Following Surprises
Text: Mark 1:14-20
I have to admit a certain hesitation that comes with the story we heard in the gospel of Mark. It is quite well known… Jesus says, “follow me and I will make you fish for people!” or, perhaps better known in the language of older translations “fishers of men.” It was certainly a favoured text during the 50’s and 60’s… I remember hearing it periodically when I was growing up in the 70s. The focus was primarily on evangelism, as it was named. More properly, it was a text used to justify recruitment drives, and not always in a way that was appropriate. As I’ve learned, there is a considerable difference between authentic evangelism, and church recruitment. Growing up in Calgary, the underlying subtext was “How many people can we hog-tie into coming to church?”
The way this passage has been portrayed in past forty years comes across as being sterile, or even a bit creepy. In at least one film that was made in the 1970s, a wide-eyed zombie-like Jesus stiffly walks up to the actors playing Andrew and Simon, says in a monotone “follow me and I will make you fishers of men” and ambles off. The two get up and walk after him rather stiffly. One could have hit the mute button and you would think you were watching a version of Night of the Living Dead… which oddly enough came out around the same time. Admittedly, I’m not the first to make this connection.
Because of this “baggage,” like a song that is played too many times on the radio, we have become far too familiar with this story. If anything the passage has been used or even abused so much that we don’t think there’s anything new that can come out of it. But these passages from scripture are living, breathing stories that can give new meaning and change lives. If something is too familiar, then maybe we need to make it unfamiliar. There are a number of passages like this, and all of them have something to offer that we have never heard before. It is Epiphany after all.
In particular, there is something fascinating about the gospel of Mark that is lost in translation. In the original Greek, the gospel is written entirely in the present tense… as if the very story is unfolding as the listeners are hearing it. Yet when translated into other languages, the story is almost universally put into the past-tense. After all, these events happened “back then” and it only seems appropriate to tell them as if they were in the past. After all, it seems that the gospels of Matthew, Luke and John have their tenses right, and yet primitive Mark seems out on a limb all alone.
Yet, the medium is the message here. By telling the story in the present tense, we are following the story as it unfolds. It is happening as we watch it… more akin to a dramatic play than simply a dry historical recounting.
Here’s the same passage in English, written in the present tense:
As Jesus was walking along by the Sea of Galilee, he spots Simon and Andrew, Simon’s brother, casting into the sea since they were fishermen. Jesus says to them, “Become my followers and I’ll have you fishing for people!”
And right then, they abandon their nets and follow him.
Sounds different doesn’t it? This isn’t so much of seeing something in a new way as it is reclaiming something that’s been lost in translation. The story is unfolding as we see it, rather than it being recalled. There is a timelessness to this that is always bringing the story of Jesus into the present… keeping it in front of us.
Mark’s use of the present tense is an intentional choice… the medium is the message… and maybe a surprising one. It has us asking questions that we normally wouldn’t if we thought we were listening to something in the past. Instead this being an account of how Jesus called the first of his disciples, it becomes more a story of how Jesus calls disciples… Suddenly we’re no longer just listeners, but an interactive audience actively participating in the story. Jesus is saying to us “Become my followers and I’ll have you fishing for people!” Mark is reminding us that the call Jesus makes isn’t just to Simon, Andrew, James or John… but to everyone who hears the good news.
We may be the audience, but Mark’s method draws us in that we are also called to be disciples. It catches us off guard, because we tend to look to the “back then” and “those people” that Jesus called to be disciples. It’s human nature to put our historical and spiritual mentors up on a pedestal… but it really doesn’t help us out in exploring our own faith.
When Jesus approaches Andrew and Simon, he is not approaching well-to-do, successful members of the community. He is not approaching those who have already figured out how things work… Jesus calls very ordinary people, people who are simply trying to eke out an existence where they are. What is striking is how ordinary the people who follow Jesus are. Yet over time, each one will become known as a giant of the faith. Over history, each one of them will have hundreds of churches or even cities named after them, one will even have a rather famous golf-course named after him. We have effectively built altars to these people, hailing them as great heroes of the faith. Somewhere along the way I think we’ve missed the point about what it means to be a disciple.
Jesus calls ordinary people to be followers. These were average people, with unremarkable jobs sitting at the side of the sea trying to make a living. He speaks to their context, he knew who they were… how ordinary they were… and yet Jesus calls them as disciples. At the same time we are surprised when we think that God might actually be calling us.
Maybe that says something about our faith… that we need to learn live it out, play it out… Maybe we need to be following those surprises… After all, following Jesus is not simply reflecting on something that happened “way back when” but engaging in life right now. It occupies every part of our life, because God gives our lives meaning and purpose.
In doing some research on this sermon this week, I found a helpful reminder:
The word religion comes from the Latin religio, a root that has received a remarkable number of different translations. The translation most meaningful to me is “to connect.” American psychologist and philosopher William James defined religion as the attempt to be in harmony with an unseen order of things. In other words, theology attempts to describe our proper connection into a spiritual, as opposed to purely material, universe.
This matter of connection is what many have described as the distinction between the “secular” and the “sacred” mentality. The person with a secular mentality feels themselves to be the center of the universe. Yet they are likely to suffer from a sense of meaninglessness and insignificance because they know they are one human among five billion others - all feeling themselves to be the center of things - scratching out an existence on the surface of a medium-sized planet circling a small star among countless stars in a galaxy lost among countless galaxies in a universe whose size is mind-boggling. The person with a sacred mentality, on the other hand, does not feel themselves to be the center of the universe. They consider the Center to be elsewhere and other. Yet they are unlikely to feel lost or insignificant precisely because they draw significance and meaning from their relationship, their connection, with that center, that Other.
When we encounter Jesus in Mark’s gospel, especially in the way that Mark tells it, there is this real-time connection to the one who gives us meaning. God calls us to live out our own story… in the light of the gospel… to be prepared to follow those surprises when, not if, they happen. Personally, I find this to be a far more helpful and meaningful way to experience the story… God’s story continues to unfold as we live our own lives. It allows us the opportunities to truly become engaged in our faith, and that we might be able to learn and live what it means to be a disciple.
Amen.
I have to admit a certain hesitation that comes with the story we heard in the gospel of Mark. It is quite well known… Jesus says, “follow me and I will make you fish for people!” or, perhaps better known in the language of older translations “fishers of men.” It was certainly a favoured text during the 50’s and 60’s… I remember hearing it periodically when I was growing up in the 70s. The focus was primarily on evangelism, as it was named. More properly, it was a text used to justify recruitment drives, and not always in a way that was appropriate. As I’ve learned, there is a considerable difference between authentic evangelism, and church recruitment. Growing up in Calgary, the underlying subtext was “How many people can we hog-tie into coming to church?”
The way this passage has been portrayed in past forty years comes across as being sterile, or even a bit creepy. In at least one film that was made in the 1970s, a wide-eyed zombie-like Jesus stiffly walks up to the actors playing Andrew and Simon, says in a monotone “follow me and I will make you fishers of men” and ambles off. The two get up and walk after him rather stiffly. One could have hit the mute button and you would think you were watching a version of Night of the Living Dead… which oddly enough came out around the same time. Admittedly, I’m not the first to make this connection.
Because of this “baggage,” like a song that is played too many times on the radio, we have become far too familiar with this story. If anything the passage has been used or even abused so much that we don’t think there’s anything new that can come out of it. But these passages from scripture are living, breathing stories that can give new meaning and change lives. If something is too familiar, then maybe we need to make it unfamiliar. There are a number of passages like this, and all of them have something to offer that we have never heard before. It is Epiphany after all.
In particular, there is something fascinating about the gospel of Mark that is lost in translation. In the original Greek, the gospel is written entirely in the present tense… as if the very story is unfolding as the listeners are hearing it. Yet when translated into other languages, the story is almost universally put into the past-tense. After all, these events happened “back then” and it only seems appropriate to tell them as if they were in the past. After all, it seems that the gospels of Matthew, Luke and John have their tenses right, and yet primitive Mark seems out on a limb all alone.
Yet, the medium is the message here. By telling the story in the present tense, we are following the story as it unfolds. It is happening as we watch it… more akin to a dramatic play than simply a dry historical recounting.
Here’s the same passage in English, written in the present tense:
As Jesus was walking along by the Sea of Galilee, he spots Simon and Andrew, Simon’s brother, casting into the sea since they were fishermen. Jesus says to them, “Become my followers and I’ll have you fishing for people!”
And right then, they abandon their nets and follow him.
Sounds different doesn’t it? This isn’t so much of seeing something in a new way as it is reclaiming something that’s been lost in translation. The story is unfolding as we see it, rather than it being recalled. There is a timelessness to this that is always bringing the story of Jesus into the present… keeping it in front of us.
Mark’s use of the present tense is an intentional choice… the medium is the message… and maybe a surprising one. It has us asking questions that we normally wouldn’t if we thought we were listening to something in the past. Instead this being an account of how Jesus called the first of his disciples, it becomes more a story of how Jesus calls disciples… Suddenly we’re no longer just listeners, but an interactive audience actively participating in the story. Jesus is saying to us “Become my followers and I’ll have you fishing for people!” Mark is reminding us that the call Jesus makes isn’t just to Simon, Andrew, James or John… but to everyone who hears the good news.
We may be the audience, but Mark’s method draws us in that we are also called to be disciples. It catches us off guard, because we tend to look to the “back then” and “those people” that Jesus called to be disciples. It’s human nature to put our historical and spiritual mentors up on a pedestal… but it really doesn’t help us out in exploring our own faith.
When Jesus approaches Andrew and Simon, he is not approaching well-to-do, successful members of the community. He is not approaching those who have already figured out how things work… Jesus calls very ordinary people, people who are simply trying to eke out an existence where they are. What is striking is how ordinary the people who follow Jesus are. Yet over time, each one will become known as a giant of the faith. Over history, each one of them will have hundreds of churches or even cities named after them, one will even have a rather famous golf-course named after him. We have effectively built altars to these people, hailing them as great heroes of the faith. Somewhere along the way I think we’ve missed the point about what it means to be a disciple.
Jesus calls ordinary people to be followers. These were average people, with unremarkable jobs sitting at the side of the sea trying to make a living. He speaks to their context, he knew who they were… how ordinary they were… and yet Jesus calls them as disciples. At the same time we are surprised when we think that God might actually be calling us.
Maybe that says something about our faith… that we need to learn live it out, play it out… Maybe we need to be following those surprises… After all, following Jesus is not simply reflecting on something that happened “way back when” but engaging in life right now. It occupies every part of our life, because God gives our lives meaning and purpose.
In doing some research on this sermon this week, I found a helpful reminder:
The word religion comes from the Latin religio, a root that has received a remarkable number of different translations. The translation most meaningful to me is “to connect.” American psychologist and philosopher William James defined religion as the attempt to be in harmony with an unseen order of things. In other words, theology attempts to describe our proper connection into a spiritual, as opposed to purely material, universe.
This matter of connection is what many have described as the distinction between the “secular” and the “sacred” mentality. The person with a secular mentality feels themselves to be the center of the universe. Yet they are likely to suffer from a sense of meaninglessness and insignificance because they know they are one human among five billion others - all feeling themselves to be the center of things - scratching out an existence on the surface of a medium-sized planet circling a small star among countless stars in a galaxy lost among countless galaxies in a universe whose size is mind-boggling. The person with a sacred mentality, on the other hand, does not feel themselves to be the center of the universe. They consider the Center to be elsewhere and other. Yet they are unlikely to feel lost or insignificant precisely because they draw significance and meaning from their relationship, their connection, with that center, that Other.
When we encounter Jesus in Mark’s gospel, especially in the way that Mark tells it, there is this real-time connection to the one who gives us meaning. God calls us to live out our own story… in the light of the gospel… to be prepared to follow those surprises when, not if, they happen. Personally, I find this to be a far more helpful and meaningful way to experience the story… God’s story continues to unfold as we live our own lives. It allows us the opportunities to truly become engaged in our faith, and that we might be able to learn and live what it means to be a disciple.
Amen.
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