PENTECOST VI

 

Christ in the Synagogue N N Ge (1831-94)

• 2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10 and Psalm 48  • 
• Ezekiel 2:1-5 and Psalm 123  • 
• 2 Corinthians 12:2-10  • 
• Mark 6:1-13
    
  The short Epistle for this Sunday is hard to understand, because it appears out of context. It is an excerpt from Paul’s second Letter to the Corinthians, and part of a longer passage in which he is arguing against making personal experience of religious ecstasy the basis of spiritual authority. By speaking of himself in the third person, he writes dismissively of his own such experience, despite ‘the exceptional character of the revelation’ that was given to him on the road to Damascus.
  
  

  This is because he does not want ‘boasting’ about it to make anyone ‘think better of me than what is seen in me or heard from me’. It is not his one-off experience, but his life as a living instance of the grace of God, that must prove his faith in Jesus. Indeed, to keep him from ‘being too elated’ he draws explicit attention to ‘a thorn in the flesh’ that constantly reminds him of his real life.

  
  

  We do not know what this ‘thorn’ was, but its role was to keep Paul mindful of this fact: the discipleship to which he was called was not a matter of elevated mystical elation, but ‘weaknesses, insults, hardships’ borne for the sake of Christ. Paradoxically, it is only when we fully acknowledge our own weakness that we are properly aware of the strength of God’s grace within us.

  
  

  The Gospel passage from Mark resonates with this important truth. Even Jesus, in whom the grace of God is brought to perfection, must confront ‘insults’ in his ‘own country’. Those who knew him as a boy dismissively discount his message in the synagogue. They cannot see beyond their assumption, to the prophetic voice he has become. This rejection is a prelude to instructions about discipleship. At their heart, we might say, is a balancing act. True Christian discipleship must avoid the temptation to seek self-affirmation in either persecution or popularity, since both turn the spotlight unto ourselves, and away from Christ.