Read Mark 6:1-32

“He could do no miracles there except laying hands on a few sick people and heal them; and, he wondered at their lack of faith.”

This is the description Mark has for Jesus’ time in Nazareth teaching in their synagogue on the Sabbath. It is remarkable because of all that Jesus has done in the Gospel of Mark thus far: healing the sick, casting out demons, wakening a girl from death, commanding the weather.  News of these things surely would have reached Nazareth.

We know that some found his teaching exceptional because they wonder where one of their own “got this stuff” in the first place.  They know the family, his parents, his brothers, and his sisters. They haven’t had any reason to suspect that that family was gonna produce someone like Jesus.

Mark in just a few verses lays out a very human experience for Jesus.  He is judged by the people he grew up with and the provincialism of his hometown places restraints on him.  Many people can relate to this “who does this guy think he is?” experience.

To be clear the lack of miracles is not an indictment on Jesus.  The power of God is not limited by lack of belief, that is not the message to be drawn from this story.  In a few chapters, Jesus will say that “nothing is impossible for God” and even before this he commanded the sea to be still despite the disciples’ fear and lack of belief.

And yet, in so many of the healing stories in Mark faith is commended.  “Your faith has made you well” is a consistent refrain.  We can be forgiven for coming to the conclusion that faith is a key component.  I don’t believe that Mark has shared with us about this rejection to imply that God is limited to only helping those who believe in Him but I do think that Mark wants us to wrestle a little with disbelief.

When my children were young we lived in Corpus Christi.  One afternoon the excitement at our house and our neighbor’s house across the street was that a dog was stuck in a tree.  That is not a typo there was a dog in the tree.  I do not know where it came from, I do not know if it chased a squirrel, or how it managed to be there in the first place.  I simply know that when my young son came and told me to come quick because there was a dog in the tree it was not a Mulberry Street moment.

For those of you who are struggling with picturing this, it was not a straight up and down kind of tree like an Oak or an Elm.  Because of the more or less constant wind trees grow a little crooked all the time in South Texas.  This tree had a long trunk that grew sideways for some distance so I am pretty sure that this sure-footed dog had chased something up into the tree.  But make no mistake it took a ladder in the bed of a pick-up truck to get high enough to grab the frightened fellow in a blanket and get him down. He was high up in the tree in the sort of place that only cats or squirrels usually go.

I cannot prove to any one this story is true.  I know the names of a few witnesses.  I have the little “book” that my son made after the fact that he entitled How Many Aggies Does it Take to Get a Dog Out of a Tree. Some of you who are reading this will not accept my word for it because dogs just don’t climb trees. You do not trust me enough to believe me even though I know what I saw and remember getting the dog down.

God has this same problem.  Faith is trust between two parties.  You may choose to not trust the story God is telling us about what he has done for us.  When we choose to reject the story we are demonstrating our disbelief.

Are you struggling to accept God’s love for you?

Do you wonder if trusting Jesus can make any difference in your life circumstances?

The rejection in Nazareth reminds us that some people will miss out on what God is doing in their midst because it comes in the every day and the mundane.  To them, Jesus had no chance to be a great teacher or a miracle worker because he was always gonna be the boy who grew up working with his hands alongside Joseph. It didn’t matter what they heard from neighboring towns or even what they heard that day in the synagogue, they knew what they knew and instead of accepting the truth in front of them they chose to get mad.

This happens to churches and denominations all the time.  God begins to do some good stuff, some times miraculous stuff, and the kabosh is put on it quick by counsels, committees, etc. because of fear of what changes may come.  This happens to individuals who miss the teaching and wisdom of God because it is coming through the ordinary and the mundane.

Have you stopped listening on Sunday mornings because you think you already know what will be sung, prayed, and taught?

Have you quit seeking the Kingdom of God through scripture and worship because it all seems so just like it has always been?

Have you given up on asking for big things from God because you aren’t sure God cares any longer?

God wants our trust.  When the Israelites were gathered at the foot of the mountain awaiting the Ten Commandments, they ended up getting distracted and made an idol to worship since God seemed too busy and was invisible.  God was very angry and really wanted to just get rid of them all and start over with some other group of people. Moses told God, “Look here, Pal, I didn’t do all that stuff you asked me to in Egypt where I was a felon and trekked across the desert with those ingrates and climb this big ole mountain by myself for you to just change your mind!” (clearly I am paraphrasing) So God relented and a covenant was formed between the Israelites and God.  That covenant was formed around the law and the first commandment ushered in tells us about what God wants.

I am the Lord your God.  You will have no other gods except me.

God wants an exclusive relationship.  He wants to “go steady” with us, as they used to say.  He wants our faith and trust that he did act, does act, and will act for the future of all creation.  He wants our commitment to Him.

It wasn’t that Jesus couldn’t heal any one in Nazareth.  Jesus didn’t want to because he was being rejected.  The power of God was not diminished it simply wasn’t going to be wasted in a town that didn’t want to accept the truth in front of them.  No doubt what Jesus had taught that day in the synagogue was a variation on what Mark tells us his message was “The time is now and the Kingdom of God is among you. Repent and believe the Gospel.”

So the lack of faith resulted in God not wanting to act.  Just like at Sinai when the lack of faith made Him so angry he wanted to call off the whole make a covenant with the people plan. Just like the seven churches in Revelation that have their lampstands removed (the Light of the World taken from them) because of their lack of faith.   Suddenly, it doesn’t seem as harsh when Jesus instructs the 12 that if any town does not receive them or listen to them they are to dust off their shoes and move on as a testimony against them.

God will work wonders where He is welcomed, recognized, and trusted.

I think this also explains why Mark has injected the story of the death of John the Baptist into this section.  This may not seem odd; after all, John is an important figure and the first person we encounter in the gospel. True. Consider this, in a book that only has 678 verses, Mark uses 16 verses to tell this story.  In contrast it only takes 7 versus to introduce John the Baptist and his ministry.  Mark only uses 3 versus to describe the baptism of Jesus!

And the story comes in-between the verses where Jesus sends his 12 most trusted disciples out on their mission (to preach the gospel, heal the sick, and cast out demons) and when they come back and tell him how it went.  We get almost no detail into the mission.  We don’t learn which villages got the shoe treatment.  We don’t know any statistics for how many were baptized, how many were healed, how many demons were cast out, etc.  But we do get an in-depth look at how it came about that John the Baptist’s head wound up on a platter.

So it seems that John the Baptist was imprisoned because during his ministry preaching about the need for the repentance of sins he often raised the point that Herod was a bad example to the community through his relationship with his brother’s wife.  It is not always safe to call into question the activities of a high official even when you are right. True today and true back then.

Mark tells us that Herodias, the wife, held a grudge against the Baptizer, but Herod was afraid because he knew “he was a righteous and holy man”. So Herod kept John safe.  Mark goes on to share that whenever Herod heard John speak he was perplexed and even enjoyed listening to him.

Seems that Herod was hearing the message, felt the stirrings of conviction, but was afraid of the implications to his current situation.  If Herod were to convert it might make trouble for him with Rome.  If Herod were to convert it would clearly make trouble for him with the missus.  So he chooses not to and then finds himself in this circumstance where a carelessly delivered promise in the midst of a party with prominent folk leads to the unnecessary death of John.  Consequences.

And that I think is the secret to this portion of the Gospel of Mark.  Our lack of trust in God, our failure to believe has real consequences for our lives.  Our lack of faith can cause God not to act like he chose not to in Nazareth. Our collective disbelief may cut off an entire community from the blessings of God like those the disciples were told to shake the dust off their feet rather than continue to labor there.  Our further disbelief, the choosing to believe in our position, status, or the upholding of ill-considered oaths may lead us to deeper depths of sinfulness at the expense of other people.  Our disbelief can cost us the privilege of taking part in the resurrection of the people of God on the last day.

Disbelief may cost momentarily; disbelief will cost us eternally.

If you are struggling with the truth about who Christ is or if you believe but struggle with where to find God right now, I encourage you to take on this simple prayer from a little later in Mark’s Gospel:

“I believe Lord help my unbelief”