out two by two. There are some obvious ones that we understand easily; by sending disciples two by two, Jesus guaranteed the formation of community — knowing that ministry is draining and difficult, traveling together is simply a better idea, and learning to live together in peace is a part of the message of peace.
Another possible reason, though, that I’d never encountered before my research this week is that in Jewish law, the testimony of one person isn’t invalid; two witnesses were needed for testimony to be used in any substantive forum, like court or synagogue. By sending disciples two by two, disciples would be able to witness together to the larger group about what God had done.
Another thought on sending — it’s worth noting that this is the only time that Mark refers to the disciples as apostles; and there is good reason for this if we look at the Greek word Mark uses — ἀποστέλλειν, where we get apostles; this word literally means ‘the sent ones,’ with connotations of messengers, or envoys. The disciples are not just disciples, students being formed by Jesus, but now sent to bear his message to other communities. In the same way, we are not called only to learn from Jesus, but also carry his message to others, in both word and deed.
Knowing this, we may ask why Jesus sends them out with so little to carry — and, we may ask, should we imitate these instructions, or were these time-specific for Jesus’s first twelve followers?
Myers says “there is no indication that Jesus’ orders are unique to this [particular] mission [of the twelve]; they are for “the way” — that is, [central to] the discipleship lifestyle. Their narrative significance lies not in some model of heroic asceticism, which would contradict Jesus’ ambivalence toward fasting, but in the emphasis upon the utter dependance of the disciples upon hospitality. The apostles…are allowed the means of travel — staff, sandals — but not sustenance (bread, money bag and money, extra clothes. In other words, they, like Jesus who has just been renounced in his own “home,” are to take on the status of a sojourner in the land.” (Myers, page 213)
“This makes [both] the [disciples and modern] missionaries completely vulnerable to, and dependent upon, the hospitality extended to them, and obviously precludes them from being able to impose their views by force” (Myers, page 214)
This was the focus of my sermon on the sending of the 72 — that Jesus’s instructions to travel light, while perhaps frightening or strange in our view, clearly open doors for us as we go through life, as followers of Jesus in whatever context. We need to travel light, as the disciples did, and be willing to receive the hospitality of the people wherever we go.
Final thought on the ministry of the twelve — we’re told they “anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.”
Now, this may come off as a non-sequiter to us, or as two separate ideas — in our world, anointing with oil is typically a spiritual act of blessing that doesn’t have much, if anything, to do with physical healing. In Jesus’s day, however, anointing with oil was the height of medical science — we see this too in the parable of the good Samaritan. Jesus isn’t just sending out the 12 solely to pray for people, but also to heal them using every tool available, including contemporary medicine. We may not be able to drive out demons like the disciples, but we can use modern medicine to be instruments of healing, just as the disciples did.
Further reflections on healing
Healing is a big part of what we do as a congregation — and I want to start with a story to illustrate this. Last week, I got together with one of my old college professors, Kevin Seidel, who will actually be preaching here next week. Following a bit of a non-traditional path to professorship, he went to seminary thinking he would become a pastor before he went on to get a PhD in English, so I’m glad he’s willing to preach for us next week! Anyhow, in the course of our conversation and in preparation for his sermon, he asked about the congregation, what we were like and what people here did; as I was running through the list of people who came to my mind, it struck me just how much we as a congregation serve in healing professions: we’re blessed to have medical professionals of many kinds — doctors like Emmanuel and Alison, dentists like the Hsus, eye doctors like Joanna, nurses like Stephanie, and I’m sure I’ve missed more!
Also, I think as well of the health screening many of us worked with yesterday — what a lovely service to those in need. We should remember that these medical efforts, from once-yearly events to daily work, are part of our sent-ness, our apostle hood, bringing health to those in need in the name of Jesus.
Working in the medical field has long been a Christian calling — from starting hospitals in ancient times and the middle ages to modern medical missions, Jesus’s disciples have continued on in this mission of healing, across the generations.
I’m thinking of this even more these days as Stephanie and I begin our preparations to move to Taiwan — the main partner we’ll work with there, Mennonite Christian Hospital in Hualien, was started by MCC in the 1950s, and is today a 500-bed hospital and a landmark for the whole city. Hospitals like this one are one of MCC’s big legacies around the world — just this past month I also heard for the first time about the Mennonite General Hospital in Puerto Rico, which now, according to Anabaptist World magazine, ‘employs nearly 700 physicians in a chain of hospitals across the island.’
But I want to close with a thought about another hospital that MCC started, this one in Nha Trang, Vietnam. When it was built, it was built in a grove of trees outside a village, a stone’s throw away from the beach. Today, it’s completely overshadowed by high-rise apartment buildings, primarily used as vacation rentals by Russian tourists — for whatever reason Nha Trang is the hot spots for Russians to visit in Vietnam.
This hospital, unlike those in Hualien and Puerto Rico, hasn’t grown and flourished — in 1975, when the war ended, it was seized by the government, but eventually re-opened as a traditional Chinese/Vietnamese medicinal hospital that still runs today; it was a privilege to visit there a few years back.
Anyhow — I share about it because of a funny story that frequently makes me laugh when I think about the hospital in Nha Trang and generally about medical missions and evangelism debates.
In the era of the American war in Vietnam, MCC partnered closely with the Christian Missionary Alliance in Vietnam, including at the hospital in Nha Trang; while many parts of partnership ran very smoothly, there were some sharp disagreements — CMA workers were laser-focused on evangelism, while MCC workers thought that the medical missions they were engaged in were an indelible part of their Christian witness and that evangelism, particularly in the context of war, shouldn’t be the first priority.
One way this disagreement played out at the Nha Trang hospital was that the CMA workers insisted that at least thirty minutes should be set aside every day for bible study for patients who were waiting to be seen at the hospital. MCCers at that time thought this was inappropriate — offering a voluntary bible-study session is one thing, forcing patients to attend a bible study in order to receive medical care is another.
Anyhow, one Mennonite doctor who worked at the hospital gleefully told me, when I ask him about this tension, how he creatively demonstrated he though their healing work was evangelism enough on it’s own — every morning he would do his morning rounds, and then, when the mandated bible study began at 9.30, he would leave the hospital, run down to the ocean and take a swim — and be back at 10 to continue seeing patients.
So — what’s the point of this story? One lesson is that we can remind other Christians that using medicine to heal was a core part of the apostles mission. Healing, just like preaching, is part of being servants of Jesus, and we should not reduce what Jesus did, what the 12 disciples did, or our service in the world solely to evangelism — we also seek to heal all in need. While we do preach with words when appropriate, we also minister to people’s lives and bodies through our actions. Like the 12 apostles, the sent-ones, traveling light, we don’t need to force our message on anyone — rather, we give and receive hospitality in the name of Jesus while working for healing and reconciliation — even if this message of hope and healing baffles our oldest friends and family.
As we go this week, may we remember that we are sent to heal and serve — may we have belief in our ability, as both individuals and communities, to improve the lives of people — for God will transform our small offerings beyond our wildest dreams. May we continue to strengthen our imaginations and hope, so that God may do great things through us. Amen.
