Served and Serving

(Scriptures: Isaiah 40:21-31, I Corinthians 9:16-23, Mark 1:29-39)

We’re continuing along in Mark’s fast moving Gospel – it’s something to realize that already we’ve watched Jesus come to John to be baptized, go out into the wilderness to be tested, begin calling disciples, preach and perform an exorcism – and we’re still only partway through the first chapter! Sometimes I think it must have been exhausting to have been a follower of Jesus, trying to keep up with his fast-moving ministry. Jesus’ actions in the synagogue were very public, but now Jesus spends some time in a more private setting. Apparently the house in which the brothers Simon and Andrew lived was right next door to the synagogue. Having wowed the crowd at the synagogue, Jesus and his (at that time) handful of disciples slip into Simon and Andrew’s house for some down time, some rest and refreshment.

We’re reminded quickly that families in those days were not like the tidy families to which we aspire today – husband, wife, 2.5 kids, a dog, a minivan, all situated in a McMansion way out in the ‘burbs – but rather were large, extended families where three or more generations lived under the same roof. You had lots of people living in relatively close quarters, and privacy was limited. We learn that Simon’s mother-in-law lived with the family – and that this particular day, she’s under the weather – in fact, more than under the weather, she’s deathly sick. You who are parents can probably relate to this story: you’re feeling just plain rotten – maybe you have a migraine or a stomach bug or the flu or such – and all you want to do is lie down, turn off the lights, pull up the covers, and have some peace and quiet as you wait for the fever or migraine to run its course. But your kid brings over some friends from school, and they want run around the house playing cops and robbers, or maybe they try to play Suzy Homemaker and you hear an alarming clanging and clattering and dishes breaking in the kitchen. You shudder….why can’t I have some peace and quiet, just this once. But you haul yourself out of bed and force a smile, because your kids and their friends need you, and that’s what parents do. Obviously in our Gospel reading Simon and Peter and company are adults, not noisy kids – but on hearing she had company downstairs, Simon’s mother-in-law likely shuddered just the same. If she were feeling better, she’d probably be bustling around providing hospitality – but today she’s sick as a dog, and can’t even get out of bed.

For Simon’s mother-in-law, what started out feeling like an intrusion turned into a blessing. Simon and Andrew and Jesus appear in her doorway, and she starts apologizing for being bedfast. But Mark tells us that Jesus steps over to the bed, takes her by the hand, and lifts her out of bed. After all the high drama that had taken place at the synagogue earlier that morning, this is a tender, intimate moment – Jesus reaching down to take the hand of this sick woman, as her sons stand in the doorway watching. And in doing so, Jesus is breaking all sorts of religious and cultural boundaries – healing on the Sabbath – his second such healing that Sabbath day, touching a sick person who would have been considered ritually unclean, not to mention the social boundaries between men and women. But for Jesus, restoration, not respectability, is what matters. The mother-in-law is healed, made whole, restored to health, so much so in fact that she starts waiting on the gathering. And at this point, the women among us are probably rolling their eyes – she’s just gotten out of bed, and already the men stand around expecting her to wait on them. Man may work from sun to sun, but a woman’s work is never done…..

Perhaps some of us have our own stories of situations that started out feeling like a burden but turned into a blessing, started out feeling like an imposition, but wound up being an invitation to healing and wholeness. We have tickets to a game or concert that we’d paid for in advance some time ago, but the day of the game has come and we’re not feeling up for it – but we push ourselves, and the game or concert turns out to be just what we needed. We’ve had a long day at work, but a friend calls, needing to talk – and the conversation turns out to be a time of healing not only for the friend, but for us. Granted, none of us can be on call 24/7, but if we’re too quick to shut others out, we may miss blessings God intended for us in our encounters with others.

All that said, even Jesus – even Mark’s fast-moving, supercaffeinated Jesus - needed some downtime. By the time Jesus had finished his lunch at Simon’s house, the crowds were making their way to see him. At sundown – after the Sabbath was over – those who were sick pressed in on Jesus, and he healed many of them. Having ministered to the crowds, Jesus, who had healed and restored so many, needed some R&R himself, and so he went off to a deserted place to pray. And as Jesus is spending some badly needed quiet time with his Heavenly Father, Simon bumbled onto the scene, reminding Jesus that everyone’s looking for him. But Jesus is not the property of those who gathered at Simon’s house – there are people in other towns who need to hear the Gospel, and so Jesus sets off to proclaim the coming of the Kingdom in the surrounding region.

We are invited to bring our brokenness to Jesus to be healed. But our healing is not something for ourselves alone, but rather is given to us so that we can serve and bless others. Jesus healed Simon’s mother-in-law, and she responded by serving Jesus. In turn, as Jesus prayed, God restored Jesus’ spirit, so that he could continue to proclaim good news to others, in words of mercy and deeds of compassion.

There may be times when God can use even our brokenness to bring good news to others. Roman Catholic writer Henri Nouwen some years ago wrote a book called 'The Wounded Healer', about pastors and other healers whose wounds and weaknesses become opportunities to heal others. We see wounded healers in many places –the person emerging from a difficult time of bereavement who becomes a grief counselor, the battered spouse who gains independence and goes back to volunteer at a women’s crisis hotline or shelter, the recovering alcoholic who starts an AA meeting so that others can embrace sobriety. Some years ago I was at the funeral of a recovering alcoholic – I’ll refer to him as Jack - who had started several AA meetings in the Philadelphia area. Having at one time nearly drank himself to death, he started AA meetings at which the lives of many others were saved. In the eulogy, the pastor reflected that Jack had taken the raging torrents in his own life, and poured them out as cups of cool, life-giving water for those dying of thirst around him.

From our Isaiah reading: “Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” As we gather in worship and especially as we gather at the table in a few moments, may our weary spirits be renewed and our broken places healed and restored, and may we be channels of renewal, healing and restoration for our friends, our neighbors, for all with whom we come into contact. Amen.