Mark 12:13-17: image is everything

It isn’t surprising that on the heels of Jesus stinging critique of the religious leaders of his day that they would seek to discredit him in some way.  Immediately following Jesus re-telling of the parable of the tenants some Pharisees and Herodians show up attempting to snare him in a legal technicality.  In fact, the Greek word agreusosin is used only here in the New Testament, with its usage elsewhere referring to the snaring of animals.  The hunt is on, and Jesus is the prey being stalked by the religious elites of his day. 

Their flattery is designed to force him into answering the question they pose, and their desire for an answer is understandable.  It would seem that they have cleverly formulated a question that will put Jesus between the proverbial rock and a hard place.  If he says yes, that Jews should pay taxes to Caesar, he is a collaborator with the Roman.  If he says no, he is a revolutionary.  Jesus’ choice is to be so unpopular as to become irrelevant and thus of no threat to the establishment, or to become an insurrectionist and thus a marked enemy of the state.  It was six of one and half a dozen of the other for Jesus’ enemies, who saw the end result being the same, the neutralization of Jesus preaching and teaching. 

      

What those opponents weren’t banking on however, was the cleverness of Jesus’ response.  Indeed, Jesus responds is such a way that ultimately it is the Herodians and Pharisees that are trapped.  By asking for a denarius, Jesus is showing that he doesn’t carry money, or at least not Roman money.  By providing it, his accusers are showing that they carry and make use of Roman coinage.  Before even attempting to answer the question, Jesus has discredited those who asked it.   The coin would have been well-known because of its circulation in everyday use, as is witnessed by their recognition of the image of Caesar.  This is what the coin would have looked like: 

(Courtesy of the Digital Image Archive, Pitts Theology Library, Candler School of Theology, Emory University)

Jesus asks whose eikon, or image, is on the coin.  One side of the coin would have read “Tiberius Caesar, son of divine Augustus”, while the other would have said pontifex maximus, referring to Caesar’s role as high priest of Rome.  Tiberius reigned from 14-37 AD.

So it’s the emperor’s image.  What does that mean for how Christians should respond to political authority?  Paul and Peter, two of the most prominent apostles and leaders of the early church, both instruct Christians to respect the governing authorities.  They understood that peace and political stability make for a good environment in which to preach the gospel.  Paul traveled from Ephesus, to Corinth, to Philippi, to Colossae, and eventually to Rome, on roads built and protected by the Romans.  As a citizen, he enjoyed certain protections.  In a sense, the Roman Empire was a tool that God would use to help spread Christianity.  And yet, Jesus is sure to differentiate between the emperor and God.  The emperor needs your money and your loyalty, so it can be used to maintain, and even expand his domains, his power.  God doesn’t need your money or your loyalty, but he desires your love.  Caesar claims the coins in your pocket because they bear his image, but God claims the person carrying those coins, because that’s what bears the divine image.  Perhaps we should learn something from Jesus here.  He isn’t interested in quibbling over money, wealth, or material possessions.  Instead, he makes a statement about what truly matters, relationships.  When Christ looks at us, he sees someone that bears the image of God, and he desperately wants us to recognize that image in ourselves, and return the love and devotion that he offers us continually.  

“Almighty God,

We come to you, thankful for the grace and the mercy that you continually extend to us.  Help us to examine ourselves, and to discern your image not in our appearance, but in our entire being.  Help us to understand the depth of your love for us, a love so deep that you would send even your own Son to not only call us to repentance, but to die for us as well.  May we return to you the love and devotion that you show toward us each and every day.

We ask this in the name of your beloved son, Jesus Christ,

Amen.”

Mark 8:11-21: the story is the sign

Have you ever tested God?  Most of us would say, "of course not!"  But if we are truly honest with ourselves, there have probably been times in our life where we bartered with God to some extent, asking Him to confirm His presence with a sign, or to reveal the proper path on which to proceed.  Asking for wisdom and insight from God is certainly acceptable, even commendable!  And yet, sometimes what we are doing is less asking for insight, and more trying to commandeer God's agenda so as to make it look more like our own.  When we ask for signs to confirm God's presence, it's usually a sign that we have forgotten the story of God's work in our world.
That's what the Pharisees were doing when they asked for a sign.  Even though Jesus had just fed 4,000 people, they want a sign to specifically confirm that Jesus' is indeed who He claims to be.  What's so wrong with that you may ask?  Many of us are asked to confirm our identity every day, sometimes multiple times a day.  Why would it be so hard for Jesus' to simply give the Pharisees what they want?  To start with, the Pharisees were asking for a form of I.D. that would prove nothing.  If you dig back in your Old Testaments to Deuteronomy 13, you will see that God tells the Israelites that the ability of a prophet to give a sign is not grounds for accepting his message.  A prophet who performs a sign, but then advocates the worship of other gods is to be opposed (read executed).  In other words, the final word on the validity of a prophet's message is not the ability to do signs.  Jesus knows this, and so he refuses to fall into the Pharisees trap.  In fact, in denying their request Jesus' uses language that draws comparisons between the Pharisees, and the generation of the exodus.  He asks "why does this generation demand a sign?  Truly, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation."  It doesn't seem like much on the surface, but the only time the word generation is used in the Bible is when it is referring to a particularly faithless generation.  In referring to the exodus generation, the book of Deuteronomy says "they have dealt corruptly with him; they are no longer his children because they are blemished; they are a crooked and twisted generation." (Deuteronomy 32:5)  In Psalm 95:10 it is said that for forty years God loathed that generation because "they are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways."  Now, by referring to "this generation", Jesus is drawing attention to the similarities between His contemporaries and that faithless group of Israelites from the exodus.
That exodus generation, despite their lack of faith, was promised a new prophet like Moses.  When speaking to Moses, God said "I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers.  And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.  And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him.  But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die."  (Deuteronomy 18:18-20)  As Jesus hung on the cross on that Friday the Pharisees and His other opponents, indeed the entire world, thought that Jesus had been exposed for who He truly was, a false prophet.  Little did they know that Friday's false prophet would become Sunday's Messiah, as God in a twist of irony would use His resurrection to prove- using the Pharisees own logic- that Jesus' message was more than true, it was the very word of God.
So how could they get it so wrong?  How could the Pharisees ask for a sign after Jesus' miraculously feeds 4,000 people?  How can the disciples fails to understand who Jesus is after not one, but two miraculous feedings?  Jesus' warning to avoid the leaven of the Pharisees and Herod is a reference to their constant desire for a sign, it's a warning against a faith based on miracles.  We can see with our eyes and hear with our ears, but if the message never makes it's way to our heart, then faith will never take root.  The imminent preacher and New Testament scholar Fred Craddock once remarked, "the longest distance is that from the head to the heart."  I'm not sure if Craddock came up with that on his own, I suspect he didn't, but it aptly illustrates what Jesus is trying to say here.  The words of Israel's prophets show that this wasn't just an issue in Jesus' day.  Jeremiah would say, "hear this, O foolish and senseless people, who have eyes but see not, who have ears, but hear not." (Jeremiah 5:21)  The word of the Lord came to prophet Ezekiel saying, "Son of man, you dwell in the midst of a rebellious house, who have eyes to see, but see not, who have ears to hear, but hear not, for they are a rebellious house."  Finally, God commissions Isaiah saying: "Go, and say to this people, 'keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive.' Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed." (Isaiah 6:9-10)
The words to the prophet Ezekiel are the ones I find ringing in my ears, "for they are a rebellious house."  God's story is forever unfolding before us, if only we have eyes to see.  By asking for a sign, the Pharisees were ignoring the story and instead going in search of a sign.  They were rebelling by seeking to make God work according to their agenda.  God's work in our world is much larger than one event, however miraculous it may be.  The disciples lived the story, but failed to recognize it's significance.  It wasn't until Jesus' resurrection that we see them finally beginning to understand the scope of what was playing out before their very eyes.  We may know the story, we may have read our Bible cover to cover several times over, but do we grasp it's significance?  More importantly, do we understand that God is continuing to write page after page of the story, all the while longing to see us play our part in the drama as it unfolds according to His plan?

Mark 7:1-13: right game, wrong field

Have you ever been to a professional baseball game?  One of my favorite things to do when I lived in Atlanta was to go to Braves games.  Sometimes they would let Little League teams come and play games on the Braves field.  Of course, things would be a little hard to manage if you had t-ballers trying to play on a field designed for professional adults, so they usually divide the field up and let them play four or five games at a time.  No one judges the children because the bases aren't the standard 90 feet apart, nor do they downplay their ability to hit the ball because it's on a tee.

I mention all of this because in some ways that's what the religious leaders of Jesus day were doing.  They were taking professional standards, and applying them to people who practiced their faith out of joy and devotion.  In this section of Mark, we find the Pharisees and some of the scribes asking Jesus why His disciples eat with "unclean hands."  After all, the Old Testament is very clear about the fact that one should wash up before supper.  

Or is it?  In fact, the practice of ritually washing one's hands was begun for members of the priesthood, and then extended by the Pharisees to all Jews in an effort to produce increased holiness.  While they had good intentions, the end result was the scene we read of, with the Pharisees placing an undo burden on men who were never meant to bear it.  The scribes own response shows that the disciples hadn't actually violated the law, but the oral interpretation of the law given by respected elders and Jewish leaders.  The prophet Isaiah spoke against such legislated morality when he said:

 "because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men, therefore, behold, I will again do wonderful things with this people, with wonder upon wonder; and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the discernment of their discerning men shall be hidden." (Isaiah 29:13-14)

God would send the same message thought Amos, as he railed against a faith that worships God with words, while dishonoring others, and God, with actions:

"I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.  Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the peace offerings of your fattened animals, I will not look upon them.  Take away from me the noise of your songs; to the melody of your harps I will not listen.  But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." (Amos 5:21-24)

Jesus sums up how he sees such behavior by referring to the Pharisees and scribes as hypokrites.  The meaning of the word hypocrites for us in English literally comes from the Greek word which described an actor in a Greek drama who would wear a mask.  If our worship is with words only, and not actions, then all the hymns, songs, and spiritual songs are nothing but a mask hiding the true disposition of our heart.

The attitude described by Isaiah and Amos and condemned by Jesus leads not to faith, but rather to a religion centered on litigation and the letter of the law.  Jesus refers to instances where men were "pledging" money to God or the temple, and because of this preventing it's use in meeting the needs of one's own father and mother.  An interesting note is that in pledging the money, the man retained possession of it.  In other words, the man had in his possession money that could be used to meet the needs of his own parents, but it had been "earmarked for God", so he refused to use it.  Jesus makes it explicitly clear that this is not what God had in mind.  Jesus is not saying that a man should break his vow, but that the vow should never have been made it the first place, because it violates the spirit of God’s law.  Obedience to one commandment was never intended to nullify another.  Rather than using the law to withhold things from one another, the people of Jesus day should have seen the law as a driving force for justice and compassion.  If they had read the entire law, they would have come across sections like Leviticus 19 that not only list the rules, but also God's reason for giving them, "but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord." (Leviticus 19:18)  Jesus insists on viewing the whole law, especially in light of its purpose, to be a blessing to mankind.  Hopefully we can same the same thing about our faith.  

Mark 3:1-6: saving Sabbath from the Sabbath

We've seen it emerge already as a theme throughout the gospel of Mark: what is the Sabbath?  The discussion, and indeed the confrontation over what the Sabbath was and is comes to a head in this episode involving Jesus, the Pharisees and Herodians, and a man with a withered hand.  Parallel to the development of the conversation over Sabbath-keeping is the marshaling together of Jesus' opponents.  His adversaries started out as merely scribes (2:6), and their resistance was passive and implicit.  Before long we get a clearer picture of the opposition, as the scribes are identified as scribes of the Pharisees (2:16).  By the end of Mark 2 we see the Pharisees themselves enter into the discussion (2:24), and now by the beginning of Mark 3 we see that a formidable alliance of Pharisees and Herodians (3:6) has taken an active role in opposing Jesus and his ministry. 
I mention all of this to demonstrate that the Pharisees and Herodians were not objective judges when it comes to evaluating Jesus and his actions.  The word used in verse 2 is actually "observe", and it is the same word that would be used to describe a physician making a medical diagnosis, or interestingly enough, to describe someone taking part in a religious observance.  Given that all of this takes place in the synagogue, I think it is fair to say that the Pharisees and Herodians true religion has ceased to be the worship of Yahweh, and has become the judgment of those around them.  At some point, all of us have been guilty of judging a person's actions not based on their merit, but based on our opinion of that person.  Such attitudes blinded the Pharisees and the Herodians to the Messiah standing in their midst, and more than likely they blind us to the God-given worth of the person whose actions we pre-judge. 
As readers of the gospel, we have seen enough of Jesus' character to suspect that he is about to do something about the condition of this man with the withered hand.  Our suspicions are confirmed when he tells the man to "stand up", or more literally "rise up", a word that is used not only to refer to the physical action of standing or rising, but is also used to refer to and describe the resurrection itself.  Jesus is about to reveal the true power of the Sabbath in a way that no one could imagine.  This man who would have been barred from Temple worship (see Leviticus 21:16ff), is about to be made whole again through the power of Christ.  Sensing their silent judgment, Jesus even gives the Pharisees and chance to weigh in on the matter.  "Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?"  He asks them this question knowing that as much as they revere the Sabbath, they have deemed certain actions in the past as being acceptable, perhaps the most prominent of the "exceptions" being the Maccabees self-defense on the Sabbath (see I Maccabees 2:41, a non-canonical book that fills in many of the historical gaps from the inter-testimental period).  It is true that the Maccabees were the liberators of Israel, and that they were acting in self-defense, but nonetheless they worked (fought a battle) and killed on the Sabbath.  Jesus point becomes all the more obvious: if exceptions can be made for killing, how can exceptions not be made for healing?  The power of Jesus argument, and it's irrefutable nature are demonstrated in the silence of his opponents. 
In the end, the tragedy is that the Pharisees and Herodians view of the Sabbath, and their prejudice against Jesus, caused them to miss what should have been obvious, especially to those learned in the law.  As Jesus healed the withered hand of the man, they should have seen before their eyes the actual fulfilled of Isaiah 35:
"The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus; it shall blossom abundantly and rejoice with joy and singing.  The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon.  They shall see the glory of the Lord, the majesty of our God.  Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees.  Sat to those who have an anxious heart, 'be strong, fear not! Behold, your God will come in vengeance, with the recompense of God.  He will come and save you." (Isaiah 35:1-4, italics mine)
The Pharisees and the Herodians, the religious leaders of the day, could have used their energy to speak courage into the anxious heart.  Instead, they condemn themselves, ironically enough, by plotting to take a life on the Sabbath.  How absurd their judgment of Jesus' healing actions looks when viewed against the backdrop of their own destructive scheming on the Sabbath.  Thankfully, Jesus plans are not thwarted by judgmental attitudes, whether they belong to the Pharisees, the Herodians, or ourselves.  You see, Jesus did much more than heal on the Sabbath, he healed the Sabbath.  He restored our vision so that we can see what Sabbath truly is; not a ceasing from all work, but an entering into the rest of God. 
  
  

Mark 2:18-28: fasting and feasting

A lot of my friends have gotten married recently, which I guess is a sign that I am at that point in life where an incurable case of adulthood is setting in.  At first, when Jesus used wedding imagery to explain the concept of fasting, I was more than a little confused.  And yet, having seen so many of my friends and their fiances prepare for weddings, I think I understand now the point that Jesus was trying to make.  In essence, fasting is a means to an end.  If you know a girl who is engaged, then you probably know a girl on a diet.  I have heard it referred to as the wedding dress diet, among other things.  The months leading up to the wedding are spent in physical preparation.  More than likely, the bride has bought a dress that is a little too small, so that every time she sees that several hundred (or more than likely several thousand) dollars hanging there in her closet, she will find renewed motivation to lose a few pounds.  She wants to look her very best for that special day.  If, on the day of her wedding, that bride refused to eat or drink anything at the reception, people would think she was crazy.  She did all that dieting BEFORE the wedding so that she could look her best, and fully enjoy the wedding itself.  The wedding is a distinctly different context than the time leading up to the wedding.  The scribes who challenge Jesus and his disciples regarding their fasting practices are making a category mistake, they have failed to recognize that the wedding day has indeed arrived.  When we understand the discussion about fasting in this light, Jesus' comments about the patch and the wineskins make a lot more sense.  Jesus has brought something new into the world.  Just as we wouldn't mix old and new fabric, or put new wine into old wineskins, neither should we try to interpret Jesus actions through old categories and try to force Him to conform to the "old" way of doing things.  Jesus has begun something new on the earth, and our ability to recognize that will ultimately determine whether we are able to truly embrace this new work of God among us.
It is a quick, and yet appropriate transition to go from the topic of fasting to the topic of feasting.  The Pharisees go from questioning Jesus and his disciples about their fasting methods, to questioning them about how they eat.  Perhaps the Pharisees call to mind certain religious people you have met, whose primary religious experience seems to be to critique the religious experience of others.  The tragic irony of the Pharisees is that they were so tied up in the knowledge and keeping of their own law, that they failed to know their own story.  As Jesus points out to them, his disciples are not the first men to "break the rules" in order to satisfy their hunger.  David and his men did far more than pluck some grain on the Sabbath, they actually ate the Bread of Presence reserved only for the priest!  If God was willing to let something like that slide, do you really think he is concerned about a few heads of grain being plucked on the Sabbath?  Again, the Pharisees have made a critical error in assessing the situation.  Earlier they tried to use old categories to interpret this new thing that Jesus was bringing about in His ministry.  Here, they forget the simple fact that the rules were not made to enslave humankind, but rather to liberate it.  The rules were given to us so that we would know how to interact with each other, and with God.  It reminds me of an incident that happened at Clemson University a few years ago.  One of the football players came from a very bad home where his mother was addicted to drugs.  After he left to go to school, things destabilized even further and he decided that it was unsafe for his younger brother to stay in that environment any longer.  He brought him up to Clemson to live with him, but ran into a problem.  NCAA rules prohibited him from getting a job to support his brother, and he was forbidden from receiving any aid from those in the Clemson community.  To receive aid, whether it was canned goods, some cash to buy groceries, or even some used clothes, would be seen as an improper benefit.  Thankfully ESPN got word of the situation, and ran a story that in essence shamed the NCAA into making an exception to the rules in the instance of this young man.  The rules had been created for a good reason; to protect student athletes and to ensure fair competition.  However, in being so rigid and legalistic the NCAA was actually using the rules to harm this football player and his brother.  It begs the question, how do we use the rules?  Do we see them as a blessing and a means of protecting ourselves and others, or do we wield them as a weapon with which to judge and harm others?  How we answer will determine whether we look more like Jesus, or one of his opponents.