Loving God, you call us by the power of your Spirit to come and to follow and to live as your children. Purify our hearts and minds this day by that same Spirit, that we might live to the praise of your glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Today's gospel is not one of those readings where you can read it, say, "oh that's nice," and then go on to something else. Rather, today's gospel is one of those readings where there is so much in it that it begs to be studied and unpacked a little bit. Of course, the part that stands out for most people is that bit about cutting off hands and feet and plucking out eyes. It's one of those parts of the Scriptures that is quite obviously not intended to be taken literally!

Actually, I did consider bringing an axe with me this morning. Is your hand causing you to sin? Here - let me help you with that. How about your eye? Here - I can get rid of that, too. Yet, to do so would be to make the wrong point. Jesus is not speaking about getting rid of other people's sins in today's gospel. Rather, Jesus is talking about self-judgment and getting rid of anything that causes you to sin.

The interesting thing is that if we were to take today's gospel to its logical conclusion, we would in fact need to remove every part of our body in order to get rid of all causes for sin. In other words, we would need to die. And here we are today celebrating baptism, in which it is proclaimed that we die with Christ in the waters of baptism and are raised with him to new life (Rom. 6:3-11). Baptism unites us with Jesus, and because of our baptism we share in Jesus' life, death and resurrection.

Now, this is one of those things where, although it is taught in the Scriptures in a number of different places, we have difficulty getting our minds around what this actually means. The resurrection part - well - I think we can see that. Our baptism brings with it the promise of resurrection and eternal life through Jesus. Even sharing in the life of Jesus - his love for God and his service to others - seems a little easier to grasp. After all, as baptized people who belong to Jesus, we are called to follow him and to imitate his life by the power of the Holy Spirit.

However, the death part seems to be a little harder to grasp, especially when we're talking about the baptism of children. The Scriptures talk about our old self - our sinful self - our self-centred self - being put to death in baptism, even as we are raised to new life. Yet, all of us, regardless of what age we are when we are baptized, need to grow up into Christ (Eph. 4:15). It's an ongoing process, and we don't immediately become perfect people who never sin. In fact, in this life we never become perfect.

Yet, when God looks at us - because we have been baptized into Christ - God looks at us and sees only the righteousness of Jesus. Our sinfulness has been covered over, and as long as we keep turning to Jesus and putting our faith in him, we are forgiven. It is God who does this, and that's why it is so appropriate to baptize small children - it puts all the emphasis on what God is doing and doesn't allow us to think that we are somehow saving ourselves. It is a gracious gift from God.

I mentioned earlier how, even once we belong to Christ through baptism, we still need to "grow up" in the faith. We can see this by how the disciples of Jesus were acting in today's gospel. You see, there was this other guy who was doing deeds of great power in the name of Jesus. In fact, he had been casting out demons (which, incidentally, the disciples had tried and were unable to do - cf. Mk. 9:18). And so John comes to Jesus and says, "we tried to stop him because he was not following us" (Mk. 9:38).

It would be kind of like us going to Jesus and pointing out something good that's happening at another church and saying, "Tell them to stop, Jesus. They're not part of our church!" And Jesus would say, "Don't be silly! They are doing a good thing in my name and are spreading the good news. They're on the same team!" But don't we like it much better when we can compare and say why one church is better than another? "Whoever is not against us is for us" (Mk. 9:40).

Interestingly enough, being with or against us is not the same as being with or against Jesus. Whoever is not against us is for us. However, whoever is not with Jesus is against him (Lk. 11:23)! In other words, proclaiming Jesus is not negotiable. Which group we belong to in order to follow Jesus is.

And so, where are we so far? We are being advised not to judge others but to judge ourselves. We are being reminded that our self-centred self needs to be put to death in order for us to be alive in Christ. We are being told that one of the worst things we could do is to cause another person to lose their faith in Jesus. This is what the "stumbling block" is all about (Mk. 9:42), and perhaps it is also what the getting rid of the sinful parts is all about. After all, what turns people off faster than people who say that they believe in Jesus but don't act like it?

Finally, we have a series of statements about salt, each of which could probably be a whole sermon all by itself. However, we'll focus on the abridged version today. First of all we have, "everyone will be salted with fire" (Mk. 9:49). Say what?

First of all, the salt: In first century Palestine, its value was primarily as a preservative. When you don't have any refrigeration, you use salt, especially to preserve meat. And so, will the fire of God somehow preserve us? Perhaps it is the Holy Spirit who will preserve us, who appeared as tongues of fire on the Day of Pentecost. Or perhaps it is the trials that we will pass through that will strengthen and preserve our Christian character. Fire is also a purifying element, and I keep thinking of that line from "Children of the Heavenly Father" (LBW #474) that says, "to preserve them pure and holy." Surely it is the Holy Spirit who does this!

Well, then we have the salt that has lost its saltiness, which becomes worthless (Mk. 9:50). Pure salt - pure sodium chloride - actually can't lose its saltiness. However, impure salt can. Is it possible to only partially belong to Jesus, rather than fully belonging to Jesus? Is it this partial commitment that slowly gets leached away and then becomes worthless? Is this what happens when we won't allow the Holy Spirit to be in charge of our lives and instead try to keep control ourselves? Is that when our faith disappears and becomes worthless? Perhaps the question is purposely left open - something for us to chew on and to think about.

Finally, we have the command to have salt in ourselves "and be at peace with one another" (Mk. 9:50), but what is this salt? Is it the Holy Spirit? A preservative? Flavour? One commentator suggests that it means having a covenant relationship with one another [http://www.crossmarks.com/brian/mark9x38.htm]. This suggestion comes from the Old Testament, which refers to the "salt of the covenant" (Lev. 2:13), as well as a "covenant of salt" (Num. 18:19). Certainly, being at peace with one another and treating one another as partners in a covenant relationship go a long way in being a witness to our faith. The distinctive characteristic about the followers of Jesus is supposed to be how they treat one another. "They'll know we are Christians by our love." And so, "have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another."

In the Baptism service today, we prayed for the gift of the Holy Spirit, for baptism is always by water and the Spirit. It is this same Holy Spirit who draws us into a covenant relationship with God, as well as with one another. God's part of the covenant is to create us and to love us and to save us. Our part is to live in response to God's love: imitating the life and love of Christ, being at peace with one another, and allowing the Holy Spirit to direct, preserve and purify our hearts as we continue to grow up into Christ. Amen.

Proper 21(B) Mark 9:38-50
October 1, 2006
St. Luke's Zion Lutheran Church
Pastor Lynne Hutchison Moore
? 2006 Lynne Hutchison Moore All Rights Reserved