Psalm 130
Mark 3:20-35

The worship video for this sermon can be found on YouTube.

It’s always a little strange when we jump into the middle of a gospel story, but this one, probably a less familiar story, seems particularly confusing. I mean, there are some quotable one-liners that we could likely quote or summarize, “a house divided against itself… will not be able to stand.” But Jesus being restrained by his family? Them thinking he’s out of his mind? An argument with religious officials about whether or not he’s in cahoots with the devil? 

How did things escalate so quickly? It’s only chapter 3!

Things escalating is characteristic of Mark’s gospel. It is fast paced. The sentences and stories fall one after another, often starting with, “And then, and then, and then….” It’s an English teacher’s nightmare. In the time since Jesus was baptized, a story we read by in January, the gospel has run with barely any rest. Jesus has been moving all around Galilee demonstrating what he declared in his first spoken words in this gospel, “The kingdom of God has come near.”

Or, as I like to say, “God is on the loose!”

With his actions of healing and casting out spirits, touching those who are unclean and sitting with some who are called sinners, Jesus has been challenging the understandings held by many, especially those who interpret and enforce religious expectations. He’s been challenging there understand about to whom God goes and when and with what purposes. Crowds have begun to follow him, many seeking the blessing and restoration he brings. 

The crowds were so big that when he arrived at his home, he couldn’t even stop to eat.  Some were just curious.  Some, like the religious authorities who have come all the way from Jerusalem to investigate what they have heard about, watching very very closely and antagonistically, waiting to catch him in some act, some teaching, for which they can bring him down. Even his own family came out to try to hold him back because (and the English editors have sanitized this a bit for us with their translations) even they had begun to think he was out of his mind.

The labels are starting to pile on top of Jesus. Unstable, unhinged, unfaithful, possessed.

And once they’ve got him labeled as something and someone “other,” once they have identified him with the devil and demons, they can justify doing anything to him, even executing him, to keep him under control.

That’s how labels work, isn’t it? The reality is not foreign to us. We label people when we don’t understand them, when their actions challenge us – either when they run contrary to our expectations and “sincerely held religious beliefs” or maybe even when they touch a nerve in us, reminding us of a conviction we may not be acting on as we should. And we label people when we feel threatened by their power or potential for power – political opponents, those with spiritual or theological differences, people with experiences we don’t understand or can’t relate to, folks we see getting something we wish we had (money or attention, power or praise).

Defining people as either for us or against makes us feel better about ourselves. It lulls us into a false sense of security by giving some definition to who is on our side, where we are included, to whom we belong, and by setting us up against people on the other side, those who are excluded, folks for whom and to whom we have no responsibility.

This reality is demonstrated by the very need of an LGBTQ+ Pride Month to honor the efforts that have been made and still need to be made for the full inclusion of all people and their sexual orientations and gender identities. A long history of deadly names, labels, and demonization led to very well known tragedies such as the murder of Matthew Shepherd, the mass shooting at the Pulse night club, but also the largely under-reported murders and deaths of transgender people. More subtle, yet still hurtful and harmful, are policies and practices that make it harder for individuals and families to move through society when their bodies and relationships don’t match up with accepted norms.

And yet many of us were taught as children that “Sticks and stone may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.”

Only, it’s just not true. Names and labels wouldn’t exist if they didn’t hurt. They are meant to hurt feelings directly, and feelings matter. And they hurt bodies, they take lives, indirectly, when the names, and labels are used to justify very physical consequences. In Jesus’ case, Mark tells us a few verses earlier, this labeling of him as “other,” what turns into the very demonization we read about today as his actions are attributed to Satan, this labeling leads to plots to destroy him.

While it’s tempting to consider this demonization of Jesus as ancient history, I don’t think we’re any more immune to trying to control Jesus with our labels than we are to trying to control other human beings.  We’re no more immune to labeling Jesus than the religious folks were in his day either. Our labels may not lead to his crucifixion; we’re too late for that, but they do have the effect of subduing the power of his message.

Take, for example, the label of “personal savior.” When that is our single understanding of Jesus, when it is the only way we want to relate to him, as the one who wipes away any individual guilt, it gives the broken systems in which we operate a pass. It let’s us ignore the well-being of others who either don’t welcome him the same way or aren’t aligning their morals with ours. 

Or when we label him solely as bringer of comfort, painted in serene, soft light, with strangely golden curls, it let’s us ignore the times that Jesus challenged authority or got his hands and reputation dirty by serving those left out of traditional religion.

Even some of our revered theological language – – when only one set of words or images is used – – can put our Savior in a box and therefore limit our understanding and relationship, giving us a way to control him, so he doesn’t control us. The lofty language of Almighty, Holy, Perfect – while true, when used exclusively – puts Jesus’ witness and example, his life and his kindom so far away from us, that we may not ever bother to try to follow him.

But Jesus defies any box we try to put him in.

He calls us into personal relationship AND his salvation and redemption is for all of creation.

He cares compassionately for his dear friends upon the death of their brother, weeping alongside them. He tenderly takes Simon’s mother-law by the hand in healing her AND he turns over the tables of money changers and spars with religious leaders.

He is almighty and holy, AND he gets down on the floor to wash feet covered in the dirt of long-traveled roads.

He is perfect AND his frustration can get the best of him, driving a conversation where he compares a woman in need to a dog.

But what he isn’t is an agent of Beelzebul, a manifestation of the devil, the source of forces contrary to God’s goodness. He resists even falling into the trap of accepting the label by moving closer to those who come in opposition to him.  Rather than staying in the house, widening the divide between himself and those who would hurl insults at him, rather than hurling insults in return to drive them away, Jesus invites the scribes closer to him. In a parable he rejects their accusation. He tells a story demonstrating God’s power over all of creation, even the forces that run contrary to goodness. Cleverly, Jesus points out, even it were a demon of Satan working in him, God would still win, because the divided kingdom of demons would fall on itself, making room only for God’s kingdom. 

Additionally, he continues, and mournfully, I believe, slapping that label on him, attributing his works to any spirit other than God’s spirit, pushes the ones who label him farther from the forgiveness he brings, because if that is their belief, it would require them to walk away from him.

So no matter how it happens, no matter what label people want to put on him, in Jesus the kingdom of God has come near. In Jesus is the one who can bind up powers working against the reign of God and strip them of their strength. In Jesus, and by following Jesus, the household of God can be restored, the kindom of God can take root, the labels and accusations and mischaracterizations and demonizations must and will fall away, because the “us” and “them” they create on falls away. The inner circle and outer circle mix together. Even the bonds of family are broken down and opened up. 

It’s funny how this last piece of the story can feel so unsettling, maybe even offensive.  We can bump up against it, wondering, “Why is Jesus being so mean to his family?” It sends a little spark of anxiety through us, doesn’t it? These named relationships we have – we want to know they matter, that there are circles that won’t be broken, and there are people to whom or with whom we will belong more than any other. And so it feels a little scary to think that maybe Jesus is saying these relationships aren’t as special as they seem.

But I don’t think that’s what he’s saying. Another way to look at these named relationships is as labels, right? They define who is in and who is out.  Who we are responsible for and to and who we hold at an arm’s length, who we treat with more and who we can treat with less compassion. Who is in our physical or metaphorical house and who is out.

So what Jesus is doing by redefining his family is stripping the meaning of the label away, not by dismissing the people who wear it – his mother, his brother, his sister – but by welcoming others into it.  It’s the “strong man” who holds the boundary of who is in and who is out. And Jesus, who is stronger, bursts into the house and declares everyone is welcome. He isn’t cutting his loved ones off; he’s bringing others into his family, his household, his beloved kindom.

Jesus tells us that in the world as God desires there are no lines that declare some are close and others are far, some are loved and others get the leftovers. There are no divisions. The house he builds will not fall. For in Jesus the kindom of God for all creation is near; it is possible, and all are welcome to be a part of building it.