is a cosmic struggle between the powers of evil and the powers of God? People who sign up as Christians today seem not to listen to the baptismal vows that are spoken in church which ask, “Do you renounce the spiritual forces of wickedness, and reject the evil powers of this world?”
The words are straightforward and clear, but we domesticate them. We tame the wild beasts and reduce Satan to a Halloween costume. In so doing we lose the reality that we are in a battle. The beasts seem tame but in fact sneak up on us in the guise of the lure to be less than who we are by trying to be more than who we are.
Jesus is driven into the wilderness because his Father knows he has to deal with the reality of what he is going to face the rest of his short-lived life. This is to be Jesus’ boot camp. It is an interesting theological point that God figures that Jesus needs this testing. Jesus is not yet equipped to battle the powers of wickedness. He must first experience boot camp.
If Jesus needs to be equipped, I wonder if we need preparation in order to get ready for the work of discipleship. What would our boot camp need to look like in order to make us ready?
Notice that God does not do the tempting. That is Satan’s role. Still is. Wouldn’t it be great if Satan really was in a Halloween costume? Now the rascal has gone underground and reaches up from within to lead us in all sorts of directions. In the wilderness Satan can be seen for who Satan is: that which opposes God and good. Satan no longer needs the costume. The wilderness is always just around the corner.
Jesus does push-ups in the wilderness with Satan standing over in the shade offering him lemonade and attempting to persuade Jesus that all this conditioning work is not needed. Matthew and Luke, in their Gospel accounts, set up the lemonade stand for all the world to see. Mark has the reader fill in what the temptations might look like.
Angels are in the wilderness too. As with the temptations, Mark does not put wings on the angels. For Mark, angels are simply God’s way of getting to Jesus while not preventing him from doing his needed conditioning. The angels offer Jesus lemonade too, but only after he finishes the push-ups. You can bet Jesus has a time of it in the wilderness not only deciding which voices to listen to but when to listen to them. We have the same problem.
Satan and God can sometimes offer us the same thing. Timing is important. Grace is sometimes best utilized after the work is done, especially if the work is the necessary work one has to do on the interior life.
At other times, what God offers and what Satan offers are quite different. The choice is clear, but the problem comes when we have not done our necessary push-ups and therefore find ourselves not being able to resist Satan using only our own strength.
Angels are still available if called upon. Do not expect angels to be winged creatures any more than you can expect demons to be pitchforked, but angels are listening. God knows how lonely the wilderness can get. If Jesus needed help out there, I suppose we do too.
Mark 1:14–15 Jesus’ Message
Mark does not waste words. Perhaps Mark is not the favorite Gospel for preachers. We preachers tend to use a lot of words to get our points across. However, most of us are told in seminary that we need to express the main idea of our sermons in one sentence.
Mark knows how to be succinct. He uses one sentence to set the place, and another to state the main idea. John’s business is done; it is time for the main attraction. For Mark nothing more needs to be said about John.
Other Gospel writers find themselves not able to get rid of crusty old John so easily, but for Mark, John’s role is simply to set the stage and step off. Mark then places Jesus in Galilee where he will spend the next eight chapters. Jesus’ role, according to Mark, is to “proclaim the good news of God.” Here we have a concise phrase which says it all but which can mean many different things.
In the movie City Slickers, a city slicker on vacation is playing at being a cowboy. He and a few friends pay big bucks to be with some real cowboys in a cattle drive. Sitting uncomfortably on a horse, the city slicker looks up into the eyes of Curly, a rugged cowboy of few words who acts as if he just couldn’t care less about these cowboy wannabes from the city.
Curly looks down from his horse into the eyes of the city boy and asks, “You know what the secret of life is?”
“No, what is it?” the intimidated wannabe replies.
Curly raises his leather-glove-covered hand and points to the sky with one finger. Then he gazes at his solitary raised finger and drawls, “It’s this.”
Curious, the city slicker questions,” And what is that?”
With an enigmatic smile, Curly responds, “That is what you have to find out.”
Jesus raises his index finger in the air and tells us that the secret of life is this, the good news of the kingdom of God. And what is this good news about the kingdom of God? Jesus now invites us, “Come and let’s find out.”
Part of the good news is about the timing. It seems that whatever this is, it has “come near,” it is “at hand.” What people in Mark’s Gospel will discover is that the reason this is at hand is that he has come near. Jesus is the dawning of something entirely new.
The good news is that the secret is revealed. The not-so-good news to many who will listen to this secret of the meaning of life is that they are going to have to turn around from their old ways. The word Jesus uses is “repent.”
Part of the secret of life was, and is, to turn around, take a look, and go in a different direction. To stay on the same old, tired course is not what Jesus comes to offer. The kingdom of God has something to do with change and new beginnings. Many will find out that this change is not a matter of a slight alteration but rather a radical change in direction.
This is not going to be a matter of putting a new roof over an old roof. This repentance means tearing off the old roof and first letting the light in. Then comes the new roof. All through Mark’s Gospel Jesus will keep that one finger raised. People will ask what the raised finger means and Jesus will tell them. Some people will start tearing off shingles, other people will try simply to put a new roof over an old one, and many more people will decide that their old roof is fine, “thank you very much!”
Mark 1:16–20 Calling the First Disciples
Do you remember the first time you fell in love? The words in such a phrase are well used because it is usually indeed a falling. And falling in love can be a glorious thing. But what happens when you get up again after falling? Of course no one dares asks such a question. Falling in love is not supposed to be rational. Falling in love is falling into passion. To be blind to reason is part of the fun of falling in love.
Life is full of hard decisions and unexpected tragedy. Falling in love is one of the best parts of the script of life that we do not write. I hope you have been able to fall in love at least once, even if there was pain involved later on—and there usually is.
If you understand falling in love, or understand it as much as any human can, you can remotely understand how the first disciples simply leave everything to follow Jesus. It is a passionate decision. You can bet that Zebedee, the father of James and John, sure tries to knock some reason into his two headstrong, in-love sons. He needs those boys to help run the fishing business and here they are jumping out of the boat and into another life.
Zebedee overhears Jesus saying that he will make his boys “fishers of men.” This frightened father probably says something like, “Well that’s fine, Jesus, but who is going to catch the regular old
