Isaiah 40:21-31,  1 Corinthians 9:16-23,  Mark 1:29-39,  Psalm 147:1-12, 21c

Two weeks ago we buried the last of my mother’s five sisters.  Aunt Dorothy was gracious with great devotion to those she knew; she loved conversation and could make the simplest story humorous and interesting.  If you were in conversation with her, you were her full focus.  One of my favorites of her stories was her experience of preparing her son, my cousin, Jeff for college.

Other mothers were gathering single bed sheets and towels and notebooks, pens, and paper for their children who were headed to various colleges.  Aunt Dorothy was sewing coat hangers in the tails of tuxedos, constructing brightly colored paper Mache shoes, and purchasing a long list of grease paint supplies.  While other sons and daughters were headed to prestigious halls of academia, her son was going to clown college – he would go on to become one of the select few to make the cut for the “greatest show on earth” – the Barnum and Bailey Circus, fulfilling his lifelong dream of being a circus clown.  For two years , the mile-long circus train would be his home, travelling across country to hundreds of cities, bringing joy to mesmerized children and old folks.

There is truly a mystique in the smell of the grease paint and the roar of the crowd – the life of a circus clown.

In today’s Gospel lesson, Jesus’ ministry is beginning to feel a little bit like a circus.  As we continue our journey as described in Mark’s Gospel; we continue alongside Jesus and his disciples in these early stages of Jesus’ ministry, and we begin to sense the tension of the crowd pressing in on us.  Last week we read the account from Mark’s Gospel of Jesus’ very public rebuke of the unclean spirit as he was preaching in the crowded synagogue in Capernaum.  From that time, crowds grew and began to gather wherever he went.  As we continue in our study of Mark’s Gospel, we will encounter this theme of the crowd again and again.

After casting out the unclean spirit of the man in the synagogue, Jesus and the disciples went to the home of Simon Peter where Simon Peter’s mother-in-law was ill.  In the intimate scene, Jesus cured her and she rose up to serve.  Thus, Peter’s mother-in-law became Jesus’ first deacon.

Afterwards, we read: “the whole city was gathered around the door.  And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons.” – the whole city – really?

With attention to these words, we might sense Jesus’ growing concern.  Jesus knew that his mission was not that of a magician, performing miracles and drawing the shallow adulation of the crowd – though that seemed to be the direction it might be taking.

Jesus knew that his mission was not that of a magician on stage or a clown in the circus; his mission was and is to proclaim the Gospel message – the Good News of redemption and salvation for all creation.  Jesus knew that his mission was not to draw the adoration of the crowd; his mission would be to bring healing salvation to God’s people one-by-one as exemplified in the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law.  He would not go into towns and cities simply to draw crowds and applause and move on; he would touch individuals, take them by the hand, and raise them up.

From the prophet Isaiah:

Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength,
they shall mount up with wings like eagles,

they shall run and not be weary,
they shall walk and not faint.

One by one, they would walk and not faint.

When Jesus felt his mission seeming to become a circus, he went away while it was still dark to a deserted place to pray.  There in the quiet darkness Jesus would seek the guidance of his heavenly Father – guidance to continue his mission as God had intended – guidance in the face of the encroaching crowds – guidance within the darkness to see the faces of every member of that encroaching crowd, touching them and healing them one-by-one – intimate scenes of touching and speaking.

There is a lovely story recounted by the physician Richard Selzer in his book “Moral lessons, Notes on the Art of Surgery.”

I stand by the bed where a young woman lies, her face post-operative, her mouth twisted – palsy, clownish.  A tiny twig of the facial nerve, the one to the muscles of her mouth, has been severed … To remove the tumor in her cheek, I had cut the little nerve.  The young husband is in the room.  He stands on the opposite side of the bed, and together they seem to dwell in the evening lamplight, isolated from me, private…”Will my mouth always be like this?”  She asks.  “Yes,” I say, “it will.  It is because the nerve was cut.”  She nods and is silent.  But the young man smiles.  “I like it,” he says.  “It is kind of cute.”  He bends to kiss her crooked mouth, and I am so close that I can see how he twists his own lips to accommodate her, to show her that their kiss still works… I hold my breath and let the wonder in.[1]

Our lives can be such as circus; sometimes we feel strangled by the encroaching crowds; we become anxious and exhausted.  Jesus reminds us always to go to God in prayer, to seek his guidance in the darkness, to find his clarity of our call to ministry, to recognize we might be the only view of Jesus Christ that another might see.  One-by-one, away from the roar of the crowd; we need each other’s nearness.

One by one, with God’s help we shall mount up with wings like eagles, run and not be weary, walk and not faint.