Mark

The Road Leading to Jerusalem

The beginning of Holy Week, the scene in which Jesus makes a “triumphant entry” into Jerusalem, is a scene that is ultimately political.  Jesus demands his followers make a choice between two kings and kingdoms. Since chapter eight, when Peter and the disciples recognize that Jesus is the Messiah – the King of the Jews – everything that Jesus has done and each step they have taken have led them to this point.  Jesus has continually set before them illustrations of what God’s Kingdom looks like against the reality in which they live. Parables and healings have been interspersed with predictions that such a movement will lead Jesus to the cross. Jesus makes it clear that we cannot have it both ways – loyalty to the status quo makes one an enemy of God’s Kingdom.  Likewise, loyalty to God’s Kingdom and King Jesus makes one an enemy to those that wield power through any means other than servanthood.

The stakes are high.  Jesus knows the costs and continues to explain them to his disciples.  Challenging the powers will get you killed. But the price of living fully the life God designed far outweighs the false choice of living life in competition with one another, looking out for oneself at the expense of others.  Servanthood is the calling God places on each of us – carrying one another’s burdens as equals, rather than rivals.

Jesus’ remarks, in Mark 10: 32-45, sum this up.  Jesus is on the road to Jerusalem with his disciples.  He knows this road will end in Jerusalem with suffering and humiliation.  The disciples still think it will end triumphantly. Which makes Jesus’ triumphant entry all the more jarring for we who know how the story goes.  Along the road, Jesus pointedly tells the disciples that he would be handed over to the authorities, not as a hero but as a traitor. Immediately, after what should be frightening news, James and John ask Jesus to “grant us whatever we ask.”  Those demanding words end up being a request for special status when God’s kingdom comes.

Ever been talking to your kids and as soon as you finish explaining some serious life lesson, they abruptly change the topic around something they want?  These two disciples seem to have had the same problem. Have the been listening? Do they not understand? Patiently, Jesus once again explains the difference between ‘pagan’ rules and God’s Kingdom.

You know how it is with pagan nations, he said. Think how their so-called rulers act.  They lord it over their subjects. The high and mighty ones boss the rest around. But that’s not how it’s going to be with you. Anyone who wants to be great among you must become your servant.  Anyone who wants to be first must be everyone’s slave. Don’t you see? The son of man didn’t come to be waited on. He came to be the servant, to give his life “as a ransom for many.”

It’s with this understanding that Jesus makes his entry into Jerusalem.  It’s God’s holy city but it’s a city far from God, filled with people more concerned with getting ahead, no matter who may get stepped on in the process.  It’s a city Jesus can’t rule over. It’s a city with an agenda moving in the opposite direction of his calling; living opposed to his rules. While the common among them may have greeted Jesus as a king, the powerful wouldn’t let Jesus get any further than this simple ride on the back of a donkey.

Such background work has been helpful to me as I approach Palm Sunday.  To see Jesus’ entry through the lens of his journey to Jerusalem, against the cultural norms in which he lived, and through the not-quite perceiving eyes of his disciples paints a picture of two competing ethics:  An ethic of self-promotion that isolates and an ethic of servanthood that welcomes community. For Mark, it’s the ethic of servanthood and community that motivates Jesus’ actions and stories during the week leading up to Good Friday.  This holy week, may the simple ethic of servanthood overcome the loud and prevalent ethic of self-promotion. May we make enough room in our busy days for the presence of Christ to slow us down and correct our inclinations for self and open us up to the blessing of serving others.

  • What keeps us from accepting the posture of servanthood?
  • How are we like James and John?
  • Is it easy to recognize the difference between self -promotion and servanthood?  Are the differences more subtle than we like to think?
  • What habits must we change in order to be a servant?
  • What positions or things are we holding on to that prevents us from embracing servanthood?
  • What does a community that submits to each other look and feel like?
  • How is that different than our present communities?
  • To whom is such a community the most attractive?

Read Mark 8:1 – 10:52 prior to class this week.  Challenge your class to do the same. Will Jesus’ triumphant Entry look different after a close reading of these stories?

Challenge your class to continue its reading during holy week, following Jesus’ passion: Mark 11:1- Mark 15:39.  Does the servant ethic continue?

Taking Up Our Cross

The challenge to those we teach today is to understand the cross and apply it to our circumstances.

What is a cross?  Its symbolism and meaning are ubiquitous today.  It’s certainly more than an intersection of two lines.  It’s a fashion accessory for many.  We see it in appear in all types of art.  For sure, its a symbol of our faith.  We see placed prominently in Christian churches of all stripes.  We see it used as a memorial and in cemeteries.  Its presence can bring peace and assurance to our life and faith.  But unfortunately, it has also been misused over time as a symbol of intolerance, threat and fear.  Certain “Christian” bodies have used it to signify that their perspective is right and all others best move out of the way. While this is as far from the message of Christ as one can get, it actually is in keeping with the original Roman intent for the cross.

A Roman cross wasn’t a thing of beauty.  It was something to be feared.  It was an instrument the Roman authorities used to establish their rule far beyond Rome as they subdued people and civilizations that stretched as far north as modern day England, as far south as Morocco, and as far east as Iraq.  In doing so, they achieved a span of about 200 years, between 27 BC and 180 AD, which is known as “Pax Romana,” or Roman Peace.  During this time, their empire thrived, intricate roads were built connecting this vast empire and aqueducts carried fresh water into cities and dirty water away.  But the cross may have been one of its most useful instruments.

The cross was a popular method of dispatching threats to the empire. “Romans practiced both random and intentional violence against populations they had conquered, killing tens of thousands by crucifixion,” says New Testament scholar Hal Taussig, who is with the Union Theological Seminary in New York.

Crosses were then used as a way to repress any possible insurrection.  They were usually set up in public places, like at a crossroad, and became a signpost to all who traveled that Caesar and Rome was a power to take seriously.  This cross did not offer people traveling directions but rather, with a corpse left hanging on it offered directions of another kind:  Know your place in this Roman order and everything will remain peaceful for you.  Make even the slightest waves in opposition and you can expect to join this man on your own cross.  These “signposts” were found all over the Roman world.

This is what the disciples had in their minds when Jesus, after being identified as the Messiah, announced “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”  Can you imagine both the horror and confusion that must have surrounded them?  This gifted rabbi that people had been flocking to hear speak and be healed by is telling us that he is the long awaited savior of our people.  He’s the Messiah!  But instead of saving us from the oppressive Romans, he is asking us to embrace their form of submission!

No wonder Peter, who first identifies Jesus as the Messiah, reacts so forcefully at Jesus’ teaching of his rejection.  Peter, like many of us, wants to take control of the situation and preserve his leader and movement.  Given the context of the Roman world, perhaps Jesus is simply stating a fact.  If I am what you say I am, the local authorities and ultimately Rome’s response will be to kill me.  But Peter’s desire to fight fire with fire was not the agenda God had planned for his son.  And, after forty days of training in the wilderness to resist satan’s temptations, Jesus’ work pays off as he resists any plan of self-preservation, even when it comes from his star pupil.

Would-be messiahs were nothing new in first century Palestine.  More than a few had risen to prominence, with their own band of disciples and the cause of God and nationalism as their banner.  Violence and death were always their end as they resisted the empire’s strength.  After each demise, there was nothing left to show for their efforts.  Jesus’ call was to embrace, on behalf of his followers, the path of savior through martyrdom.  Looking back at the witness of Christ in the gospels, it appears that part of God’s beautiful plan was that only through the embrace of self-sacrifice can the movement of God’s reign ever come in any significance.

What does this scripture have to say to followers of Christ today?  What kind of self denial and cross is Jesus asking us to carry?   And how abrupt and difficult is such a message to our ears?  To answer, we must first start with the question, “who do we say Jesus is?”

Who do we say Jesus is?  This question makes all the difference.  If we are going to take up our cross, we first have to believe the cause is worthy of suffering.

This is the question that gets this whole scene started.  Jesus and his disciples have been traveling from town to town preaching God’s kingdom, casting out demons and healing the sick.  He’s developed quite a fan club.  And Jesus wants to gauge his disciples by asking them about the folks they are encountering.  What are they saying about me?  Do they recognize me?  But ultimately, he wants to know if they, who have been with him the most, recognize him for who he really is.

When Peter makes his confession, the wheels start to turn. A messiah by any other name than Caesar is someone with a mark squarely on his shoulders.  The disciples have given up everything to follow him.  With this news, they may have to give up their life.  Peter and the others were probably ready to die for Jesus’ cause, to go down swinging in a fight against the evils of the empire.  What Peter did not like, what he didn’t fully understand, was Jesus’ acceptance of what seemed like defeat.  His teaching that he would die seemed like a certainty, not a possibility.  How could the Messiah be victorious when he was ready to accept death at the hands of the enemy?

Yet, as the story plays out, Jesus’ death is not the end but rather the beginning.  Jesus’ death changes everything.  Jesus’ willingness to trust fully in God’s authority over everything rather than the Ceasar’s violent version of reality, put Jesus on a cross but brought those who follow him life.  Today the Pax Romana is but an ancient history lesson.  But the gospel of Christ is embodied in every person who believes and follows.  Jesus’ death and resurrection was the ultimate signal that humans, no matter how powerful or threatening they appear, can’t really have any lasting power over God’s creation.

So, how we understand who Jesus is will make a difference in how we understand the cross that Jesus asks us to carry, and our willingness to pick it up and follow him.  What is our cross today?  Is it worth our sacrifice in order to bear it?

The challenge to those we teach today is to understand the cross and apply it to our circumstances.  The cross may not mean a literal death or martyrdom.  Rather, it may mean that we have to daily say no to things that stand in the way of our ability to fully trust in God alone.  What systems and technologies do we trust more than God?  Are we able to fully claim the way of Jesus above the way of capitalism, a particular political point of view, the threat of violence, a work ethic that drives us to continuous work or lifestyles that compromise our ability to see God at work and join God there?

These lifestyles, as an example, are not necessarily scandalous.  But, it very well may be in our comfort, in our overwhelming options of how to use our time and wealth, that we choose being served rather than serving. What does this look like?  If it is a continual guilt trip, then we don’t want it.  But, I think the Jesus way is a simple truth that our life is more than the conveniences we have become enslaved to.  As we follow Christ, we start to recognize this but too often we give into our own Peter rebuking us, trying to keep us safe, in a predictable place we can control.

Following Jesus is a greatest adventure.  Walking in his footsteps brings us purpose beyond anything else society can offer.  The tension is that society doesn’t want this adventure and doesn’t trust it or celebrate it.  Society wants to stay in a system that is predictable and controllable.  The adventure of faithfully following Jesus will either go under the radar of popular culture or it will be rejected.  This is just one of the crosses we as Christians are called to bear.  Being unpopular, crazy or both.

So, what does it mean to bear our cross?  We have collective crosses we must bear faithfully for God such as coming to terms with gun violence in America.  And we all have our own crosses that require sacrifice and faith to bear.  What will it look like for a community of Christ followers to bear our burdens (our crosses) together?  Is it possible?  I pray and hope that it is.

For a radical example of taking up the cross, Greg and Helms Jerrell have followed Jesus’ call to minister among a marginalized neighborhood in Charlotte, NC (http://qcfamilytree.org/).  Instead of pastoring in a church setting, which would have perhaps brought them more comforts and middle class lifestyle, they were called to Enderly Park.  Their choice has made them who they are and they wouldn’t change a thing!  A mission team will go to serve with them and learn with them June 27-30.  Sign up at http://www.hrbcrichmond.org/my-hrbc

Healing Presence

Below, I start by restating the student sheet introduction statements.  Then, I give my impressions followed by a couple of video illustration suggestions.

What is important to know?  Jesus is not scared of brokenness – either physical or spiritual.  His willingness and ability to heal draws a crowd.  Jesus can give them what they long for.  What is it that they long for?  (Wholeness?  Acceptance?  New life?)

Where is God in these words?  Jesus’ healing is powerful.  The Greek word egeiro is used here and in Mark 16:6 in reference to Jesus’ resurrection.  It seems that Jesus’ work is not healing just for healing sake.  It is restorative.  For Simon’s mother in law, her social responsibility to was to provide for guests when they were present in her home.  Today, her guest was none other that the Son of God!   The healing restored to her the social expectation and meaning for a homemaker in 1st century Palestine.  It restored her dignity.  Don’t mistake the role of Simon’s mother as normative for today, however.  That would be missing the point!

So what does this mean for our lives? God recognized that nearness and even touch were important for building a relationship and trust.  Thus, God put on flesh and came near to his creation he was seeking to re-connect.  The incarnation, God becoming flesh, is a astounding show of God’s love for creation.  Jesus was willing to come into contact with all kinds – no matter their ailment.  That means none of us are ever to far gone for Jesus to come near to us and restore us!  In Mark 1, that included the demon possessed, the sick and the unclean – those skin diseases believed to be spread by touch.  If Christians are considered the body of Christ, what does our willingness or unwillingness to associate with others say about who Jesus is?

Now what is God’s word calling us to do?   How have we been healed and restored by God’s word or by God’s healing touch?  How has that healing allowed us to use our words and deeds to heal and restore others?

All of us are children of God, created in the image of God.  All of us also live in a world where sin still is present.  We can’t deny it – every new day brings heartache and disappointment for so many.  Our human condition brings with it the capacity to do great and creative things and to fail; to hurt others and let others down.  Some bodies are capable of at one point running a sub-four minute mile or jumping hurdles and the next moment succumbing to cancer.  It leads us all to ask, where is God in this?  If we are created in God’s image, why all the pain, the sickness, the heartbreak?  How are we, God’s children, capable of such beauty and such evil?  The simple answer, of course, is sin.  The sin that started in our inability to fully trust God but rather to think of ourselves as God.  Its that same sin, our desire to think of ourselves as God that prevents us from most fully reflecting the image of God.  Rather, its in our humility to trust God fully and to put our neighbor first that is ironically the way we reflect the divine.

Mark introduces Jesus, the Son of God, in fast-paced snippets.  We learn about John the Baptist, Jesus’ baptism, Jesus’ wilderness temptations, Jesus’ proclamation that he embodied God’s reign come near and his call of his first disciples, all within the first 20 verses of chapter one!

Then, we find Jesus teaching in the synagogue on a Sabbath.  He spoke with authority, which is to say he was interpreting the scriptures without the help of another teacher or prophet.  (See N. T. Wright, Mark for Everyone p. 11, last paragraph).  Who better to recognize the authority of his teaching than the demon possessing a man present in the synagogue?  The demon obeys Jesus’ command and the assembly is amazed.

The scene switches to Simon’s mother-in-law’s home.  There, she is sick and unable to offer the typical hospitality that was expected of a first century Jewish home.    We don’t know anything about her illness.  But what seems to be significant is that Jesus is able to restore her health in such an effective way that she begins to serve her guests.  I don’t think this is a story about God’s desire for gender roles.  What it does speak to, however, is that in Jesus’ day, a woman’s role was wrapped up in her ability to offer hospitality to her guests.  Her sickness may have been grave.  She may have been brought back from the brink.  But at the least, her dignity was restored as she was able to provide what her peers would have expected her to do with guests in her home.

In the section after our reading, Jesus and his disciples happen upon a leper.  Lepers were some of the untouchable in Jesus’ day, with fear that their skin disease would be caught not just by touch but if they were within eye shot of others.   Therefore, lepers existed outside towns, alone and ostracized. This leper also recognizes who Jesus is and asks for healing.  Jesus is filled with compassion instead of repulsed as most would have been. (the Greek is splagchnizomai which is translated indignant or filled with compassion)  He reaches out and touches the leper!  And the leper is healed.

What do these miracles have in common?  What do they mean for we who follow Jesus, today?

For each of these people, the man demon possessed, the sick mother-in-law and the leper, were all  in one form or another considered less than whole.  One was possessed.  We may consider this person mentally ill today although this is to not diminish the reality demonic forces.  One could no longer do the tasks that gave her meaning. And the last was completely cut off from the community because of a physical ailment. But, when, in the NT, the person with leprosy was declared clean, it was her/his ticket to re-enter community, to be engaged again in work, family, worship, life. When the demonized person was set free, s/he was set free to fully connect again with others. Simon’s mother-in-law was raised to do the things that gave her purpose and meaning. The person who carried a sick one to Jesus walked home arm-in-arm with that one. These are not stories of magic; they are stories of human community being healed from the brokenness that sickness, disease, and mental illness can bring.

We know of the faithful Christians who do not receive the healing they prayed for, who suffer in a quiet but dignified way.  Is there hope for them in this scripture?  There is, if healing equals human connection.  If healing means God’s love for humanity does not depend on what society deems as acceptable.  If healing means that because of God’s work in Jesus, all can find full communion with God.  But this truth must be echoed in the way Christians in the present treat all God’s children.  That all people are worthy of our care, our time and our effort.

Martin Luther King’s vision of a Beloved Community that reflects God’s reign is the outcome of this kind of healing.  To offer a quote from Dr. King:  “But the end is reconciliation; the end is redemption; the end is the creation of the beloved community. It is this type of spirit and this type of love that can transform opposers into friends. The type of love that I stress here is not eros, a sort of esthetic or romantic love; not philia, a sort of reciprocal love between personal friends; but it is agape which is understanding goodwill for all men. It is an overflowing love which seeks nothing in return. It is the love of God working in the lives of men. This is the love that may well be the salvation of our civilization.”

from “The Role of the Church in Facing the Nation’s Chief Moral Dilemma,” 1957

God’s Kingdom, God’s rule is evident in this world when, in seeking God first, we are able to offer to others the dignity of a love that seeks to elevate others instead of ourselves.  As Jesus says later in Mark:  Whoever wants to be first among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all.  (Mark 10:43-44).

Did you see Patch Adams when it was released in 1998?  It is the true story of an unconventional Dr. who learned to offer healing to others in unconditional ways.  In one scene, he brings laughter to children suffering from cancer in a sterile and serious hospital ward. https://youtu.be/byPJ22JDFjI  In another he argues that all people can be doctors when they see one another not as patients or problems but as people who can offer healing. https://youtu.be/Pr9ruvxA3K4 These clips may be helpful in illustrating the point or starting a conversation.

Preparing for Christmas

December is the time of year that I pull out what I consider my favorite movie and watch it again and again.  While I like movies, I’m not one to watch movies over and over again or remember the dialogue enough to quote it word for word.  Except for one:  Christmas Vacation.  Christmas Vacation, though rather irreverent, puts a smile on my face every time I see it.  So this week’s lesson, all about preparation and good news, reminded me of a classic scene in the movie.

Christmas Vacation Clip

Clark Griswold loves Christmas.  In the movie, he is determined to give his family “the best family Christmas ever!”  In addition to the perfect experience, he also wants to give the best gift – a swimming pool.  Only problem is, he has to put a large down payment on the pool before he gets his Christmas bonus, a check he has to have to cover the cost.  He grows anxious when, come Christmas Eve, his check has still not shown up.    Finally, a knock at the door reveals a delivery man who has an envelope from the company.  Unfortunately, the gift inside the envelope isn’t quiet what Clark has prepared for.

  • How do you prepare for Christmas?
  • Does it matter how we prepare for Christmas?
  • Do much effort do you give to the secular Christmas and how much to spiritual?
  • Often times, there is a let-down after the busyness of the season?  Why?  Might the amount of attention we give shopping and parties versus the time we give preparing our spirits for Christ have a direct correlation?
  • When have you been disappointed when something you have looked forward to doesn’t work out?

This week’s lesson is about preparing the way to receive the good news about Jesus, the Messiah.  Our text is Mark 1:1-8 and the first verse will set the stage for our lesson.  “The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God.”

For Christians who have been hearing “the good news” or “gospel” for some time, this language can seem rather mundane and ordinary.  There is the temptation to get past this introduction and get to the meat of the story.  While Mark’s gospel obliges this request and doesn’t mess around with a lot of details, it also doesn’t include a birth story or any childhood mention.  He gets straight to the point, starting with Jesus’ baptism.  So this Advent season, sitting with Mark as our guide, we are left with John the Baptist’s message of preparation, repentance and forgiveness.  How does this message help us prepare for Christmas?  Knowing a little more about the context of Mark’s audience and the language he employees, even in verse one, will help.

The roots of an announcement of “good news” or “gospel” as a new beginning of peace and prosperity can be traced to the Old Testament, especially in Isaiah’s announcement of hope for the faithful exiles in Babylon (Isaiah 40:9; 52:7; 61:1).  The herald of good news pointed to a hope that lay in the future.  The Old Testament lesson for Sunday (Isaiah 40:1-11) illustrates this.

In the more immediate context of Mark, “good news” is linked with the announcement of military victories.  During Jesus’ day a Roman messenger bringing good news may have looked like this:

The messenger appears, raises his right hand in greeting and calls out with a loud voice: Greetings…we are victors!”  By his appearance it is known already that he brings good news.  His face shines, his spear is decked with laurel, his head is crowned, he swings a branch of palms, joy fills the city, euangelia (sacrifices for good news) are offered, the temples are garlanded and the one to whom the message is owed is honored with a wreath.

By the time of Mark, the term good news or gospel was closely connected with the acclamation of Caesar Augustus as a divine man who by his victories had inaugurated a new era of peace for all the world.  An inscription from Priene in Asia Minor links the term “good news” to Augustus who is also called “savior.”  Against this background, Mark 1:1 would have been understood as both the fulfillment of the messianic hopes of Israel and a polemic against the cult of the emperor.  Mark’s message is the crucified, not the enthroned, should be worshiped for overcoming evil and ushering in a new kingdom of peace and deliverance.

Knowing this, Mark starts his story of Jesus with quite a strong statement.  This Jesus is significant.  Mark then quotes Isaiah 40:3, Exodus 23:20 and Malachi 3:1 when he refers to John the Baptist’s work of preparation:

“I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way” – “a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’”

What is the significance of this voice calling out for Mark’s audience and why is it important for we modern Christians to hear during advent, as we prepare to celebrate Christmas?  Mark’s earliest audience would have heard the following Old Testament scripture in John’s voice:

In Exodus 23:20, God promises protection through an angel who will go before them to protect them and guide them as they take the land of Canaan.  God, through the angel, was preparing the way for Israel to be established as a light unto the nations.  The greek word for angel can also mean messenger.

Malachi is the last book in the Old Testament and is addressed to a people who had grown indifferent to God’s presence and their role as light to the world.  Malachi’s name is literally “my messenger” and his aim was to stir his audience to a renewed commitment.  Malachi 3:1 portrays a mysterious and unpredictable God that an apathetic people would be fearful of encountering.

Isaiah 40 is a well known advent text that portrays God as comforter to a people who, in exile, have paid their debts.  The messenger asks his hearers to make a way for this forgiving God who stands above and beyond time while we are subject to finality.

Part of John’s call for preparation was baptism.  Baptism does not hold the same meaning this side of the cross as it did for Jews in the first century.  While baptism now reflects a change in status from death to new life in the light of Jesus’ sacrifice, both call for repentance.  Repentance is a recognition of sin and a complete turn from an old way of behavior to a new and different way.  Essenes, Jews who lived an ascetic life of piety and purity in the wilderness, practiced ritual washings that required repentance which brought forgiveness. But repentance had to be genuine – no saying one thing and then behaving in your old manner.  Baptism meant nothing if nothing changed.  Essenes may have influenced John’s understanding of baptism.

Josephus, a Jewish historian alive at the time of Jesus, reports that John the Baptist,

“Exhorted the Jews to lead righteous lives, to practice justice towards their fellows and piety towards God, and so doing to join in baptism.  In his view this was a necessary preliminary if baptism was to be acceptable to God.”

So what does Mark 1:1-8 teach our modern ears in regards to preparation for Christmas and faithful living?

  1. Jesus is the Messiah.  He may come to us in unexpected ways:  as a baby born into poverty to an unwed mother, in the wilderness, or challenging the people and things which we give priority.  In the end, Jesus – the Son of God – is victorious.  His strength, however, is found in his selflessness, gentleness and his truthfulness.  Unlike other conquerors of the past, there is nothing for Jesus to hide or conceal, making his truthfulness both good news to those who are prepared to receive it and inconvenient for those who chose to avoid it.
  2. Repentance forgives and prepares.  The good thing about a beginning (v. 1) is that it conveys newness.  Genuine repentance recognizes we haven’t lived according to the way we were created to live. We haven’t contributed to God’s shalom (wholeness).  Genuine repentance says, “knowing what I know now about my life, I’m going to live in a different way.”  John’s baptism marked that moment in which folks could look back and say “at that moment, I changed my direction.”  Unlike the people in Malachi, those who sought baptism in the Jordan were ready to give up their apathy toward God and were thus ready to recognize God when God appeared.

So how do we confess that Jesus is good news today?  What stands in our way?  More importantly, does our confession match our action?  Are we genuine? Nothing could be more damaging in 2017 than a confession that is not complemented by behavior and action.  I’m afraid that nowadays, our society expects to be disappointed by our leaders.  How can our confession that Jesus is Messiah overcome the failings of so many leaders in religion, business, government and entertainment?

How might our preparation of the way of the Lord this advent help us recognized God at work among us?