Jesus Is Ever About What He Is About

13th Sunday of the Year

I pointed out back in December when we began reading from the Gospel of Mark that Mark is characteristically scant on details. Writing as he was to Gentile believers living in Rome, he knew that those pragmatic Romans didn’t have the time or patience for anything but the bare facts. That being said, Mark’s Gospel is, at the same time, curious and thought-provoking for the details it does include and for the ways in which it tells the story of Jesus in not always the most direct manner. Today’s passage, from the fifth chapter, is a good example.

Here, we have a story interpolated within another, and the drama of the one interrupts and intensifies the drama of the other. Jesus is delayed in healing the daughter of the synagogue official by the woman suffering with a hemorrhage who grasps at Jesus’ cloak as he passes through the crowd. Had Jesus been able to respond to the request immediately, presumably, he would have arrived at Jairus’ house before the girl had passed. At the same time, without the pressure of a little girl on her deathbed, Jesus’ encounter with the woman in the crowd loses its edge. When there is no time to lose, he stops and looks around to see who touched him, though his service was desperately needed elsewhere. That he should take the time to converse with this suffering woman while the life of another is on the line is not without significance.

This passage feeds on the tension of the moment, on the pressure that one need for healing exerts on the other. You can imagine the frustration of the disciples noticing that Jesus has stopped moving. You can sense the woman’s anxiety pushing through the crowd as if taking  her one and only shot. You can feel the impatience of the synagogue official as he knows every second wasted is a second lost. You can hear the voices of the crowd ridiculing Jesus, having delayed in coming, as he proclaims she is not dead.

This passage, like so many in the Gospels, invites your entry. In one way or another, you have been perturbed by Jesus’ attention given to another and not you. You have grown tired of waiting for Jesus to get around to you. You have felt the pressure of needing to get to him at this exact moment. You have joined the crowd’s laughter in the face of what he claims to do. You have because I have. That is what makes this passage, as so many others, rich ground for meditation and fertile land for spiritual growth.

This passage is lavish in meaning because, through the midst of it all, Jesus demonstrates, from start to finish, that he is in control. Defying every expectation, and resisting any force outside himself, he moves from beginning to end resolutely determined on what he has set out to do. No matter what the disciples or the crowds thought Jesus was going about to do that day, nothing that happens here happens by accident. He is not surprised by Jairus and his request; that is why he came to that side of the sea and landed where he landed. He is not caught off guard by the woman in the crowd; she too is why he is there. He is not delayed in reaching the official’s house; he arrives precisely when he means to. He is not distracted by anything, for everything that happens happens within his will. Through it all, Jesus remains unshakably in control of the situation. Every voice that presses upon him from every side would only take him away from his mission; and only he, as the eternal Son of the eternal Father filled with the power of the eternal Spirit, can bring to completion the work he has been sent into the world to do.

What I think this marvelous passage teaches us about the Christian life is the importance of forbearance and trust. What I think the past three years serving at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen have taught be about the Christian life and the ministry of the priest is not only the need for forbearance and trust but also the profound fruit they bear, for the priest and for the people, when the priest is patient and trusts the Lord Jesus to do the work he is about. What I have learned in serving among you is that Jesus is always and ever about ‘the long play.’ He has his sights set further down the road than we do. And while it is enticing to press him to move more quickly, to pay attention to us more closely, and to act in our life more directly, he manifests once and again that that is not the way he works—and, by his grace, we are only the better for it. If Jesus had listened to his disciples and followed their path through the crowd to Jairus’ house, pushing away all others away from him, then a woman would not have been healed of her affliction. Jesus’ power would have been limited by those who looked too close and expected too little of what the Lord was able to do.

Three years is the longest amount of time I’ve spent in any one parish. As a seminarian, you are given a couple of months of parish experience for several summers. As a deacon, I spent a little over a year in the same place. You can notice tangible progress in a short span, and it is possible to have an outsized impact for time served. But what I have learned, looking back on my three years as Associate Pastor here, is that God works best when he has time and space to do as he pleases. There are a number of instances where this has proved true and which I wish I could tell you about, though I am bound by confidences not to. What I can say is that, having walked with people—including some of you—for more than just a quick lap around the block, but through the mess of life, up its peaks and down into its valleys, is that I have seen how, in the words of the Psalmist, the Lord changes mourning into dancing. And what I have learned is that, for the Lord to do that, I need to stay out of his way. I have seen the Lord do great things when I have held back, have checked my instinct to speak first and listen second, and have avoided giving a hasty diagnosis and a quick prescription.

In leaving an assignment, it is natural enough to look back at the things one has done and be proud of the work of one’s hands. And to be sure, I am proud at what I have been able to do here—not by myself and not without the Lord’s grace—but proud all the same at what God, his priest, and his People have accomplished here in these years together. Even still, I marvel more at what God has done because I have stood in the background. I think about the times I have given a simple encouragement in the confessional rather than cooking up some fast-and-ready advice that would do more harm than good. I think about the times I have sat and listened to a person talk for hours and waited until the end to offer my perspective and guidance. I think about the relationships that began on shaky footing that I let unfold and flower and which in the course of time came alive and became beautiful. In short, I think of all the many ways my pride and my ego could have gotten in the way of God, and I give thanks for his grace that won-out and kept me on the sidelines, so that I could taste and see his goodness, his love, and his power present and active in my life and in the life of this parish. As I leave, I am also aware that I have not always been so docile. I think—contritely—also about the times when I have gotten in God’s way and have not been the instrument of grace he ordained me to be; and as I begin a new ministry I know better how much I need the Lord’s grace to practice the forbearance and trust he so desires, loves, and rewards.

I want to thank each and every one of you for the ways in which you have shown me the mystery of God and of his love for us in Christ Jesus these past three years. One can study God, read many books, and say many prayers; but until you see God at work among his People, you can never really know him. And without knowing him, you cannot trust him or be patient with him. On account of you, I leave the Cathedral knowing, loving, and trusting Christ more deeply and following him more closely as his disciple and his priest. I thank God for the gift of all of you.

In a way not entirely different from today’s Gospel, it happens from time to time that a priest’s ministry is interrupted by the call to minister elsewhere. I leave this place with the assurance that, no matter where I go, the Lord Jesus is with me, working through me—working often enough in spite of me!—and carrying out indefectibly the work he was sent into the world to do. And that is true of every priest, now and until the end of the age. The priesthood is a wonderful thing, so also is the opportunity to serve in a parish as wonderful as this. To Jesus Christ, Eternal High Priest, be glory and praise, now and for ever. Amen.

Homily preached June 30, 2024 at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen