Wednesday, February 1, 2012


Epiphany 4 Year B

Mark 1:21-28

Spirits

By Rich Gamble

 


Stories are different than math formulas, cooking recipes, or IRS instructions. Stories do not have to be taken literally to properly understand them. Indeed often, a literal interpretation of a story misses completely the intended meaning.


When Jesus sits a group of people together and tells a story about two brothers, we generally understand that he is not describing a historical event but is using a narrative to convey meaning in the best possible way. Parables are not meant to be taken literally, they are meant to be taken as sources of wisdom. We get that but often we take the other parts of the Gospels as literal history rather than a means to convey wisdom.


Today’s story from the Gospel could be interpreted to be about an historical incident. Jesus comes to a particular place, does some particular things and elicits a particular response from those who were there. Taken literally it is history about Jesus, and has little to do with us.


I think that this is a story. That does not mean that I think it is less valuable than literal history, rather, I think it is more so. As a story, it is not simply about Jesus, it is about us.


Let’s think about Spirits in a different way. Rather than being autonomous, independent entities, imagine Spirits being internalized reflection of our vision of ultimate meaning. This vision of ultimate meaning can be reflected in a person, or a community or civilization.  So we can talk about the spirit of a church, or a nation, or a person. As we see ultimate meaning so we act. The spirit of a person, church or nation is reflected in the actions of that individual or group and in the values reflected in those actions.


To talk about our lens on reality as spirit moves it out of the purely rational lines of thought and into our emotions and passions. This talk of spirit moves our understanding of this lens on reality into our subconscious.  Once we are utterly immersed in a particular reality then thinking along the lines of that perspective does not require conscious choice. It seems natural. It feels right, even when, through the perspective of another spirit it is very wrong.


If looked at in this way, modern reality looks different. We in the modern material world are continually striving to measure ourselves materially. Dribble paint on a canvass and it’s a mess, unless someone is willing to pay a million dollars for it, then it’s a work of art. We win a war when we control the land of our enemies. We win an election when our people control the offices of power. The more we have the more we are worth.


What if this world view was merely the manifestation of a spirit? If we are possessed by that spirit, then that is the way we see the world. There is a cohesive logic to it. Spirit then is not an autonomous external being which takes residence in us. It is how we understand the nature of reality and our lives.


A way of understanding this is to turn your television to the FOX news cable station. Fox news provides a particular perspective on reality and it filters news and opinion through that perspective. All news stations and news papers do the same but because FOX is so extreme it is easier to see. No matter what happens in the world you can count on Fox to look at the news and show us that Big Business is good, labor unions bad, tax breaks to the well off are good, welfare for the poor- bad, enemies are to be feared and destroyed, capitalism good, socialism bad. No matter what happens in the world these maxims will be proven by the news and opinions offered by Fox. When people allow Fox to be their filter, then these maxims will be their reality no matter the course of world events.


Understood in this way, reality is something we can choose. There is a conflict of Spirits out there and if we are aware enough we can exchange one for another.


Interpreted in this way, the man who speaks up to Jesus is not a guy with demon who is causing him problems, but a spokesman for the whole society which has taken on a world view in opposition to the world view borne by Jesus. In healing this one man of the evil spirit, Jesus is showing us the real nature of his work, to heal the world of the spirit which is leading us to lives of pain, isolation, fear and violence.  


Please note that this guy with the demonic spirit did not have a problem until Jesus showed up. He was fitting in just fine in the Synagogue and in his community. Mark here is pointing out that the Spirit of Domination was quite at home in the day to day world of the people of that town. Throughout the Gospel of Mark and the other Gospels as well we see the leaders of the community of his day responded to Jesus with the same anger and concern as this possessed man. His possession is symbolic of the possession of the whole community.


Note that this is the first act of Jesus’ ministry in the Gospel of Mark. His first act is to confront an evil spirit inside a synagogue. At the end of the Gospel, Jesus’ ends his ministry by confronting the men who run the Temple. From evil spirit in a man in a synagogue to the men who do evil in the Temple which governs the faith of a people, the work of Jesus is primarily confronting the spirit of his people. Jesus was engaged in a struggle but not in the terms of the world view of the domination system. His victory would not be marked by killing his enemies, or by becoming fantastically wealthy or powerful. He was engaged in a struggle to replace the spirit of domination with the spirit of agape love. Measured by that Spirit Jesus’ campaign, though it ended in his death, was a stunning success.


The man who spoke up reflected the spirit which controlled most of the people alive in that day. By driving out that spirit, Jesus was showing us the nature of the struggle. It’s not about turf or wealth or gaining the power to harm or destroy. It is about changing the spirit which guides the way our world understands itself and ultimate reality.


What does this mean for us? It is what we are called to do and be. Our work is to free ourselves, our neighbors and our world from the “spiritual forces of evil” quoting Paul. That means that we are called to see ourselves involved in a struggle for the hearts and minds and souls of our community. We take actions in the world yes, but our goal is not defined by the spirit of domination. 

First we strive to chase the spirit of Domination out of our hearts. We see it when it calls on us to be fearful of other people, to hate others, to place ourselves over others. We see it in our community in the subtle and not so subtle messages that tell us to consume, and to place a lesser value on outsiders than on insiders.  

Externalized messages can become internalized world views, and we can unwittingly be controlled by the evil spirit of domination. That is what FOX news does audaciously and other news sources do more subtly. That is what advertising does, movies do, novels, cereal boxes, state budgets all reflect and convey a spirit.

Once awakened to this, we realize that our job is to convey a different spirit, a different understanding of ultimate and therefore present reality.

The man who spoke up in the synagogue spoke for the world around him. In chasing out that spirit, Jesus showed that the journey of faith is about a spiritual struggle in a material world. Jesus showed us our calling. In acts of love, in compassion and justice we confront the spirit of apathy and fear and domination. We name it, not for being ultimate reality but being a festering evil, and we plant a new vision.

That’s our work: to name the evil on FOX news and in the budget of our state, and on cereal boxes and in our hearts. We are enlisted in a struggle for the spirit which governs our lives, our church, our faith, our nation, our planet. Instead of guns we use truth. Instead of bombs we use humor, instead of hate we use love, instead of fear we use hope. Instead of trying to gain positions of power and privilege, we strive to align ourselves with the outcasts. In this work, we must not lose sight that this is ultimately a spiritual struggle. It is measured by our ability to help people see and live out of the truth of God’s alternative spirit.  


Thursday night while most of our neighbors of King County were sleeping safely in their warm beds, I joined hundreds of volunteers who participated in the annual One Night Count of people who are homeless outside. Eight hundred volunteers found 2,594 people sleeping on the streets, under bridges, in their cars, on public transit, in temporary shelters and in makeshift campsites. This is 152 more people than volunteers counted one year ago.


The world is facing a hunger crisis unlike anything it has seen in more than 50 years.

925 million people are hungry. Every day, almost 16,000 children die from hunger-related causes. That's one child every five seconds. And though it would take about 30 billion dollars to end world hunger, the world spends over a trillion a year on its military. 

 These people are hungry and homeless not because there aren’t enough resources in the world to feed and house everyone but because the spirit of Domination has caused the world to see great disparity in wealth, the necessity of violence and the subsequent suffering of poverty as natural.

The guy in the synagogue and the men running the Temple, were not in and of themselves evil. They were doing what was right in accordance with the spirit that controlled them. Jesus sought with his life and death to liberate them and the rest of us from the hold of the spirit which closes our hearts and minds to the love of God.


We are called to awaken to the spirit of God, and once awakened to help others do likewise. That is our calling and that is real hope and good news for the world.

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