God's Last Words

Hamburgers and Jesus
Mark 1:29-39 NRSV

A well known miser defended himself against criticism about his penny-pinching ways. He said in his own defense, “Wait a second, I couldn’t stand for my mother to go on, year-after year, working every night scrubbing and cleaning office floors, so I just bought the office building she works at.”

The critic then asked, “Well what did you do for your mother then?” The man smiled proudly and said, “Well, I immediately moved her to the day shift.”

A woman was out shopping one day. She sprayed her wrists with an expensive perfume from a sample bottle and completed the rest of her chores relishing the fragrance she felt the perfume gave her.

That evening after the family’s usual Saturday evening meal of hamburgers she was helping her son do his homework. As she leaned close to him he told her, “You smell really good mom.” She said, “I know honey, that’s the perfume I sprayed on my wrists when I was shopping earlier.” He answered, “No, it isn’t. That’s hamburgers!”

The really good thing about relationships is also the really bad part of relationships: “We are seen and known by what we do, how we look, and what we smell like -regardless of how we think or protest about who we try to be.”

It was the same for Jesus as well.

As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. ³⁰Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. ³¹He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.

³²That evening, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. ³³And the whole city was gathered around the door. ³⁴And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.

³⁵In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. ³⁶And Simon and his companions hunted for him. ³⁷When they found him, they said to him, “Everyone is searching for you.” ³⁸He answered, “Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.”

³⁹And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.

One of the questions I always ask myself about the passage I’m going to preach on is straightforward: “What does God and Jesus want us to learn from this passage and why is this part of it here?”

In today’s lesson I particularly ask that question because the passage tells us that Simon Peter’s mother-in-law is sick, in bed, with a fever. The Greek word used in both Mark and Matthew’s recounting is “pyressō,” (pu-ress-o).

This woman is sick and Jesus heals her, and she resumes her care for Jesus and the rest of the household right away. The rest of this passage then becomes Jesus helping, healing, and caring for everyone He can.

To me then, obviously this is a message about service and ministry to all. We can occasionally take some time for ourselves but the needs of others will find you and require your help. The Lord heals your fever and puts you right back to work.

Becky and I used to laugh about how it seemed as if everyone in need seemed to find us in the grocery line, at the mall, in restaurants, on vacation, where-ever, and either share a dramatic incident or their whole life story and want something from us. Even now that happens a lot. I’ve come to understand that it happens because of our openness to God’s presence and our willingness to be approached.

The great architect Frank Lloyd Wright was fond of an incident that may have seemed insignificant at the time, but had a profound influence on the rest of his life.

The winter he was 9, he went walking across a snow-covered field with his no- nonsense uncle. As the two of them reached the far end of the field, his uncle stopped him. He pointed out his own tracks in the snow, straight and true as an arrow's flight, and then young Frank's tracks meandering all over the field.

"Notice how your tracks wander aimlessly from the fence to the cattle to the woods and back again," his uncle said. "And see how my tracks aim directly to my goal. There is an important lesson in that."

Years later the world-famous architect liked to tell how the experience had contributed to his philosophy in life. "I determined right then," he'd say with a twinkle in his eye, "not to miss the things in life, that my uncle had missed."

Frank Lloyd Wright saw in those tracks what his uncle could not:

It is easy to let the demands of life keep us from the joys of living. For those of us in Christ the joy is in serving and caring for His Kingdom.

We all recognize that any goal in life worth achieving demands a great deal of our energy. If you are a doctor you must spend vast hours alone and in residency studying the human body. The life of your patient demands it.

If you are a teacher you must live in the library researching and preparing for your lecture. The mind of your student demands it.

If you are a carpenter you must patiently measure the building before you drive the first nail. The integrity of the structure depends on it.

If you are a mother you must sacrifice your life for your family. Your children require it.

Sure, we could not live if we did not set goals and work to fulfill them. No sane person would argue otherwise.  But here’s what young Wright discovered at the tender age of 9, and what some don’t learn until 69: The objective in life is not the goal but the journey on the way to the goal.

In our scriptural passage for today the whole city of Capernaum had gathered around the door, pressing in to see Jesus. The demands on him were already piling up. He cured many, cast out demons, and taught constantly.

His disciples didn’t help matters. When he left in the morning early to pray, they went searching for him. When they found him they said, “What are you doing, everyone is searching for you?”

Jesus told them: “Yes, you’re right – let us go to them, this is what I am suppose to be doing.”

To everyone you see, just like that little boy and his mom, Jesus smelled like home, like a favorite meal shared joyfully. In Jesus people were finding healing, a place to belong, a place to rest.

 

Do you have a special memory of a safe place, a church, home, a safe person, a family member, or a friend? What did it smell like? Did it provide comfort, safety, security?

Simply put, in the words of our young boy speaking to his mother, Jesus smelled like hamburgers. And Jesus was calling them from their sickbeds to come and start service to others, as He showed them the example of discipleship He desired of them. Amen.