Fifth Sunday after Pentecost

Lissa Wray Beal

Mark 5:21-43

I’ve been watching the Harry Potter movies again – perhaps proof that some of us never grow up?! You might think Voldemort – the villain of the books; a dark wizard beyond imagining – would be the most hated character of the book. He is terrifying. But it’s Delores Umbridge who gets my vote as being right up there with the Dark Lord as the most evil character.

For those of you who don’t know the story, Delores is the under-secretary to the Minister of Magic. She has a position of power. To look at her, you might think she was also a nice person: sweet; compassionate. Why? Well, it’s the way she’s presented in the movie: dresses in pink (such a gentle colour!). Smiles a lot. Pink office. Lots of cats. Sweet voice. But then you realize that all that is a sham: her sweetness is cloying. Any “niceness” is quickly stripped bare and you see her for what she is: cruel. Mean-spirited. Petty. A mask of compassion hiding a power-rich, and power-hungry horror.

Power without compassion is a dangerous thing.

 But of course, there’s the other side of the coin: compassion without power to act. That is something we see a lot of in our world. It might be something we’ve experienced this week as we watched repeated terrorist attacks. We ache for the world around us and often feel helpless to act to change people and systems that hold power. It is what I think of when I recall Romeo Dallaire, the general of the Canadian Peace Keepers during the Rwanda genocide. If you read his book, Shake Hands with the Devil you hear the anguished voice of an individual who cares – is compassionate – in the face of the evil he sees loosed around him. Anguished because he is limited in what he can do against the evil. Powerless in the face of international deafness and lack of will to act.

Compassion without power is at best anguish. At worst, it devolves to mere sentiment – domesticating evil in the face of our inability.

These two poles: power without compassion/compassion without power are what make our gospel reading this morning so striking. For in our reading, both all power, and all compassion are fully present.

We encounter here what is called a “Markan Sandwich” – this is a classic example: one story that stands like two slices of bread, with another story stuffed into the middle like the peanut-butter-and-jelly. The two stories work together, creating a taste sensation (or in the case, a theology sensation) that is more than the sum of its parts.

Two women. Both Jewish – and in a Jewish context, it is interesting that the narrator remarks that one is 12 years old, the other sick for 12 years – do they somehow represent those 12 tribes of Israel that Jesus is trying to reach?

One – Jairus’ daughter – is of a house with social standing: her dad is a leader of the synagogue. The other – the woman with the flow of blood – must have some financial means. Or she did at one time: now, she has spent it all trying to find a cure. But though these two women have some kind of connection to “society that matters,” in many more ways they are on the margins:

-          They are women in a society in which women are not part of the structures of power. One is further marginalized because she is a child. Their lives are contained within male social structures. Their sphere is limited – as if they are second-class citizens.

-          One has a flow of blood – a condition (perhaps gynecological) that makes her ritually impure, unable to come to worship; unable to touch people and things that are holy. And therefore, an outcast.

  • This woman would know the sharp point of village gossip. She would know the difficulty of her own body working against her. She would know the pain of seeing her savings dwindle as she tried first one – then another – then another – “sure cure” that only failed. She knows weakness, and likely loneliness.

-          One is at the point of death

  • This child is old enough to know that her hopes and dreams: perhaps of marriage and family; of sabbath walks along a beloved river; of participating in the daily round of life that is so sweet – stand on a knife edge
  • And we can’t forget her father. Surely he must know the agony of any parent who sits, helplessly, at the bedside of a child, watching their life ebb away, with no power to restore it.

All three of these people – child, father, woman – are in desperate straits. Each could take today’s psalm as their own: “Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD. 2 Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications! “

          Into the lives of these powerless, desperate people, Jesus comes. He’s just finished calming the storm – speaking a word as the world’s creator: “Peace! Be Still!” And he’s just finished demon-busting – restoring a man inhabited by a legion of demons to sound mind and free life. Jesus comes into the lives of powerless women, and his power to do something is not in question – the calm sea and the reclaimed man are proof of that.

          The question is: will he do something? Can the one who exercises all power now stoop to these little lives? Will the creator and sustainer of the universe have time for what must be (in comparison to keeping the whole world turning on its axis) little concerns – and be moved with compassion? And the goodness of the gospel is that Jesus can, and does.

          All over this accounts the narrator has revealed the compassion of Jesus:

          Ever notice that it is Jairus’ “little daughter” – this, in a time when child mortality was high. Jesus could pass her by and leave her as just another “statistic.” But Jesus is moved to redirect his steps to her house. Ever notice that enroute to that encounter – an encounter that could have brought Jairus (and likely many other religious leaders) onside with Jesus, perhaps dissolving some of the opposition he faced - ever notice that Jesus doesn’t take the route of political expediency but stops and changes direction again? For a woman? For a woman who (sick and not supposed to touch holy people such as Jesus) touched him? Taken power from him? Ever notice that he calls this woman “Daughter?” (how long since she’d heard such kind words?) Takes time to talk with her – hear her story – care for her? Ever notice that Jesus doesn’t just attend to her physical healing (which she knows has taken place), but on speaking with her responds to her faith and grants her not just healing but shalom – peace/wholeness of mind, spirit, and body?

Ever notice that Jesus guards the privacy of Jairus’ daughter, taking only those closest to her and him into the room of the dead child? Ever notice that when he raises her from the dead, he looks after her restored physical needs by ordering lunch for her?

Ever notice that – from first to last with these on-the-margins, desperate women – Jesus (Storm-Calmer; Demon-Buster) speaks and acts out of compassion?    

Mark shows Jesus as both all-powerful, and all-compassionate. Read through his gospel sometime – it’s short; you can do it in an hour or so – and see how chock-full it is of Jesus exercising power out of compassion. Healings. Casting demons out of tormented people. Restoring Life. Calming storms for fearful disciples. Feeding hungry multitudes. Over and over again, by showing Jesus as all-powerful and all-compassionate Mark bolsters the initial claim of his gospel. He makes this claim in the first line of his gospel when he says he’s presenting

“The good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Mark shows Christ as God – the powerful, compassionate God of the Old Testament – now come in the frailty and weakness of human flesh. Experiencing all our human frailty – yet without sin – Jesus knows what it like to be human. In that experience, God’s compassion finds new focus, and new expression.

Steve Bell has an Advent/Christmas CD– it came out about a year or so ago. I have that CD and of all its 11 songs, there is one that I always play – repeatedly – when I listen to the album. Steve puts to music words of the poet Malcolm Guite. It’s called “Descent” and it speaks of Jesus – the all powerful God who comes in human flesh, experiencing all its weaknesses yet without sin. The song ends with these words, “Born to these burdens, borne by all/born with us all “astride the grave”/Weak, to be with us when we fall/and strong to save/Weak to be with us when we fall/and strong to save.

That is only accomplished by the one of All Power, who out of compassion, stoops and becomes humanin order to be with us and meet our need.

Jesus Pantocrator MonrealeIf you ever travel to Palermo, Sicily, you must take the bus to Monreale. It’s an ordinary city bus: crowded, smelly. It lets you off in the nearby city of Monreale. Walk through the ordinary streets and market to the 12th century Normal cathedral. Its façade is plain stone. Go inside. And be prepared to be overwhelmed! Its interior will immediately communicate a sense of God’s awesome power. Its inside is covered with golden mosaics. Everywhere: walls, ceilings you see depictions of God’s mighty acts of power and compassion in the Old, and the New Testaments. But the centerpiece of the whole interior of the church is the ceiling mosaic of the “Christus Pantocrator” – the “Almighty Christ.”

          The pose of the Christus Pantocrator is familiar in churches, and icons. Iconography is executed in strict style, using codes to help the observer understand what is being communicated.

          Look at this icon of Christus Pantocrator, Christ Almighty. You see the gold – symbolic of heaven and power. Over his heads are Greek words that say “The One Who Is” – indicating he is the God encountered at the Burning Bush – the “I am that I am.” He is the creator; the all-powerful one who sustains the universe in its place. You look at the mosaic in Monreale and so powerful is the depiction of Christ that (with Isaiah) you feel you must fall to your face in worship. “Woe is me for I am unclean in the presence of Almighty God!” might be the only appropriate words in the face of such almighty power.

This is what I think of every Sunday as we sing our opening praise:

          “Glory in the highest glory/peace to all, in all their days.

          Worship, thanks, and praise unceasing/to the Source of all we raise.

          Reigning in the sapphire heights/hidden from our mortal sight,

          Now receive our adoration/as we make our supplication”

At the moment I imagine Christ “reigning in the sapphire heights” I am transported to the power and majesty of the Monreale Christus Pantocrator. I imagine God’s power; and Christ surrounded by the radiance of that power.

         

But this icon also shows something besides Christ as the All-powerful one, reigning in heaven. Or – to be more accurate – this icon shows something unusual that exhibits Christ’s power. You can see that Jesus is wearing a cloak -  sometimes green, in this case blue. It is a sign of Christ’s humanity. All the glory – all the power of heaven – is now cloaked in human flesh and the experience of our needs and weaknesses. Jesus is fully human not just while on earth. But forever. Notice how the cloak is tightly bound – symbolic of the fact that Jesus takes on human flesh – in compassion meets us in our human situation where we so desperately need him – and he does so for all time. Why? Because he has the power to do so. Why? Because he has the compassion that moves him to do so.

It is the placement of the Christus Pantocrator in Monreale cathedral that is most instructive to understand the all-powerful/all-compassionate Christ. It is in the ceiling, right over the table.

Rightly, the Christus Pantocrator could be set nowhere else. For it is the table that signifies to us Christ’s greatest act of compassion, and his greatest act of power. At our greatest point of need – helpless to help ourselves – Christ died for us in compassion. And in the greatest display of power, he did not use his power to save himself, but laid it aside, enduring death on a cross. And it is after that (powerful!) sacrifice of power that an even greater power is demonstrated in Christ’s resurrection from the dead.

No wonder that the Roman Centurion who witnessed Christ’s crucifixion says in Mark’s gospel, “Surely, this man is the Son of God.”

Ultimate compassion. Ultimate power.

This is the table where we meet Christ anew. We bring the needs of our lives here. He acts in compassion and power toward us – saving us. Perhaps we find healing as we receive communion and people anoint us in Christ’s name. Perhaps he speaks a word of love and comfort to us as we share at the table. Christ today is not on his way to some more important meeting – he is here – with us – to meet each of us at our point of need. He meets us in ways we hope for and expect; he meets us when his timing is not ours; he meets us when we don’t understand what or how or why. In compassion and power, he meets us here.

And experiencing anew his compassion and power, we will leave this place. By his power, as Eucharistic people we will share his compassion with the world around us.

This is the mystery of faith. Thanks be to God.