Mk 1:1-8

8 December 2002

2nd Sunday of Advent

“On Your Mark”

            Can anyone tell me what’s wrong with this sentence (don’t worry, I won’t ask you to diagram it; just tell me what’s wrong with it):  My dog Duncan, who loves playing in the snow.  How about this one?  Our church, which is located on Third Street.  What’s wrong with those sentences?  Well, here’s the answer:  they aren’t complete sentences.  Neither one has a verb to go with its subject.  They have phrases that describe the subject, but there are no verbs to say what the subjects are or do.

            Okay, so what?  Why bother with this little quiz in grammar?  It just so happens that our gospel reading starts off with one of those incomplete sentences.  The very first verse in the gospel of Mark reads:  “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”  Again, there’s no verb (and that’s also true of the original Greek).  It’s an unfinished sentence.

            It’s like Mark is in such a hurry to get started with his gospel that he can’t even finish his first sentence before he’s off and running.  He’s like an athlete at a track meet who’s itching to jump the gun.  “On your mark…”  Actually, that’s his style throughout the gospel.  Even the most casual of comparisons with the other evangelists—Matthew, Luke, and John—shows that Mark moves quickly from one episode to the next.  The result is the shortest of the gospels.

            And this first verse, considered by many to be a kind of title or theme for his entire book, sets the stage for everything that follows.  “The beginning of the good news.”  The beginning of the gospel.  “Beginning” is the Greek word arch (archē), a word that suggests that in Christ, a new reality has begun.  It can often be hard to see that reality, but the word also implies a new way of looking at things.[1]

            Mark sounds a theme of preparation.  As I’ve indicated, he seems anxious to show that something new is emerging.  Can you sense the movement—the vigorous movement—in the text?  Already, John the Baptist (“the baptizer” in the NRSV) has burst onto the scene.

            Our evangelist signals John’s arrival with quotes from the Old Testament.  He includes something from Isaiah (part of today’s Old Testament reading), but Mark begins with language borrowed from Malachi 3:1.  Did I mention the sense of movement?

            It’s both John’s words and his actions that carry this theme of preparation.  His message is “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (v. 4).  John tells the people that not only do they need to—but that they can—start all over again.  As I said in my sermon on repentance last summer, that word gets a lot of bad publicity.  But for those who understand that their lives are heading straight for the toilet, this is a note of great joy and hope.  And is there anyone here who doesn’t need that message?  (If so, please let me touch you!  Please let me be healed by the hem of your garment!)

            By this time in the history of the Jewish nation, the people’s messianic expectation, their longing for the promised liberator, has reached stratospheric levels.  Frustration with Roman rule continues to mount.  Would-be messiahs and revolutionaries are coming out of the woodwork.  It seems that John needs to get the people’s attention; they need to get ready for the real thing.

            But something else is going on.  With these sweeping claims about what he’s here to do, John is making some serious waves.  When you start promising people that they really can start over, you earn the displeasure of those who like things just the way they are.  You attract the suspicion of the powers that be.  And that’s especially true if you practice what you preach.

            Verse 6 really appeals to the senses.  “Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist [stylish!], and he ate locusts and wild honey [yummy!].”  Did I say “appeals” to the senses?  Depending on one’s sensibilities, maybe I should say “engages” the senses, or even “assaults” the senses!  We have a portrayal of John that certainly involves vision, but we can also describe it as “smelly,” or even as “crunchy”!

            Actually, John the Baptist can be seen as practicing a simple lifestyle.  You know:  what some folks shell out hundreds, even thousands, of dollars at seminars to learn—to be trained by well-paid experts in how to live simply?  John isn’t dressed in the latest fashions from Athens; he’s not dining on the finest Mediterranean delicacies.  What he is doing is making a statement about not being dependent on those who call the shots.  John’s preparing himself, and those who will listen, for the advent of the one who will usher in a new age.

            So, what does John the Baptist, by way of the impatient Mark, say to us in Advent 2002?  Churches all over the world are asking that question today—or at least, words to that effect!  I want to suggest something that I wrote about in our December newsletter, something which involves an observation this coming Tuesday.  That is International Human Rights Day, which commemorates the day in 1948 when the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted.  And as I said in the newsletter, that’s a document which, in the aftermath of World War 2, helped set the framework for international recognition of human rights.

            Much like the first verse of our gospel reading, the matter of human rights is an unfinished sentence.  Last July, a jury of ordinary people in Florida found two generals from El Salvador (who now live in the US) guilty of torture.  Their offense wasn’t that they themselves applied the electrodes to the victims of the US-backed government during the 1980s; rather their crime was that their men committed torture, and they did nothing to stop them.[2]

            Of course, we’re used to hearing stories like this about dictators around the world, including a certain fellow in Iraq.  Recently, some high level officials from the Reagan administration confirmed a New York Times report that during the Iran-Iraq war, the US knew that Saddam Hussein was using chemical weapons against the Iranians, but continued to support him anyway.[3]  Now that Saddam no longer is our ally, his human rights violations have become a matter of utmost distress!

            How, it may be asked, is concern about human rights to be seen as a concern for Advent?  How is awaiting our Lord’s return in any way linked to caring what happens to, for example, Presbyterians imprisoned for acts of conscience?  What does it have to do with the fates of Rev. Erik Johnson and Rev. Chuck Booker-Hirsch, who were fined and thrown in jail for trespassing on federal property during a nonviolent protest against the facility formerly known as the School of the Americas?  (It’s now called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.)

            If we believe that the humility of John the Baptist—who felt himself unworthy to even loosen the strap on Jesus’ sandal—means anything, then the picture becomes clearer.  Love of our coming Lord and love of neighbor compels us.

And we must be careful.  We need to guard against, in the name of national security and in a spirit of fear, giving up the freedoms that have defined America—the freedoms for which so many have sacrificed.  It’s very easy to ignore what happens to others, at least, until the knock comes on your door.

In Luke’s gospel, after hearing his message, the crowds ask John, “What then should we do?” (3:10).  How then should we live?  I believe it begins with prayer.  Every week, we pray for God’s kingdom to come, for heaven on earth!  Think about that; meditate on that awhile.  If that really is our intention, I promise you that we’ll start finding little ways to make it happen.  We’ll be able to move from vague generalities to very specific things, if we’re open.  We may even find ourselves making appeals on behalf of the tortured, to being the voice of the voiceless.

            Some people ask:  does God hear prayer, or does prayer make any difference?  Those are good questions.  I think they’re behind some of the comments in our epistle reading in 2 Peter (3:8-15a).  But here’s another question to ponder:  does prayer change us in any way?  Do we find ourselves yearning for Christ?  Advent, as much as any time of year, reminds us of the need for preparation.  The season calls us to start all over again; it tells us that we are unfinished sentences.

            I want to conclude with something from A Child in Winter, a book of devotionals by Caryll Houselander, which covers Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany.  Houselander was an English woman, an artist, writer, and mystic who, as the introduction to the book puts it, “comforted and challenged the English-speaking world through the ravages of World War II and the London Blitz.”[4]

            Speaking of how pregnant mothers carry their children within them, she says this:  “By his own will Christ was dependent on Mary during Advent:  he was absolutely helpless; he could go nowhere but where she chose to take him; he could not speak; her breathing was his breath; his heart beat in the beating of her heart.

            “Today Christ is dependent upon us.  This dependence of Christ lays a great trust upon us.  During this tender time of Advent we must carry him in our hearts to wherever he wants to go, and there are many places to which he may never go unless we take him.”[5]

            May we follow the example of John the Baptist and prepare the way of the Lord.

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