Sermon from June 11, 2000
C.S. Lewis tells the story of speaking to members of the British Royal Air Force about Christian belief. "An old, hard-bitten officer got up and said, 'I've no use for all that stuff. But, mind you, I'm a religious man too. I know there's a God. I've felt Him: out alone in the desert at night: the tremendous mystery. And that's just why I don't believe all your neat little dogmas and formulas about Him. To anyone who's met the real thing they all seem so petty and pedantic and unreal,'" (Mere Christianity, 131).

The version of that point of view that I have heard most often goes like this. "I don't have to be in church to worship God. I like to be out in nature. I feel closer to God there than I do in a stuffy church service."

People who say such things are wrong, because their doctrine of isolation goes against the nature of the kingdom of God. When we hear about the kingdom of God, two words ought to at once come to mind: love and authority. The kingdom of God means God's exercise of authority over ever-increasing circles of human life in love. But love has to do, not with isolation but with social relationships, like worshiping together. And authority has to do with God's governance of His people, which is a communal affair. Doctrinal statements are a necessary part of that governance.

At the same time, Christianity clearly encourages times and places of solitude. In Mark 1:35 we saw Jesus rise early, go out to a lonely place and pray. The long history of the Church has a sustained tradition of communion with God in solitude, even though it always tests the results of that solitude by the received doctrines of the Church.

Both crowds and solitude appear in today's passage in Mark. I want you to see the purpose of both. I want to end with reflections and a challenge about communion with Christ. Look with me at Mark 3:7-19.

Verse 7 offers two powerful statements about Jesus. The first one says, Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the lake. No wonder Jesus withdrew. Do you remember Mark 3:6? Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus. Withdrawal made good sense, but also it had symbolic power.

Mark never again reports Jesus to be present in the Capernaum synagogue. In fact, He appears only one more time in a synagogue – in His hometown of Nazareth – and that is negative. If, as I believe, Jesus intended to show a new way of being Israel, the people of God, He was going to do it outside the synagogue. The other statement in verse 7 suggests that He might have success in doing that.

A large crowd from Galilee followed. Scenes like this characterized Jesus' public life. He did nothing to discourage them. It is just the sort of mass appeal He had to have if He intended to start a national revolution. Verse 8 tells just how broad His appeal had become. When they heard all he was doing, many people came to him from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, and the regions across the Jordan and around Tyre and Sidon.

This goes well beyond Galilee. Jerusalem and Judea represent the southern half of the country. Tyre and Sidon represent an area outside the northern boundaries of Israel. Idumea and the regions across the Jordan represent territories in between. All these people had come to Galilee, the center of Jesus' ministry. Implied in this gathering is a remarkably effective means of communication. Word about Jesus got about from one end of the country to the other and even beyond its borders. For people looking for a political solution to Jewish problems, the crowds gave reason to think Jesus might be able to provide it. However, verses 9-10 tell a more complicated story.

Because of the crowd he told his disciples to have a small boat ready for him, to keep the people from crowding him. The Greek word Mark used here may likely mean crush. He needed to get into the boat to keep from being trampled. Verse 10 identifies the unruly crowd. For he had healed many, so that those with diseases were pushing forward to touch him. They had not come seeking to overthrow the Romans. All these people had come seeking relief from physical suffering.

Of course, that is exactly what made Jesus a political threat. After all, if He healed them, who knows what these people might be willing to do, if He asked them to do it? When large numbers of people take to the streets, anything might happen. Maybe they thought God had raised Him up to vanquish the Romans. The trouble was that He was not acting like a political revolutionary. Look at verses 11-12.

Whenever the evil spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, "You are the Son of God." Mark called Jesus the Son of God in Mark 1:1. The Voice from heaven called Jesus my Son in Mark 1:11. Now, the evil spirits call Him the Son of God. Nowhere does Mark give a precise explanation of that name. He leaves us to find an explanation from the composite picture of Jesus He presents for 16 chapters.

In the meantime verse 12 says, But he gave them strict orders not to tell who he was. You will be amazed at the number of times Jesus asks people to be quiet about Himself or something He has done. Mark has peppered his gospel with ample evidence but little explanation of Jesus' reticence.

Now, if you are Jesus, what do you do with all this public interest that you have awakened? What happened next offers dramatic insight into Jesus' intentions. Verse 13 reports a mountaintop retreat. Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him.

All lovers of solitude will take pleasure in this scene: out in nature, up on the mountain with your closest friends, "far from the madd'ing crowd." We may need to point out that Jesus did not go there to get away from it all. He went there and asked His friends to join Him, so that they might prepare to go back into it all.

Verse 14 reminds me of the event we read in Mark 1:35-38. Jesus had arisen early, gone out to a lonely place, and there prayed. All lovers of solitude take pleasure in that scene too. Simon and those with him had found Jesus and asked Him to come back to Capernaum, because crowds were seeking Him.

Do you remember Jesus' response? Jesus replied, "Let us go somewhere else – to the nearby villages – so I can preach there also. That is why I have come." Those last six words spoke eloquently of Jesus' intentions. "That is why I have come." This Man knew what He was about. He was not acting randomly; He was acting according to some clear vision of where He was to go next and what He was to do. Capernaum mattered. Other places mattered also.

Something like that was happening again in the solitude of the mountaintop. Verses 14-15 say, He appointed twelve – designating them apostles – that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach and to have authority to drive out demons. Mark's language is heavy with purpose. Three words carry what Jesus intended: appointed ... designating ... send them out.

He appointed twelve. Throughout Mark we must see in Jesus' actions His intention to show Israel a new way of being the people of God. To appoint twelve men said symbolically, "I am starting a new Israel, and here are my replacements for the twelve sons of Jacob." He designated them apostles. They were to be men with a mission. The mission He sent them out on was to preach and to have authority to drive out demons. In other words, He appointed them to do what He was already doing.

In the context of that mountaintop solitude something like an organization was coming into existence. People might or might not think Jesus had political motives for what He was doing, but clearly He had gone up into the solitude of the mountain with a collection of followers, and then had come down from the mountain and into the jungle of life with a cadre of disciples in order to expand what had been going on before. Verses 16-19 give us a list of the twelve men He appointed, designated, and sent out.

These are the twelve he appointed: Simon (to whom he gave the name Peter); James son of Zebedee and his brother John (to them he gave the name Boanerges, which means Sons of Thunder); Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.

Remarkably, we know nothing else about Bartholomew, James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddeaus. We would know nothing else about Philip, Thomas, and Andrew, if it were not for the Gospel of John. There we know Thomas for his intractable skepticism and his passionate confession of Jesus, "My Lord and my God." Tradition says that he became the apostle to India.

Philip appears in the Gospel of John as someone who is always bringing people to Jesus. John says Philip was the disciple who pointed out that eight months' wages would not buy enough food for 5000 people. He comes across as a very down-to-earth man – very handy to have around among the egos of the other apostles.

Andrew first made his brother, Simon, aware of Jesus, and it was Andrew who, John says, made Jesus aware of the five loaves of bread and two fish at the feeding of the 5000. He seems to have had more authority than Philip among the disciples. We associate Andrew with Episcopalian churches, many of which bear his name.

Simon (Peter), James son of Zebedee and his brother John head the list, because they were most important. I will not say anything else about them, because we will meet them over and over. Mark presents them powerfully. An ancient witness, Papias, said that Mark based his gospel on Peter's sermons.

Only three gospels even mention Simon the Zealot. Calling him the Zealot is intriguing, because Zealot was the name given to political agitators, who were dedicated to the violent overthrow of the Romans. This Simon may have come from their ranks. If so, I would like to have heard conversation between him and Matthew, whom Mark calls Levi in Mark 2:13-14. Matthew the tax collector, collaborator with the Romans, and Simon the Zealot, dedicated to their overthrow. Why would Jesus have included them in the same collection of disciples?

Finally, Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him and then committed suicide. John's Gospel says he was a thief, but otherwise, the gospels say very little about him, except that he betrayed Jesus. It was the defining moment of his life, whatever else Judas himself may have done with his life.

In verses 7-19 Mark lets readers know that, despite the plot against His life by Pharisees and Herodians in Capernaum, His influence did not diminish. He may have withdrawn from the synagogue, because He was no longer welcome there, but He did not withdraw into isolation. His whole ministry continued to be intensely public. It reached into all Israel and beyond.

Jesus encouraged that and also organized His efforts so as to sustain and increase it. He continued to show that He had authority where it counted – with people. He continued to demonstrate the presence of God's love and authority in the public arena. He continued to show that He had what it took to start a revolution, although He had in mind a kind of revolution different from that of people then and people now, who think politics is where the action is.

But alongside His public life He also encouraged something indispensable to His public life. Did you notice what He appointed the apostles to do, even before they were to preach and cast out demons? Verse 14 says, He appointed twelve – designating them apostles – that they might be with him. He called for an intensely intimate relationship between Himself and the twelve men He appointed as apostles, and He meant to develop this relationship in many times of relative solitude.

It is right here that the story of our journey through this world merges again with the story of His journey through this world. Spending time with Jesus has long been honored in Christian spirituality. How do we do that?

We commune with Him in a way that we may fail to recognize appropriately. In Matthew 18:20 Jesus said, "Where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them." One reason I sometimes feel this gathering lasts too short a time is because everything we do here is the flesh and blood means by which we commune with Jesus Christ. He is with us. The words of the songs we sing, our prayers, our silence, our greetings to each other, the reading and reflection of scripture, best of all Holy communion – all serve as the means of communing with Him. This is how we are with Him.

Furthermore, we commune with Him in the four gospels. Haven't you ever received a letter from someone you missed and devoured it? Didn't you feel closer to the person after reading and rereading the letter? Didn't you miss them even more? Psychologically, the four gospels work this way to give us a sense of communion with Jesus, even though we have never seen Him. Read through Mark with me. Take the passage from today, and allow it to come before your mind each day. Place yourself in the scene. Hear what Jesus said and watch what Jesus did, as though you had been there. Imagine how you might have responded, had you been there.

Bring to this interaction with the Gospels your maturity. The Gospels were not written by children or for children. They were written for people caught up in the unending business of living life to the end. So, bring your aspirations, fears, questions, doubts – bring your life to this interaction with the Gospels.

Third, if you are a leader in this congregation, you especially need to have this disciplined, on-going communion with Jesus Christ. Being clever in what you do everyday is not enough. Having a good education is not enough. Showing that you are a person who gets things done is not enough. These are all splendid gifts to bring to Christ. But the Church needs leaders who are in communion with Jesus Christ.

Finally, if you are under 40, develop the habits of communion with Christ, and the sooner the better. Don't wait till your children are less demanding. Don't wait until your career is well established. The longer you wait, the more difficult it will be to develop these habits of holiness. The renewal of the Church in the next generation will come through you who are in a disciplined, on-going communion with Christ.