Grumpy Healing

Here we are on the edge of Lent. Our last week in ordinary time or epiphany (depending on which calendar you are using). And we continue in Mark’s faced past story. The story is moving rapidly. “Now is the time. God’s kingdom has come.” (Mark 1:15)

After the intimate healing of Peter’s mother-in-law, and then praying in wilderness in the night, Jesus leaves Capernaum to preach to all the towns of Galilee. Not all were healed, but his mission is to all in Galilee. On his way he encounters a man with a skin disease. It is a strange story. The translations vary – is Jesus filled with deep seated compassion or anger? It is intimate, Jesus touches the man. He encounters people face to face. And it raises all kinds of questions about what Jesus is ordering people not to tell? At the end Jesus and the man trade places and Jesus returns to the wilderness, where it all began, and the man is restored to his whanau (family) and community and is free to enter any town he likes.

Healing stories are difficult. Many of us struggle with them. Even in the stories not everyone got healed. Those that got healed still got sick again and died. Healing was important. But it’s not the point. The point was “Now is the time. God’s kingdom has come. Let that blow your mind. Trust this good news.” (Mark 1:15) These stories, especially those at the beginning of the gospel, set out what that kingdom looks like. They teach us about the markers of the reign of God.  They teach us about who God is. In this story Mark offers “an image of a God who is compassionate; reaches out to touch us in love; is so willing and eager to embrace us in healing, forgiveness, and grace; and eagerly embraces the pain and sin of the world out of love for us, for us and the whole wide world we live in.” (David Lose < http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=1561>)

So a question to ask for the gospel as a whole – what does this teach us about God who we meet in Jesus? How do those qualities shape our life as a community? How do we live in response? Good questions as we enter into Lent this year.