Is it Caesar's or to God's?

 

Once again in Mark10:2-16, the Pharisees ask Jesus about divorce "to test" him and once again they misunderstand or misuse the scripture to justify their agenda. They hope their question will expose Jesus as dangerous to families, in light of his scandalous comments in prior encounters.

In typical fashion Jesus turns the table on the Pharisees away from their legal foundation for divorce to God's design for marriage. Because of the hardness of your hearts, he [Moses] wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made them [husband and wife] male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together no human being must separate.

God is love. We are products of God’s love and handiwork, a small but unique part of God’s great ongoing work of art. Love cannot be governed by temporal laws of man any more than God can. We speak of marriage, a construct of civil law that we attempt to apply to God’s law, as a contract. But is it? 

I can remember studying what goes into the essential parts of a valid contract in a Business Law course a long time ago. For a contract to be valid there must be a valid offer and a valid acceptance of that offer; there must be an agreed upon exchange, or a quid pro quo, that is “something for something,” and the contract must detail specified “consideration,” a term used to affix a value exchange, usually money or equitable services rendered.

“God established a creation, a covenant bond, with humanity, with Adam. Adam’s name is not only the name of an individual, the founding father of the human race, but it’s also the Hebrew word for humanity…The difference between covenant and contract, in the Old Testament and throughout scripture, is profound. Contractual relations usually exchange property, exchange goods and services, whereas covenants exchange persons. So when people enter into a covenant, they say, ‘I am yours and you are mine.’ So God uses the covenant to enter into a relationship with those whom he created in his own image: humanity and all human persons.” (Scott Hahn, Contract vs. Covenant, Outlook, February, 2002.)

So how do we apply a transactional agreement to love? We can’t. Love cannot be governed by man. No human can break the love between two people; it’s not theirs to break. Once again in our reading, Jesus refuses to be trapped by either the Pharisees or his disciples as he challenges the rules of men with the law of God. Each of the synoptic gospels cite some variation on Jesus’ take on separation of Church and state with the famous quote Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s. This phrase has profound resonance throughout scripture and God’s law based on his love and covenant with man. It has become widely quoted as a summary statement of the relationship between Christianity and secular authority that goes far beyond whether it was lawful for Jews to pay taxes to Caesar.

"We renew our faith in the word of the Lord which invites faithful families to this openness. It invites all those who want to share the prophecy of the covenant of man and woman, which generates life and reveals God!”(Pope Francis, Openness, 9-27-15, Philadelphia)

"I leave you with this question, for each one of you to respond to. In my home, do we yell, or do we speak with love and tenderness? This is a good way to recognize our love.

(Pope Francis, Patience, 9-26-15, NYC)

 

In Jesus Name

 

In Mark 9:38-50 the apostles are all bent out of shape because someone outside of their “elite” group of 12 dared to do their job and has been discovered casting out demons. Ironically, none of the twelve were able to exorcise an unclean spirit from a boy earlier in our readings. Yet, they are indignant that someone not part of the twelve apostles has been successfully ministering to the afflicted and infirmed in Jesus name. Of course, they want the individual to cease and desist and prohibit him from doing the work for which they have been charged to do. Jesus tells them to cut out all their elitist nonsense and get over themselves. The accused healer was acting on behalf of Jesus and in his name.

 What does acting in Jesus name mean? It is not merely a knee jerk response to a liturgical prayer said or invoked without soulful intent. It is living a life in God as Jesus through Jesus.

Jesus was also unequivocal when he tells us that anything that gets in the way of living in His name, should be eliminated. Likewise obstacles that get in the way of others’ ability to follow Jesus must be eliminated. “If you hand causes you to sin, cut it off.” Once again, the intensity of Jesus' words is palpable and unequivocal. It serves to remind us that preventing another from being “of Christ” and acting in his name is far worse than self-mutilation.

Do we get in the way of others in their following the teaching of Jesus? What does it mean to be “of Christ?” What criteria should we use to determine if someone is "of Christ" or not?

 

Whoever welcomes me...welcomes the One who sent me

 

 

 The disciples self-centered thoughts continued to be barriers to Jesus’ message that He was a Messiah who must surrender his life so that their/our lives will be saved. As close followers of Jesus and witness to his abilities to heal, they were taken in by their own deluded sense of self- importance which began to strain the lines of communication and their relationship with Jesus. Mark 9:30-37.

Their inability to help the child was inevitable as they were more interested in getting attention and impressing the crowd than channeling the grace of God through them in faith. As such they were not serving as instruments of God’s healing power and peace as they childishly competed with one another to get Jesus’ attention.

In referencing the child, Jesus reminds us that we have to welcome those “non-persons” who occupy the lowest rung of society’s ladder: "whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me."

Once again Jesus is challenging us to reverse long-standing, ingrained, habits and set aside our desires to win fame and glory and tells the disciples “Whoever wants to be first must be last and become a servant to all.” Though this isn’t as sharp a rebuke as the one he offered Peter last week, it nevertheless most likely stung. Because this is definitely not what they or we had been taught. Greatness, we assume, implies power, accomplishment, fame, wealth, and all the other things that allow us to make things go our way. And further to his point home, Jesus scoops up a young child, considered among the lowest in the social strata of that time, into his arms and tells the puzzled disciples. whoever welcomes a child like this welcomes him.

 

Who Do You Say I Am

 

Peter quickly learns that truly knowing someone means more than knowing his name. Believing is rooted in the intellect which is greatly influenced by the ego. On the other hand knowing is a palpable feeling deep inside that is hard to explain in words. Knowing requires a depth that goes beyond believing which the apostles are having a hard time taking to heart. 

Peter quickly learns that merely citing Jesus’ “title,” e.g., you are “the Christ,” is not enough. Mark opens the can of worms again, regarding expectations of the title, “the Christ,” and the reality of knowing Jesus’ presence as Messiah. Jesus reveals how the Son of Man must suffer and die and be raised after three days. Jesus says all this with a boldness that contrasts the secrecy He emphasized only two verses earlier with the deaf mute.

Peter is really upset when he realizes that a "suffering" Messiah, is not what he and the disciples were prepared to hear or understand. What we find then in this passage in Mark 8: 27-35 is a series of questions about identity and expectations. These issues are not confined to the past as it was not just a problem for the disciples or those early Christians. It's just as real for us today. 

Mark uncovers a human condition that persists. We tend to apply what we believe our God should be and as such, find it easy to put words in his mouth that later can find their way to dogma and doctrine. We think we know the way things are, how they are supposed to go. If we believe God is active in the world and that God in the person of Jesus is very in our presence, then the question posed to us is not whether we confess Jesus as the Messiah. That is the easy part. We know what the title means. The question really becomes how do we understand what the implications of the title Messiah are? And how do our personal expectations align with God’s will for us? 

Believing in a personal God, means giving mental assent to the existence of a supernatural entity. In essence "Who do you 'think' I  am" should be "Do you 'Know' who I am." However, without spiritual transformation, belief is empty. We are transformed when we relate to God personally: knowing that each of us is accepted just as we are, and trusting that everything real in one’s life is a gift and a blessing in disguise. 

For many of us mystery became an adversary; unknowing became a weakness. The contemplative spiritual life is an ongoing reversal of this adjustment. It is a slow and sometimes painful process of becoming ‘little children’ again in which we first make friends with mystery and finally fall in love again with it. And in that love we find an ever increasing freedom to be who we really are in an identity that is continually emerging and never defined. We are free to join the dance of life in fullness without having a clue about what the steps are…Confusion happens when mystery is an enemy and we feel we must solve it to master our destinies. And ignorance is not knowing that we do not know. In the liberation of the night, we are freed from having to figure things out and we find delight in knowing that we do not know. (Mystery & Freedom, May, Dark Night p.133)