Tag Archives: unclean spirit

4th Sunday B: An Explosive Day

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To listen to the audio for today’s homily, please select the audio player below:

Our gospel reading this Sunday, like most from the last four Sundays, is from the first chapter of Mark’s Gospel. It describes a day– one day in the life of Jesus–one commentator calls it a “paradigmatic day”– a day you can see everything you need to know about Jesus.

The evangelist prepares us for this day with an account of Jesus’ baptism and temptation in the desert by Satan. At the Jordan River the heavens open and a voice says, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.” Immediately, Mark says, Jesus is led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by Satan for forty day.

This is God’s beloved Son, but he knows what it means to face evil. He came among us and faced evil.

“After John had been arrested,” Mark continues, “Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God: “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel.”

Jesus goes into Galilee “after John has been arrested,” not the safest time to announce anything, but that doesn’t matter. God’s kingdom is stronger than the powers of this world. It wont be stopped.

Mark’s Gospel is fast paced. As Jesus passes the Sea of Galilee, he sees Simon and his brother Andrew casting their nets into the sea. Jesus says to them. “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.” They abandoned their nets and followed him.

He walked along a little farther, he sees James and John, the sons of Zebedee, getting ready to go out in their boat. He calls them and they leave their boat to follow him.

They can’t resist him, Mark’s gospel says. There’s something exciting and commanding about him. They have to follow him.

They come to Capernaum, the town where they all live. It’s the Sabbath Day. They all go into the synagogue and Jesus begins to teach. He amazes the people with his teaching. No one has taught like him before.

But then, as happens all through his life, the voice of evil is heard. A man with an unclean spirit cries out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?

“Have you come to destroy us?

I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”

Jesus rebuked him and said,

‘Quiet! Come out of him!’ The unclean spirit convulsed him and with a loud cry came out of him.

All were amazed and asked one another,

‘What is this? A new teaching with authority.

He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him.’”

Of course, when those people leave the synagogue, they tell everybody they meet. Capernaum was a trading center. The news gets out quickly.

“His fame spread everywhere throughout the whole region of Galilee.”

Next Sunday’s gospel from Mark will continue the story of this momentous day. Jesus leaves the synagogue goes into Peter and Andrew’s house in Capernaum and heals Peter’s mother in law. This same day is filled with excitement. Mark ends his account by saying that as the day ends, the whole town in at the door, anxious to hear him, with their sick and those who are disturbed.

I wish I could convey some of the excitement that this gospel wants to convey. When Jesus comes into your town he brings life. Peter and those he calls can’t resist him. They have to follow him to know more. That’s always what Jesus does. He draws us to himself; he sets our hearts on fire.

Of course, he’s always accompanied by the evil of this world. The man with the unclean spirit whom always be there too. “Stay away from us. Get away from us. We want to be left alone. Even if you are the Son of God we want to be left alone.”

“If today you hear his voice harden not your hearts.” What a tragedy that is. not to hear his voice, to harden our hearts.

An Unclean Spirit

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Our gospel reading this Sunday is from the first chapter of the Gospel of Mark.  Jesus  has come from his baptism in the River Jordan; he’s gathered disciples and now he’s living at Peter’s house in Capernaum along the Sea of Galilee.He enters the synagogue in the town and amazes people with his teaching. They’ve never heard anyone like him.

But a man in the synagogue who has an unclean spirit challenges him.  I’m not sure what an unclean spirit is. Certainly the man reacts violently to Jesus. Listen to him shouting out:
“What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”

In other words: “Keep away from us; you’re only going to bring us trouble.” The man just wants to be left alone. Even if Jesus is from God, the man just wants to be left alone. “Get away from us!” he says.

That strong reaction was not limited to the synagogue in Capernaum. It continued as Jesus made his way to Jerusalem. Mark’s gospel insists that others rejected Jesus, sometimes strongly, sometimes by simply ignoring him, and he calls their rejection diabolic.

However wise his teaching, compassionate his healing, loving his words, some rejected Jesus in his lifetime. In the end, his enemies killed him.

We believe the gospel repeats itself, and so it’s repeated today as we relive and experience it.  “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” Can we reject Jesus too?

Doesn’t he stand in our synagogue today, in signs and in faith?

Belief in Jesus Christ is at the heart of everything. “I believe in God, the Father Almighty…I believe in Jesus Christ…I believe in the Holy Spirit.” Believing means hearing Jesus, listening to him, offering ourselves to him, entering into friendship with him, hoping in his strength, waiting patiently to receive what he promises.

Belief is not something we do once; we believe day by day. We’re always dangerously close to losing sight of Jesus. “Leave us alone,” we say, “You want to destroy us.” How easily we prefer isolation to communion with the One God has sent.
Perhaps an unclean spirit is not rare at all. If it’s a spirit that’s cloudy and dark then, when it takes hold of you, you cannot see the Light at all.

Deliver us, Lord, from an unclean spirit.

Peter’s Mother-in-Law

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The gospels tell the good news of Jesus Christ– what he did and said. They don’t tell it all.

We’d like to know more about him, of course, but how about some others the gospels mention in passing?

Like Peter’s mother-in-law, for example, whom Mark’s gospel recalls. After leaving the synagogue at Capernaum where he expelled an unclean spirit from a man, Jesus entered the house of Peter and Andrew where Peter’s mother-in-law has a fever. Not quite as bad as being possessed by an unclean spirit, we may think,  but most of us know a bout with the flu can take  a lot out of you too.

Jesus took her by the hand and helped her up. The fever left her and she waited on them.
That final phrase “and she waited on them” – says a lot.

She was one of those who cooked their meals, washed and mended their clothes, fussed over them when they came home, wanted to know what happened that day, tried to protect them when too many people were knocking on the door to see them. Cook, Cleaner, Advisor, Gatekeeper, Supporter, and much more.

We all know what it means when someone like her waits on us.

Peter’s mother-in-law not only received the blessing of Jesus but kept it alive in what she did. She welcomed Jesus in the way she alone could. Without what she did, do you think he and his disciples could have carried on?

The church exists on many levels. Paul used the analogy of a body. We tend to think it’s just a few that bring the gospel to the world, but it’s never been the work of a few. Many, like Peter’s mother-in-law, have a part in it too.

The church is not made up of “Lone Rangers.” The final chapter of Paul’s Letter to the Romans has a litany of people in the Roman church whom the apostle greets as friends and co-workers. Most of them we know nothing about. Some of them, like Peter’s mother-in-law, probably “waited on him.”