Mark records that Jesus gets a lot of teaching done in the last week of his life. He tells of the wicked tenants who squander what has been given them by the master. People try to trick Jesus in a question about taxes but he tells us about the futility of worshipping images and who we are to give to God what is his, as if there are things that aren’t. Christ teaching about what it will be like at the resurrection. He makes sure that we know the greatest commandment is the first—love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. He tries to make them understand his equality with God and then is very pointed in his denunciation of the religious leaders who were set against him.

Then Christ talks about money. Which is certainly something that we don’t like to talk about very often. It tends to conjure up images of sweaty  guys in white suits telling us that we need to give God a “seed” and that will fix all our problems. But Jesus thought it was a very important topic. During his ministry, Jesus talked most about the Kingdom of God. His second most popular topic was money. He spoke on money more than he did heaven and hell combined. 11 of the 39 parables hi gave us talk about money. In the Gospel of Luke, 1 of every 7 verses deals with money. All that must mean something.

It’s pretty interesting to me that Christ purposefully sat down in the temple to watch what people gave. He watches many rich people come by and put in some very large sums of money (which is certainly better than them putting in tiny amounts, I suppose). But after they have gone, a widow puts in about a penny. Just a penny. I think that while this story is about money, it is mainly about what God finds to be important. It wasn’t the amount that was given. That didn’t seem to matter much to Christ at all.

He talks to his disciples about people giving out of their surplus. This is a tricky one because to be honest, this both looks great and feels great. We go to great lengths to commend people like the owner of a certain fast food chain that gives 90% of his money as an offering. That seems pretty impressive and I would certainly feel a lot better about myself if I did that with each of my paychecks. But the old widow gave out of her poverty. This is different. This not only looks bad, it tends to feel inadequate. Imagine following a group of people to the front of the church, each one placing thousands of dollars in the offering and when it gets to be your turn, you drop in a nickel, in view of all those there.

And this is where we get to decide what is important to us. What do we think that we own? Isn’t all of it God’s? We are called to be stewards and stewards do not own what they have been charged to watch. I think it can be very scary to live life giving out of poverty. Especially with everyone looking. But we know one who looks with purpose and intently. He knows how to bless though who do.

As Mark rushes towards the last week of Christ’s life, he tells us about Jesus sending out the 12 disciples. He explains to us how a field full of people were fed. He tries his best to show us Jesus’ emphasis on personal relationships over religious law. And then he finally gets to his destination… Passion week. The last week in Christ’s life. Jesus, on the back of a colt, proceeds into Jerusalem in what we call the Triumphal Entry. I am sure it was quite the spectacle.

The first place Jesus goes is to the temple. Now the Gospel of John records this in the beginning of Jesus’ ministry but I don’t think chronology was John’s concern and I really don’t believe that the Sadducees, who ran the temple and it’s markets, would allow Christ to do this twice. So anyway… Jesus rolls up into the temple and he is not happy with what he sees. The High Priests had been buying the priesthood from their Roman benefactors and were paying for the lucrative concession rights.

Jesus drives out the money changers. Imagine you have traveled from far off as an obedient Jew to visit the temple of God. Well, you’re not from Israel and you don’t carry their currency. Well, no problem, weary traveler. Boy, have we got a deal for you. Just exchange your money for ours so that you can buy the sacrifices you need to be right with God. Oh, and by the way, we going to have to charge you and pretty hefty fee for the service. Sorry.— This is probably not what the Lord had in mind. We also see Christ drive out those who were selling doves. Doves were the sacrifice of the poor, the lepers and women. But these holy men were making these people pay three times the amount that the doves usually cost. And if the women or the poor brought their own, they were often found to be “unworthy” for sacrifice and disqualified. It was quite the racket.

Jesus is taking a stand in defining the law’s true purpose versus what the religious leaders had turned it into. It was to be a way to point people towards their dependence on God, not a way to set up a den of robbers. This is not the first time or the last that people will be cheated out of their money, time, even their identity under the guise of religion. There are still those who try to use God to further their own means. These thieves are better thought of as insurrectionists. An active rebelling against God. Woe to us when we allow that to exist, when we allow the name of God to be sullied in the world.

I grew up in some churches that, well, let’s say, took a fairly fundamentalist view of Christianity. Imagine the conservative viewpoint on any particular situation and then move to the right of that. That’s what I was shown as the character of God for most of my youth. There was definitely a hierarchy of sins. The worst sin was to be gay. To hear my church talk about it, being gay was just about the worst thing a person could ever do in any way at any time. I can’t imagine those churches would really even let a gay person into the church, let alone, sit on the back pew. No, the back pews were reserved for the second worst sin a person could commit. Yep, that’s right, being divorced. Oh, the humanity. Those vile, evil, family-destroying divorced people.

I can remember times when we as a church would let preach or listen to “evangelists” who were actual convicted murders. And they were praised for their being a “new creation” and the power that God could do in a person’s life. What a legacy to live up to…. King David- Adulterer and murderer. Moses- Murderer and coward. Saint Paul- Murderer. Saint Peter- Betrayer. All of these people were just fine and right as rain but those divorced people… well, we could barely even think to talk about them. And they sure weren’t getting any kind of leadership position in the church, that is for certain.

While I always had a problem with the way these people were treated, Mark 10 shows us that it is indeed an important subject that needs to be discussed. To Christ, marriage was important and living up to such an important commitment was not something to take lightly. The ideal is for the 2 to become 1. This is why Jesus puts so much importance on it. Paul tells us that Christ is married to his bride, the Church. It is his very body. The two becoming one. It’s a big deal.

Divorce has such short and long term ramifications on family. It is the destruction of relationship. We as the Church are supposed to be the light to the world and set an example in this area but so often, we fail here as well. We don’t salt the earth as well as we should. We should be living out the call to be ministers of reconciliation in all areas of our lives, especially in marriage.

But the ideal is not always the world we get to live in, is it? And Jesus understands that. I guess I believe that infidelity comes in many forms. I don’t think that it just means that one partner physically cheating on the other. I have seen emotional infidelity actually be more relationally destructive than physical infidelity. I find that we believe our happiness should trump righteousness. “If I’m not happy, I get to leave.” And that is true if the commitment we make is to our feelings. But I can’t find in the Gospel where that’s the idea. We are committed to each other through Christ in both the good times and the bad. Or at least, we are supposed to be.

I think that God’s standards are high but I really believe that his grace is even higher. James tells us that mercy triumphs over judgment. So if while we try to live out the commitment in our marriages, we rely on God’s grace. And if we find we fall short, we still rely on God’s grace.

As Mark continues to record Peter’s experiences with Jesus, he tells us of a time when Christ walks up on his disciples who happen to be having a little discussion with some religious types. The disciples and religious leaders were arguing actually. This should come as a surprise to no one. The scribes argued with Christ, they were certainly going to argue with his people. What is true for the teacher is true for the students. Why would this shock us? Why would it shock us now when we face criticism?

The disciples were having a slight problem casting a demon out of a little boy. They thought they had this kind of thing under control, after all, they had done it before. But this one was being tough. And it’s in this failure that the scribes spoke up. Their big problem though was that the scribes were concerned with the theological implications of the situation. Christ was concerned with the faith of the people and the healing of the boy. That’s a fairly important distinction.

When Jesus asks what was going on, the father of the boy explains the situation in detail. He makes the situation very complicated and tries to give Christ every possible detail. (This is one of the healing stories told in the Gospels and whenever I read one I try to reflect on just how diverse they can be. Sometimes the infirmed come to Jesus, sometimes he goes to them first. Some seem to show great faith and some seem to show no faith. In one case, a man’s friends do all the work for him and speak in his place.)

Christ, who rarely lets a teachable moment slip away, admonishes his disciples, those people who should know better. The disciples seem to still not be fully grasping the Kingdom of God. They seem to have brushed aside the importance of prayer. For it is prayer that is the lifeblood of relationship. Those words we speak are just a byproduct of our relationship with God. Christ puts such an extreme emphasis on belief because belief and prayer interact with each other and intertwine into something beautiful.

After this discussion, Christ asks, for some reason, how long the boy has been in this condition. The father goes further into detail and it is here that he almost gets himself into trouble. He ends his explanation with the phrase, “If you can”. Uh oh. “If you can??” Christ appears to take a bit of offense at this questioning of what he can and cannot do. Again we see the relationship and importance of prayer and belief. His answer to the man is that all things are possible. This is certainly not a blank check or a way to manipulate God. It is the promise that all things done in the authority that God gives us are possible to the one who believes.  

I really do appreciate the father’s recognition of his faux pas. He works quickly to  correct his slight and speaks the inner workings of heart. “I believe. Help my unbelief.” And I love that Christ meets the man where he is in life and accepts his unbelief but loves him enough to not let him stay in that state. And the boy is healed.

In art, the gospel of Mark is often represented as a lion. It is fast and always seems to be rushing. Mark uses the term “immediately” a lot and seems to be moving us quickly along a road. And that road leads to the last week of Christ’s life. One third of the book is dedicated to that single week. That week must have been important to Peter. Why Peter? Because it’s probably from his sermons in Rome that Mark gets his account.

And it’s from this account that we see Jesus heading out of Nazareth, escaping because he dared to be something more than his hometown thought he should be. It’s right after this that Christ sends out his twelve disciples. He basically sends them out with nothing but a staff and a pair of sandals. Well, not entire true. Christ gave them his authority. He gave them the power to perform these Messianic signs in order to show the culture the present Messiah. Someone they had never met before.

In a society that has a rooted faith, we are to walk by faith and not by sight. Those who see and believe are blessed but how much more so those who do not see and believe. Even Christ would stop giving signs. We are to trust in God, no demand miracles. And we are not asked to have blind faith. Neither were the disciples. They had Christ’s example. Now not everything that is said in the Bible is said to us and we should be careful when applying a verse to ourselves. But I do believe that this idea is for the disciples then and for the Church now. We are to rely on the faith of what has come before, heed the call to righteousness of the moment, and cling to the hope of what will come.

It must have been quite unnerving for the 12 when Jesus started listing off the things they couldn’t bring with them. Don’t take food or money or a bag or an extra tunic. It think what he was trying to get them to understand was that they would not be able to plan for every situation they would face. So often we are paralyzed by continual preparation. We never think we are quite ready enough so we never venture out. But we can’t prepare for every situation, problem or contingency either. We aren’t meant to.

Not only did Christ send them out with his power, he sent them out with each other. They didn’t have to go through this alone. In fact, they were never meant to do it by themselves. We aren’t supposed to either. We are the Church and are meant to live this life out together. We are going to encounter places and people that are accepting of the message and people and places that reject it. Not everything can be conformed to the culture or the desires of the people in it. This is why we do this together.

In the second verse of the second chapter of the book of Genesis we are told that after 6 days of creating, God rested. This seems to be pretty important because when God gives Moses the 10 Commandments, he makes sure to include that one of those commandments is to have a day of rest, a Sabbath. A little further on we see that Jesus practiced this commandment and in Ephesians Paul will tell us to be imitators of God. Well, there is no doubt that God rested. God honored the Sabbath.

Jesus tells us in Mark that as important as it is, the Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath. See, the Sabbath is about freedom. Freedom from the curse of the garden. Freedom from the belief that we are in charge of all the things in our life. Freedom from the thought that this world is all there is and all there ever will be for us. Hebrews 4 talks to us about there being rest for us in the fulfilled Kingdom of God. Sabbath lets us look forward to that fulfillment.

I think that we don’t do Sabbath very well. We either make the mistake our biblical elders did and make up rules that force us to “honor” the Sabbath and in doing so puts us subservient to the Sabbath. But again, it’s not us that is made for it. If not that, then we usually abandon it altogether, usually because we believe that we are too busy to actually rest from the extreme importance of our daily lives. But it seems that God wasn’t too busy to rest. And that Christ wasn’t too busy to rest. I wonder if we think our stuff is more important than God’s stuff. Are the activities in our lives so much more important than the activities Christ was attending to?

What does it mean when we feel that every second needs to be filled with activity? What does it say about us when we feel that every minute needs to be filled with accomplishment? Why can’t we be alone with ourselves and with God? We fill our Sabbath with “good” things but we still feel the need to fill it. And in doing so, we really don’t rest.

Spiritual practice is not something that comes easy. We have to practice it. How could we do Sabbath? We could run errands beforehand. Sabbath is not a time for a to-do list. It doesn’t have to be a private practice. We could probably practice it with someone else. We could start small if we have to. Maybe starting off with an entire day at this point in our lives would just be brutal. Start with a few hours. Or an hour. Or 15 minutes. Just start. Practice restful activities. Do things that bring you closer to God and set your distractions away from you. Practice the Sabbath.

So Moses has led the people out of Egypt. Well, sorta. For 31 chapters, God has made sure that it was known that it was God’s strength through God’s right hand and God’s mighty right arm that led God’s people out of Egypt. He led them out and let them plunder the Egyptians as they went. They went from small family to large tribe to tortured slaves to wealthy independents. And then God calls Moses up to the mountain and he goes to have a talk. And he is gone for a while.

It’s here that the people start to forget about everything that has occurred for them. They begin to lean on their own understanding. We have seen how easily and quickly Pharaoh fell back on the old lies of the world and the people of God do as well. To their credit, they want God. To their discredit, they want him when they want him. On their terms and timetables.

The people go to Aaron and ask for something to be done. So he sets up a feast for “The Lord”. And they build a calf. You may have heard of it. But the calf wasn’t actually God. It was the place were God was supposed to sit. The people think they can build this thing and get God to appear when they call. Poof! Here he is! This is the problem the people had at the tower of Babel. Their motives weren’t bad… they wanted to be together, they wanted to be near God but they wanted it on their terms too. They want to be in control.

Well, God sees what is going on at the base of the mountain and he is none too pleased. In fact, he changes his tune about the people, which is his right under the terms of the covenant, which they are breaking. So this is when God gets a little humorous. All of a sudden, these are now Moses’ people who Moses brought out of Egypt. Oh, and he wants Moses to walk away for a bit so that he can kill them all and start over with Moses and his descendants. Yeah, he was not happy.

It doesn’t say but you have to wonder how much thought Moses gave to the offer. He would now be the patriarch of the people, not Abraham. You gotta figure he was at least tempted a little bit. Well, he doesn’t give into that temptation and decides that this is not a wise path. I love that Moses had a close enough relationship with God to be honest and frank with him. I think that often we don’t think we can talk to God that way. Moses asks God to slow down. Asks God to repent of this plan. Moses reminds God of his promises to Abraham. He also tells God that it will look bad to the other people of the earth if he does this. It was be bad for his reputation. The reputation of God is something we should be aware of when we decide to throw our doctrines and opinions in the faces of those with whom we disagree.

So God repents. He turns away from that course of action. He turns away his wrath. But there were still consequences for what the people had done. It would not have been in their best interest to just let their idea of who God is and their relationship to him exist in error. And 3000 people die that die. Following God is a matter of life and death. There is no way to get around that fact. We can’t just follow a little bit. We can’t just love the world a little bit. That’s not how it works.