Reflection for Sunday, September 23, 2018 – Mark 9:30-37

Peoples

The Collect for this Sunday beautifully sets the tone for the passage from Mark’s Gospel we’re about to hear. With the busyness and demands of life weighing us down, our corporate worship will begin with this poignant plea we would “not be anxious about earthly things, but to love things heavenly; and even now, while we are placed among things that are passing away, to hold fast to those that shall endure.”

There is an ongoing discussion about how church must be “made relevant” to effectively reach a contemporary audience. It’s hard to argue against helping people see the significance of church in their daily lives. But this is often expressed in terms of music, décor, or “lowering the barriers to entry” so that people will feel more “comfortable” or “less intimidated” with the idea of going to church. Yet, as this opening prayer reminds us and Mark 9:30-37 reinforces, true relevance is not about changing liturgy or updating aesthetics; it’s about truth that lasts.

The Christian life is about sacrifice. It’s about suffering on behalf of others. It’s about faithfulness, even unto a bitter end. It’s about death and resurrection.

The tastes, fashions, and preferences of the day will—sooner rather than later—become passé, outdated, and fall out of fashion. Simply mirroring the world around us is a losing game when by the time we catch up with whatever is “now,” it’s already the past. And many of the principles and priorities of the surrounding culture (whenever and wherever) place importance on wrong things or undue weight on things that can’t support it.

And that’s where we as Christians must model something different than the world sees or the culture promotes. What we do and who we are as the church, the Body of Christ, is relevant because it is temporally and eternally significant.

This is hard. Even the disciples didn’t always get it. They hear Jesus talk about His coming death for the sake of the world, then immediately argue with one another about power and personal prestige. It seems silly, if not crazy, that Jesus can level with His closest friends about ultimate humility and sacrifice and their response is petty selfishness. We can laugh that they missed the point or be reminded how easy it is for us to do so as well.

To truly be great, we must be good. There is lasting strength in humility. We gain more than we lose by serving others. The people who seem unimportant or useless to our ambitions are, in fact, of eternal significance to God. There are things worth suffering and even dying for, people worth suffering and dying for. And love like that is greater than the temptations of this life and even stronger than death.

So, serve like a deacon. Love like Jesus. For these things will never pass away but shall endure. It is the Way of the Cross and it is the way of life; now and forever.

– The Very Rev. David B. Peoples is rector at St. Stephen’s Episcopal, Lakeland