Epiphany 1 / Year B
Mark 1:4-11
The Gospel of Mark is the first of four
written accounts of Jesus’ life. As the
earliest testimony, it is the initial source to which people turned to learn
about who Jesus was and what Jesus did.
Unlike the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, which begin with stories of
Jesus’ birth, and unlike the Gospel of John, which begins with the soaring
theology of the Word becoming flesh, Mark begins his story at the Jordon River
with John baptizing Jesus.
By any measure, the beginning of Mark’s
Gospel is lean: a few verses about John and then Jesus walks onto the stage and
into the water. At this point in the
narrative, we know more about John (what he eats, what he wears, what his
ministry looks like, what he preaches, and how his role is the fulfillment of
Scripture) than Jesus. About Jesus,
well, we know nothing. In fact, by the
end of this morning’s brief reading there is not yet even a record of a single
thing Jesus says.
In Mark’s account we actually hear God
speak before Jesus says or does anything except to be baptized: “You are my
Son, the beloved. With you I am well
pleased!” These words mirror what God
says at creation: “‘Let there be light.’
And God saw that the light was good.”
Clearly, “well pleased” far surpasses “good.”
From a literary perspective we ought to be
puzzled. The announcement “You are my
Son” makes sense. It informs the readers
(and Jesus) about his identity.
“Beloved” also makes sense. Every
parent knows what it is like to be overwhelmed with love from the very first
moment you hold your child. Our
bewilderment lies in the statement “With you I am well pleased”. Well pleased?
As readers we ask how can this be, given in what we have read so far
Jesus has done absolutely nothing. “You will
do amazing things” would make sense, as would “Your time has come.” How can God be well pleased with Jesus when
he is yet to speak or to act?
Now, I suppose you could say God is
referring to all the things Jesus did before he was baptized – how he grew up
and how he has conducted himself up until this point in time. That Mark elects to tell us nothing about
Jesus’ life prior to his baptism suggests this is not the source of God’s
pleasure. As literary device (at least
to my thinking), “With you I am well pleased” serves as a foreshadowing. It alerts the reader to pay attention to what
lies ahead. Pay attention to what Jesus
says and to what Jesus does because these things will be well pleasing to God.
While God’s pronouncement, “You are my Son,
my beloved”, discloses Jesus’ identity to the reader, what we read of Jesus
following this moment discloses God’s identity to us. Those of you who join me for on-line Evening
Prayer know each night I read a passage from the book Celebrating the Seasons: Daily Spiritual Readings for the Christian
Year. Last Monday we read this
passage from a sermon by Bernard of Clairvaux, a 12th Century
Benedictine monk:
When God emptied
himself and took the form of a servant, he emptied himself only of majesty and
power, not of goodness and mercy. For
what does the Apostle say? ‘The goodness
and humanity of our Saviour have appeared in our midst.’ God’s power had appeared already in creation,
and his wisdom in the ordering of creation; but his goodness and mercy have
appeared now in his humanity.
So what are your
frightened of? Why are you trembling
before the face of the Lord when he comes?
God has come not to judge the world, but to save it! Do not run away; do not be afraid. God comes unarmed; he wants to save you, not
to punish you.
I like Bernard’s notion we are able to see
aspects of God’s true self more clearly in Jesus than we could see before. It is popular to say the God of the Old
Testament is a God of wrath, but the God of the New Testament is a God of
love. I think Bernard would say God has
not changed, but our ability to see God has.
Jesus shows us things we could not see before.
So, to each of us God says, “You are my
child, my beloved.” Nothing – and I mean
nothing – can alter this aspect of your identity. God’s compassion and mercy are everlasting. What can change is what is said next about
each of us. It might be, “With you I am
well pleased.” It could be, “With you I
am pleased.” Perhaps it is, “There are
couple of things we need to talk about.”
At times it is, “Right now I am not at all pleased with you.” No matter what is said, the first thing God says
stands, “You are my child, my beloved.”
You don’t have to earn it. You
don’t have to maintain it. You can never
lose it. It is who you are because it is
who you are to God. The question is what
will you do with this love? How will you
welcome it into every aspect of your being?
How will you allow its warmth to bathe over you? How will you allow it to transform your
experience of life? How will you express
it as you live and move and have your being?
