Faithful Living: Not for the Faint of Heart

Mark 1: 9-15

Roger Lynn

March 5, 2017

1st Sunday in Lent

(click here for the audio for this sermon)

There is a popular belief that faith is supposed to be “nice.” “Gentle Jesus, sweet and mild” is a phrase that sums up how we often think about all things religious. Just take your problems to God and everything will be fine. We understand God to be the great calm in the midst of the storm. And all of that is true. Countless people down through the ages have found comfort and peace in the midst of life’s turmoil by opening themselves to God’s presence. Following the way of Christ can lead to a life filled with meaning and purpose.

And yet . . . there is more to the story than just calm, gentle sweetness. Faithful living, in all of its fullness, is not for the faint of heart. Faithful living is about all of life, and not all of life is neat and tidy. Not all of life is sweetness and light. As we begin this season of Lent, we find an opportunity to open ourselves to the shadows of life, and discover the fullness of God’s presence even there.

In Mark’s telling of the story of Jesus’ baptism, and wilderness experience, and beginning ministry, we find sketched out in powerful brevity a journey of faith which embraces the shadows. In these few brief verses here at the beginning of Mark’s Gospel, we see revealed a faith which does not shrink from the fullness of life, even when that fullness threatens to overwhelm us. Jesus enters fully into the ancient ritual of baptism as a path to experiencing God’s presence. And what he finds is more, perhaps, than he ever bargained for. The heavens are ripped open. The very fabric of the universe is torn asunder. Everything he ever thought he understood about the way things are is suddenly cast in a new light. “You are my beloved!” is the message he receives in that moment. 

And here we might be tempted to fall back on comforting thoughts of sweetness and light. But Mark simply will not allow us to go there. “And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.” (Mark 1:12) In the understanding of that time and that place, the wilderness was not a place normal, sane people went. It was wild. It was not safe. Only prophets and crazy people went out into the wilderness. Because there, beyond the edge of safety, you encountered yourself and you encountered God. Life simply could not remain unchanged. And so it is when we dare to spend time in the wilderness of our own souls, where we encounter the fears and sorrows and doubts and regrets that haunt us. For us, as it was for Jesus, life on the other side will be powerfully changed. In his book “Wilderness Spirituality,” Rodney Romney writes about exploring our personal wilderness, “It is usually futile to ask why suffering comes to us. The greater question is to ask, What can I learn from this experience? The soul will help us listen for what suffering will teach. Every experience has the possibility of being a place of healing and growth, just as every person and creature has the possibility of being a bringer of joy. As we give the soul opportunity to reveal itself, and as we live the kind of life that fosters depth and interiority, we will discover a new power and peace.” (p. 41) Wilderness experiences are frequently not what we would choose. And they are often what shapes our lives in profound ways. 

It is absolutely essential that we pay attention to the order in which Mark tells us this story. In verse 14 of chapter one Jesus begins his public ministry. This doesn’t happen after the baptism. It happens after the wilderness. Only after Jesus has experienced the fullness of life, including the shadow places of his wilderness, and has come through that experience with a new sense of his own wholeness, is he then ready to begin proclaiming the message that “The time is fulfilled, and the reign of God is at hand...” (Mark 1:15) God is here, now, in the midst of us. Not just when life is sweetness and light. Not just when everything is going well. Not just after we are through fixing whatever is broken with us and the world. Here, now, even in the shadows. Even in a world where John the baptizer has been arrested, and will ultimately be executed. Without the wilderness experience, Jesus’ words are just so much hollow, empty rhetoric. Rich, powerful, honest faith embraces even the shadows of life and finds at the heart of the darkness . . .  the presence of God. In the words of the psalmist, “Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light around me become night,’ even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.” (Psalm 139:7-12)

Lucy Leu is a Certified Trainer in Nonviolent Communication. In this poem I see her giving expression to this same reality – a reality where wholeness is the pathway to God.

At the hearth of your heart

make a circle.

Invite all the bits of yourself

to come, sit by the fire.

This pressure in the chest,

That heat spreading through the cheeks,

This feeling of numbness,

That feeling of rage,

The thought that says, “They’re jerks,”

The thought that says, “I’m nobody,”

The need to be understood,

The yearning to be loved,

And the orphans peering in, noses pressed against the cold window,

And the shadows lumbering in the basement closet,

Invite them too, for there is space for them and more:

You are big.

You are more than the pounding in the temples –

It doesn’t overwhelm you.

You are larger than the thought, “I’m worthless.”

It doesn’t consume you.

And if it does? And if it does?

Invite Overwhelm into the circle,

Make a place for Despair.

And notice how you know

to hold Overwhelm in your arms,

and Despair in steady embrace.

Cast no part of yourself away,

and being whole,

find all humanity joining you in the circle of your heart.

– Lucy Leu (NVC Certified Trainer)

What we finally come to is the truth which was glimpsed (however imperfectly) in the first of the Old Testament’s covenant stories. In the story of Noah and the rainbow we find the beginning awareness that God is not the destroyer, that all of humanity, and indeed all of creation, are embraced in the covenantal reality of God’s loving presence. No shadows, no wilderness, no violence or pain or loss are finally any match for the power of this truth. And when Jesus emerges from the wilderness proclaiming the nearness of God, he invites us to join him on that wild, not-safe, all-consuming journey of faithful living. It is not for the faint of heart. But for those who dare to risk stepping onto the path, life will never be the same.