We had a wonderful annual meeting last Sunday. Thank you to those who helped prepare, set-up, cook, attended, and clean-up. It’s good to get together as community!
Congratulations to our new vestry members Brittney Kish Lightsey, Brantley Nicholson, Robert Goodman, and Susan Locke.
This Thursday, Feb 2nd at 6:30 pm, we will have a worship service with Eucharist for the Feast of the Presentation of our Lord Jesus Christ in the Temple, also called Candlemas. I hope many of you can make it.
The gospel for Morning Prayer this morning is from Mark 8:11-16. In it Jesus is being harassed by some religious leaders. They are requesting a sign that he is from God. They are actually creating a space to deny his authority to do the things he is already doing, such as feeding and healing. Why would they want to deny Jesus that opportunity? There were many false prophets wandering around in 1st century Palestine. Care had to be made by religious and civil authorities that these prophets and preachers were not taken too seriously by the people. Order had to be maintained, so asking for signs of authenticity was quite common and cleared the field of any challenge to power to authority. Jesus said he wouldn’t give a sign, thus upping the ante in challenging the power to the establishment.
For Mark, Jesus’ works of power, the actions of feeding the hungry and healing the sick, were signs of God’s work. What more signs were needed? So, what if Jesus had given a mighty sign of his power to show the establishment who He was? If Jesus had given in and showed a mighty sign, then I believe the whole ministry of Jesus would have been about the sign; and his ministry would have been hijacked by those demanding a sign and they would have used the sign to govern, to control. We’ve seen the ministry of God in the past and the present attempt to be hijacked, without the mighty sign that every generation seems to request. God’s work of governing is about building relationship between hearts, through love, not controlling people’s actions. I have no knowledge of a theocracy that was ever about love. Peace. Ben+