Pilgrim Preaching

John's Holy Spirit Baptism

The Baptism of Jesus

January 8, 2006
Mark 1:4-11

Notes on Structure

John and Those Being Baptized

This week's text has a couple of interesting structural things going on. First, there's a move back and forth between John and those being baptized. In the first half of the text, we hear about John, and then we see everyone—rural people and city dwellers alike—being baptized. In the second half of the text, we hear from John, and then we see Jesus being baptized.

From Sin to Spirit

It also happens that in the first half of the text, the narrator tells us that John's ministry was "a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins," to which the people respond by being baptized and confessing their sins. All good. And all sort of looking backward, in order to prepare for what is to come. In the second half of the text, what "is to come" is here. John speaks of one who will baptize with the Holy Spirit, and then the Holy Spirit descends on Jesus as he is baptized. Repentance mean a turning around, and the text itself turns from a focus on confession and forgiveness of sin to a focus on the one-who-is-to-come becoming present, and a proclamation that the baptism of the Holy Spirit is happening now.

Here are the two structural observations in table form:

Verses	Characters	Notes
1:4	John	Mention of sin.
1:5	People being baptized.	Confession of sin.
1:6-8	John	Mention of Holy Spirit.
1:9-11	Person (Jesus) being baptized.	Appearance of Holy Spirit.

A Couple of Preaching Implications

Water and the Holy Spirit

John performed at least one "Holy Spirit" baptism. Acts makes a strong distinction between John's baptism and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. (See this week's second lesson, Acts 19:1-7.) Yet, for the record, God uses John's water baptism as the time and place to split open the heavens and have the Holy Spirit descend on Jesus. In at least this one place in scripture, a baptism of water and the Holy Spirit coincide. This should offer a caution to those who teach that water baptism is second-rate or incomplete. God uses this water-baptism as a venue for anointing with the Holy Spirit and proclaiming Jesus' status as a Son with whom God is pleased.

Looking Back, Bounding Forward

The focus on sin and forgiveness in the first half of this text is not an end in itself. John preaches a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin. People receive that baptism, confessing their sins. This is astonishing ("All the Judean countryside, and all the people of Jerusalem…), but it is actually small potatoes compared with what will happen in the second half of the text. Something greater than your remorse is here. Something greater even than a whole community's capacity to repent is here. "O, that you would tear open the heavens and come down," Isaiah had pleaded with God (Isaiah 64:1). Here, God does just that. The heavens are torn open. "God is on the loose," as our teacher Donald Juel used to say. The turning back at the first part of this text leads to a bounding forward as Jesus begins his ministry.

Secret Ambition

Mark 10:35-45

I notice some dueling ambitions in this week's gospel reading.

The Ambition of the Brothers
First, there is the ambition of James and John: "Teacher, we want you to do whatever we ask of you," and then the request to sit at the right and left of Jesus in his kingdom. In the Matthean parallel to Mark 10:23-31, Jesus actually talks about the disciples joining him on thrones to judge the twelve tribes of Israel. (This is pericope #255 if you have an Aland Synopsis of the Four Gospels and you want to compare Matt and Mark.) Jesus says, "Truly I tell you, at the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man is seated on the throne of his glory, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold, and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first" (Matt 19:28-30).

In that context, the request of James and John makes more sense (not that Matthew takes this 21st century editor's advice and puts the request right after Jesus' throne speech—he doesn't). The ambition of the brothers is not just to have thrones, but to be seated close to the center of things, "one at your right and one at your left...."

Now the only other reference in Mark to anyone on the right and left of Jesus happens in the passion narrative: "And with him they crucified two bandits, one on his right and one on his left" (Mark 15:27). Asking for places at the right and left of Jesus in his glory is a dangerous prospect, especially here, on the way to Jerusalem, after Jesus has—with plain speech and repeated announcements—identified his destiny with the cross. Jesus tries to tell James and John of the danger when he says, "Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?" They don't get it. They don't understand.

The Ambition of the Ten
Second, there is the ambition of the ten. At least it seems to be ambition that Jesus responds to. The ten are indignant at James and John when they hear that the two brothers have already put in their bid for the best seats in the new rule of God. From the teaching that Jesus gives the twelve (about the gentiles "lording it over" one another), we can infer that the ten were just as interested in rank and place as the two who had just asked Jesus for the best cabinet posts.

The ten, like James and John seem eager for place, status, seats on thrones. How "established" that sounds. I once heard Will Willimon point out that in Acts, verbs for staying put (histēmi and related words) do not often occur in a favorable light. People with "place" are contrasted with people "on the way." The contrast here in Mark is the same. Jesus is on the way to Jerusalem. The disciples want to sit down—in high places of honor.

The Ambition of Jesus
Jesus has a different ambition, for himself and for the twelve. Jesus' ambition for himself is this, "The Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many." Years ago, Michael W. Smith had a hit song and video called, "Secret Ambition." (The video, by the way, has just been re-released on a bonus DVD in Smith's recent album, The Second Decade). Here's the chorus:

“ ”

Nobody knew His secret ambition Nobody knew His claim to fame He broke the old rules steeped in tradition He tore the Holy Veil away Questioning those in powerful position Running to those who called His name (But) Nobody knew His secret ambition Was to give His life away. Michael W. Smith, "Secret Ambition" on I 2 Eye © 1989.

Jesus' ambition was "to give his life away."

Secret Ambition
And truly, this ambition does seem to remain a secret to the disciples. People speculate in all directions about the so-called messianic secret in Mark: why does Jesus tell people to be quiet after he heals them? Here I see a different kind of messianic secret: Jesus' messianic ambition seems to be a secret from the very ones who are following him and who are taken aside for private teaching at every turn. Why do the disciples fail so spectacularly to see what Jesus is telling them so plainly? How is it that the nature of his messianic work is a secret from them, even though he's been speaking of almost nothing else for three chapters?

To ask this question is to notice that we are not really in the position of the disciples in this story. We are in the position of people who can see the disciples getting it wrong. As you read this text, you know something the disciples could not comprehend: Jesus aimed to give his life away in order to reconcile the whole world to God. He was ransoming the disciples who remained so in the dark about his mission, ransoming those crucified at his right and left, ransoming the ones who had manipulated systems of justice to bring about his unjust death.

What does that ransom free you from? What does it free you for?

Seeking

Amos 5:4-7; 10-15
Mark 10:17-31

I wonder if it would be OK to read two extra verses for the OT lesson. The lectionary begins at 5:6. If we start at 5:4, we get additional occurrences of the word, "seek" in the reading that help explain v. 6 and v. 14:

"For thus says the Lord to the house of Israel: Seek me and live; but do not seek Bethel..." (5:4)

"Seek the Lord and live, or he will break out against the house of Joseph like fire..." (5:6)

"Seek good and not evil, that you may live; and so the Lord, the God of hosts will be with you..." (5:14).

About Bethel: "Not one stone will be left standing on another."

What about that "do not seek Bethel..." in 5:4? What is the alternative to seeking God? In the Harper Collins Study Bible, Gene M. Tucker writes, "Seeking the Lord is contrasted with making pilgrimages to the famous religious centers at Bethel, Gilgal, and Beer-sheba, which are destined for exile and destruction" (p 1362). Ouch. Even religious activity can be beside the point and disconnected from seeking the Lord.

In 1981, I sat in the Riverside Church and listened to the Rev. Will Campbell preach. He is a white Baptist preacher who had been active in the Civil Rights movement. (Brother to a Dragonfly is his autobiography and memoir of some of that time.) I don't remember the text Will was preaching; it might have been this week's gospel (Mark 10:17-31). I was 19 years old and passionately interested in changing the world for the better.  I took a bus and the subway every week from my dorm room in Brooklyn to the Riverside Church because William Sloane Coffin's preaching indicated to me that these people were interested in changing the world for the better too.

This is what I remember of Will Campbell's sermon that Sunday. He looked out on that Upper West Side congregation dressed so well and sitting in the gothic cathedral that Rockefeller money built, and he said, "You have invited me here today to talk to you about ending racism, but I think what you actually want me to tell you is how you can end racism and keep all of this. [He gestured to the sanctuary and everything around him.] I am afraid I don't have an answer for you."

I remember nothing else of the sermon. Did the preacher get out of that corner he had painted himself into? Within the allotted time for the sermon, did he leave us with hope for "incremental change," or something? I don't remember, but I have never forgotten that lone comment from the sermon.  It seemed to me that he was saying, "You all want something you can't have: justice not rolling down like waters, but justice practiced 'in moderation.'"

"Seek me and live."

I love it that these words are in the mouth of God in v. 4. It reminds me of the picture of God in Is. 65:1 ("I was ready to be sought out by those who did not ask, to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, 'Here I am, here I am,' to a nation that did not call on my name.") God sounds like a child playing "Hide and Seek" who is bored sitting alone and wants to be found. Sadly, the other kids aren't interested. The difference, of course, is that the stakes for this game are way higher: "Seek me and live." Read: there's death where you've chosen to roam.

"There's death where you've chosen to roam."

Almost exactly a year ago, my Old Testament colleague Fred Gaiser preached a sermon on Is. 5:1-7, titled, "Love Song for the Vineyard." Here's the video as a Windows media file.  It takes about 20 seconds on my computer for the Windows Media Player to open up, but it's worth the wait. The text and sermon begin at about 5:00 minutes into the file. It remains one of my favorite sermons of all time, an example of prophetic preaching accomplished standing under the word and with tears in one's eyes, rather than any eagerness to see one's addressees incinerated, which often seems to be the way of present-day pulpit prophets.  If you're feeling called to preach the law this week (and the texts could well inspire a bold statement of the law), watch Fred's way with law and gospel here.

Jesus & Divorce

Mark 10:1-16

Here are some thoughts that Paul Palumbo and I came up with this afternoon:

This is only a test....

Maybe it means something that this is a test for Jesus (verse 2). Is the real conversation that the Pharisees want to have about divorce, or about something else?

A man shall leave...

Paul wondered if humans beings got this wrong from the get go. That is, maybe a man is supposed to leave his family (as it says in Genesis and here), so if we give anyone "away" at weddings, it should be the groom rather than the bride. Maybe there was a word here to help us break apart patriarchy (or alleviate testosterone poisoning--Paul's words, not mine), and we missed it.

One flesh...

We agreed that this really happens, hence the great pain around the end of a marriage, no matter what the circumstances. There's a gaping hole, a lot of blood lost, and a big scar--which pop psychologists might prefer to call "baggage" but which is probably more accurately referred to as scar tissue.

Healing Jesus...

All the talk of tearing flesh from flesh made me think about what Jesus has done in relationship to disfigured people so far in the gospel:

• He cleanses a leper (1:40-45).
• He forgives the sins of a paralytic and gives him back his legs (2:1-12).
• He restores the man with the whithered hand (3:1-5).
• He feels power go forth from him when a woman with a hemorrhage touches him for healing, and
• He takes hold of a corpse's hand to raise a dead little girl to life again (5:21-43).
• He heals the Syrophoenician woman's daughter from a distance.
• He puts his fingers in a deaf man's ears and on the man's tongue to give him hearing and speech (7:31-37).
• He puts spit on the eyes of a blind man, then tries again in order to get the healing right (8:22-26).
• He takes a boy with an unclean spirit by the hand and heals him (9:14-28)

I'm struck by how "in the flesh" all of these activities are. Jesus is a body, healing other bodies. If Jesus can do all these things, surely he can also heal the flesh-from-flesh wound that divorce is.

Private teaching to the disciples...

I don't have any idea what to make of vv. 10-12. We have probably all heard sermons that tell us how "radically egalitarian" this is, since traditionally only men could be the victims of a woman's adultery, not the other way around. Ho hum. I take no comfort in an even-handed statement of all remarriage as adultery. And frankly, the New Testament witness elsewhere offers no similar blanket statements, but seems instead interested in working out exceptions to the rule (cf. the parallel text in Matthew, and Paul's thoughts on the topic in 1 Cor. 7).

Link of the Week!

My Christian Century piece on Mark 9:30-37 just made Link of the Week on textweek.com. Thanks to Pastor Carrie Scheller of Mt. Olivet Lutheran Church for letting me know. I feel, like, famous!

Start Seeing Jesus

Mark 9:30-37 - Text for September 21, 2003

I wrote a couple of "Living by the Word" segments for the Christian Century on texts for this month. They called this one "Seeing Things." Thank you to The Christian Century for making these segments available online in time for us to use them!

Could it be that the disciples, with all their talk about greatness, were trying only to measure who was best at following Jesus? And would this be so bad, if it were what they were really up to? They may not be such easy marks for ridicule ("They just don't get it!") as we sometimes think. Maybe they were measuring who was the farthest along on the imitatio Christi path. It could be they just had their eyes on that Alpha Master, Jesus, and were only interested in imitating him better than anyone else in the group.

So maybe their motives are good. Yet, regardless of whether they were competing with each other for a type of greatness that did or did not have Jesus as its model, the surprise in the story is that Jesus takes himself out of their line of vision, and puts in front of their eyes, instead, a child. He stands a child in their midst, someone they would never think to look at, let alone look to for a window on true discipleship.