Mark 9:30-37

TWENTY-FIFTH SUNDAY IN ORD. TIME

Mark 9:30-37 

A good Sunday to all. 

Before getting married, people in love should reflect; they do not decide to be moved by the first emotional impulse, they need to evaluate if they are made for each other, if they cultivate the same dreams, whether they have the same goals in mind. Only at the end, when they feel fully involved in a single life project, they declare their unconditional love for each other. If we want to understand what it means to believe in Christ, we must refer to the image of falling in love because it is the one used in the Bible. 

In the Old Testament, God is presented as the bridegroom of Israel, and so, the first commandment says, 'You shall not make other gods for I am a jealous God.' The one in love knows that he is the only one who can make the one he loves happy, and he does not want any lovers to ruin this relationship. Then, in the New Testament, this same image is taken up again, and it accompanies the whole New Testament. 

John's Gospel begins with a wedding feast and with the Baptist who says, ‘I am not the bridegroom; the bridegroom is coming, I hear his voice, and I am happy.’ And we know how the New Testament ends, with a wedding feast, as the seer of Revelation tells us in chapter 19 when he says: "Rejoice, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his wife is ready, and then the angel said to me: Write, “Happy are those who are invited to the wedding of the Lamb." This is the conclusion of the whole history of the world. 

Believing in Jesus does not mean to admire him for his life or for what he teaches; it means to have fallen in love with him and decide to unite one's life to his. This cannot happen before you have acquired a deep knowledge of him, knowing exactly what is in his mind and what happens to those who decide to join their life to his. Therefore, a time of mutual knowledge, a time of maturation of this relationship, is necessary because otherwise, there could be surprises later, and one could say, 'I believed in Christ, but I was wrong; I expected from him what he did not give me.' 

The three years of Jesus' public life represented this period of mutual acquaintance between the apostles and Jesus. It was a time of commitment. Mark, in his Gospel, wants to make all of us go through this spiritual journey of the disciples, so that we may come to understand who Jesus is before the wedding feast takes place when we decide to join our lives to his. 

Last week we were with the disciples in Caesarea Philippi; let us remember that in that enchanting place the Master had asked two questions to the disciples, and the second one was very provocative because he had asked the disciples and us too, 'To what extent do you feel involved in my life?’ Are you willing or unwilling to bet your lives on me? And what do you expect from me? 

The question is addressed to us; the disciples in Caesarea began to realize that things were not going the right way because it was not what they expected from their wedding with the Master. I believe that also, for Jesus, it was a moment of intimate suffering, not of disappointment because it was expected. What he proposed was too demanding. The proposal was this: ‘My life is like this. Do you say Yes or No?’

Jesus did not expect great things and was prepared for their hesitation, he expected it, but he felt intimate suffering; he felt the disappointment of the lover who, after a year and a half realizes that he has not yet been able to involve the disciples. It is a time of crisis in love, and Jesus wants to overcome it. 

Let's listen to what he does: 

“They left from there and began a journey through Galilee, but he did not wish anyone to know about it.” 

At Caesarea Philippi, Peter had spoken in the name of all and had rebuked Jesus for what he had said, and Jesus had called him Satan, and Peter must not have been pleased about it. I believe that the two days journey back to Capernaum were quite tense, marked by many moments of silence, a fragile calm after the storm. When there is a severe misunderstanding between two people in love, what do they do? How do they overcome it? One of the ways is to pretend nothing happened, let some time go by, don't bring up the subject again, and wait that after a few days, everything will be as before. I think the disciples thought of this solution; to wait for Jesus to meet again among the people, to resume preaching, and to do wonders and the misunderstanding would have been a bad memory. 

Jesus does not make this choice because it would be sweeping the dust under the rug. To recover a relationship between two people who love each other, they need to meet again, by themselves, to confront each other, to understand each other, to readjust their thoughts and their hearts; it is better to provoke a discussion, even a hard discussion, even to quarrel, but it is necessary to be able to solve the problem. And this is what today's Gospel passage tells us that Jesus did. 

He decided to stay alone with his disciples; he did not want anyone to know where they were; he tried to resume the discussion that had provoked the crisis. Remember Peter's reaction when Jesus told him: I will lay down my life. Peter could not accept joining his own life to his because, according to everyone's common sense, one does not look for failure. 

Let us listen now to how Jesus resumes with them the discourse: 

"He was teaching his disciples and telling them, ‘The Son of Man is to be handed over to men, and they will kill him, and three days after his death, he will rise.’ But they did not understand the saying and were afraid to question him.” 

In Caesarea Philippi, the disciples had understood very well what Jesus had said; he had been unequivocal. Now Jesus resumes the discourse, not to explain himself better, but to provoke the disciples, to open a debate with them and to bring to light the objections that they have in their hearts, and it is necessary that this discussion between Jesus and the disciples we may feel it as addressed to us. 

Why did it cost so much for the disciples to accept Jesus' proposal, and we, instead, say yes to the Lord so easily? The effort they made to let themselves be involved must be ours because conversion is necessary, and this conversion is very painful; it requires the renunciation of ourselves and our selfishness, and if we think we can become disciples without this hard experience, we deceive ourselves. Jesus resumes the discourse by saying, "The son of Man is to be handed over to men."

 Son of Man in Hebrew means a real man, one who is entirely man, the successful man; because we know that one can be a rational animal but not a person. Those who commit injustice, violence and abuses are not fully human. They can be masters in the handling of science and technology, but if they build bombs, kill, and commit injustice, we cannot say they are human. Here Jesus presents himself as the Son of Man, as the successful man, and what does he foresee happening to this man? 

He says he is about to be delivered to men. It does not say he will be delivered to the high priest, no, to the scribes and Pharisees; he is delivered to all men, and who has delivered him? I believe we all immediately think of Judas... no, Judas delivered him to the high priest. Here, on the other hand, there is one who delivers him to men. In this case, biblical scholars speak of the 'divine passive'; that is how the evangelist presents the work of the heavenly Father. It is He who gave his only Son into the hands of men. 

This is the most beautiful image of God. God is the one who puts himself in our hands. Love is to put oneself in the hands of the other and to give oneself to the other. The other can ask me for everything he needs for life, and the one who loves him puts himself in his hands. God has put himself in our hands. It is the opposite of what we think about a successful person, the one who has others in their hands. They can put their hands on many people and dispose of them as they want. No! These are not yet people; they are the ones who have power, but this power is the anti-love, the anti-human. And how will it end? What will the men do amid whom the true man is found? 

He is a lamb among wolves; there will be a conflict between the new man and the men who do not want him because they want to perpetuate their world where the law is that of competition, where one tries to prevail, to enslave the other, to dominate over the other. It is a world of wolves, and his fate is sealed when this real man, a lamb, comes. And the heavenly Father, when he gave his Son into the hands of men, knew that he was giving him over to death. The only way to usher in a new world is that of the genuine people—the lambs. 

Jesus says it will not end like this. Once he is killed, after three days, he will rise again. To the wolves that killed him, it will seem like a victory because they got rid of him; he was a nuisance, and he had to be taken out of the way so that life would go on as before when to be men meant to be wolves and among the wolves to be the strongest. 

Jesus assures us that it will not be death that wins. Things will not end with death. What will win will be love. It is an illusion to think that death will be conquered by living like wolves, attaining power, dominating, accumulating wealth, living for oneself. Those who live like this live like wolves; they see how their lives go away, being swallowed up, moment by moment, by death. 

The only way to overcome death, Jesus tells the disciples, I will show it to you: to give it out of love, as a lamb gives its life. If it has become love, death can no longer touch it. Every time we silence the selfish impulse that leads us to think in ourselves and to despise others, when we love, we defeat death. The disciples did not understand these words. The words that Jesus said were very clear, but they were too far away from Jesus’ way of thinking, judgment criteria, and hopes. 

They were not yet ready to accept the proposal to be lambs. They do not risk accepting that they must surrender themselves to overcome death. They were afraid to ask for explanations, but Jesus wanted their objections to come out, and it is not surprising that after hearing the same announcement a second time, the disciples could not accept Jesus' proposal and they do not open their mouths; why? Because they cannot wait for the time for Jesus to change his speech; they want to continue to cultivate their dreams. And, if we think about it, that's exactly what happens to us. If, during a sermon, we hear somebody presenting the real Gospel, very provocative, that clashes with our life choices, that provokes us and requires a conversion, we don't say that it is wrong, but we cannot wait until the sermon is over to talk about something else; not bad things, beautiful things, but about something else because that's very challenging. And they don't ask questions to Jesus. He wanted them to ask him questions, but they were cautious not to. 

We must ask Jesus these questions; and to ask these questions to him, it is enough that we ask them to the Gospel because the Gospel answers us. So, when we have these objections, let us put them to the Gospel. I mentioned that Jesus wanted them to ask him, but the disciples did not speak with him but spoke among themselves. 

Let's hear what they were talking about: 

“They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, he began to ask them, ‘What were you arguing about on the way?’ But they remained silent. They had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest. Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them, ‘If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.’ Taking a child, he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it, he said to them, ‘Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.’” 

Jesus wanted the disciples to ask him questions to raise objections, but they only wanted him to change the subject. When they came home, he asked them, "What were you arguing about on the way?" On the way, they were arguing among themselves about who was the greatest; they kept silent, they do not answer because they know that in seeking the first places, the Master would not let it pass. There are subjects that Jesus did not deal with directly, and on these, we can discuss and even have divergent opinions, but about hierarchies, ecclesiastical careers, honorary titles, hand-kissing, of the obeisance, of genuflections... on this subject, Jesus was clear. For us, the honorific titles are secondary things... the obeisance, but for Jesus are not secondary at all because this touches the core of his proposal for the new man. It is the old man who seeks these things; the new man is the one who comes down to the last place; he does not expect obeisance; he is the one who bends down and kisses the feet of the poor. This impulse to become great, to be necessary, to count for something, we all have it inside. 

What to do? If we repress it, if we suffocate it, we will remain unsatisfied and frustrated; we must satisfy it, but it is a matter of knowing how and Jesus teaches us how to satisfy this need that we must be the first, to be great, stand out, be out of the flock, and be superior to others. It's about knowing how to become great, how to be successful, how to be admired, but by whom... People’s gaze is telling us: if you want to be admired by us, you must go up high so that we all can see you, but if you want to be admired by God you don't have to go up to the top; you must go down to the last place, so Jesus tells us how to become great. 

The evangelist Mark, who was not present and therefore is not chronicling, says that Jesus sat down, and when he says this, he wants to tell us that we must open our ears wide because he is saying something significant. Jesus sits down because the rabbi speaks and calls the 12 to himself... how come, why? What does it mean that he called them to himself? They were around him physically, but they were still far away; they still belonged to the old world. They were old men; that is, they were still in the wolf world of competition, they had not yet approached the Master. 

What did Jesus do? He called them to himself and did not rebuke them; he understood their condition, he knew that assimilating his proposal takes time to be understood and accepted. He says: Do you want to be the first? If you want to be the first, I will tell you how. He doesn't say it's wrong to want to be first; the drive that leads us to emerge must be satisfied. How? Paul says, 'Love one another with brotherly affection and compete even in esteeming one another in considering the other superior to yourselves; compete to choose the last place.' And Jesus says that “if you want to be great, you must be the servant of all, you have to be the last of all.” Twice 'all' is repeated. 

The difficult thing is not so much to serve because we could choose; if we could choose whom to serve, we would choose the nice people who show us gratitude... NO. Jesus says: last of all and servant of all; it means to be servant even to the one who has done you some harm, even of your enemy. There are services that we gladly give to pleasant persons, but Jesus says that if you want to be truly great, you must consider everyone superior to you, everyone can give you orders when they need your service. 

And Jesus makes a gesture: he takes a child and puts him in the middle. The term used here by the evangelist is παιδίον = paidíon, it indicates the individual who is the least important by age and the role he plays in society. The children didn't count for anything; it's not that they didn't love the children, they loved them, but they didn't count for anything. If you want to be successful and you want to move up the social ladder, don't waste your time with those who don't count, with the poor, with the sick and the needy; if you make friends, you seek the favors of those who can help you rise. Children, on the other hand, are the ones who only need help, attention, and services. And Jesus embraces the child. 

The real man, the successful man, is the one who embraces those who do not count. And he says: "Whoever welcomes these children in my name welcomes me." That is, 'welcomes the proposal of man that I have made.' 

I wish you all a good Sunday and a good week.