Directions: What If I Have a Problem? Deut. 18: 15-20; Mark 1: 21-28
A friend of mine posted (what I hope is a joke) on Facebook the other day. His post says, “I meet a woman outside the mall crying. She had lost $200, so I gave her $40 from the $200 I had found a few minutes ago. When God blesses you, you must bless others too!” And all I could think was, “NO! That’s not how this works!” The same day another friend shared on Instagram a video of a little girl of about 4 or so with her mother. Her mom told her that she could be part of the problem, or she could be part of the solution. The little girl replied, “Mmm, I think I’m gonna be the WHOLE problem.” And sometimes life is just like that little child, no offense to her.
When we gather ourselves up, find a new direction, follow God’s signs, we still, sometimes, encounter problems on the journey. Today Deuteronomy and Mark give us three problems and one solution. The three problems are not listening, bad voices or bad advice, and self-doubt. The solution to all three is God’s strength in some form or another.
The first problem when we try to set a new course is not listening when we need to. In Deuteronomy, the people complain to God that hearing the voice of God was too much for them. So, God offers that there will be a prophet who speaks on God’s behalf. The people are to listen to this prophet. Then God says, “I will personally deal with anyone who will not listen to the messages the prophet claims on my behalf.” And from there, Israel sets a course of listening to God’s prophet about half of the time…maybe less. At one point, it gets so bad that God says to Ezekiel that the people are so hard hearted they will not listen to any message, but Ezekiel must speak anyway.
We are often a people who like to speak, but don’t always like to listen especially if the message is hard for us to hear. This often goes in tandem with the second problem—bad advice. God goes on to say that “any prophet who falsely claims to speak in [God’s] name or who speaks the name of another god must die.” Two of the greatest human failures are not listening and listening to the wrong people speaking. Both listening and following advice should come down to one simple thing—the truth. If we are unwilling to hear the truth or are not told the truth, then we will find problems.
Our struggle comes from the fact that we are often challenged when we really listen to truth, and we don’t like to be challenged. If a preacher stands in the pulpit and says something like: Jesus healed the sick without charging payment, challenged religious authority over the politics, loved the marginalized, and was likely not patriotic, because who could imagine Jesus giving a pro-Rome message, that preacher might meet some resistance and some angry parishioners.
Likewise, a preacher who says that Jesus gives limitations on doing whatever we want in life, tells us we can be a bit selfish at times, and then calls us to be mission and evangelical-minded instead of “sitting there like a pudding” as one pastor friend said, then that preacher may also find a hostile congregation depending on who makes up the persons in the pews.
Listening and advice are a struggle for us because we often just don’t like the message, and it’s hard to accept. A prophet is sent to give boundaries, not a message of comfort or gentle platitudes. And truthfully humanity doesn’t like that and has never liked that. The Israelites often strayed from listening and heeding advice and turned to bad advice because they didn’t like the boundaries God gave them. And, as if our struggle to listen and the penchant for bad advice aren’t enough, we often wrestle with self-doubt in the same mix.
The Israelites found themselves incapable of hearing God’s voice. The people in Mark’s Gospel struggle to accept and hear Jesus’s authority over teaching, healing, and matters of faith. They doubted their own eyes and ears, and truthfully many of us struggle with self-doubt tied to bad advice and not listening. How many good things have we talked ourselves out of because we doubted our abilities? How many times do we belittle ourselves and mask it as humor because we wrestle with self-doubt? How many times do we cut ourselves off at the knees because it’s easier to wallow in despair than find joy in God’s blessings, talents, and calling in our lives? How many times do we listen to voices (even in our own head) telling us we’re not good enough or something is wrong with us? Or better yet, how many bad situations do we talk ourselves into because we don’t listen, follow bad advice, and wrestle with self-doubt or let’s just call it low self-esteem? Here’s a bit of truth to listen to and good advice to remember—God created you, and God does not make mistakes in what God creates.
Too often we forget God’s strength which can lift us up and help us. A friend of mine starts every day off looking in the mirror and imagining God saying these words to her, “You are beautiful, made in God’s image. You are loved, for Christ gave his life for you. And you can make a difference because God’s strength goes with you.” God’s strength is powerful and can work the miraculous in our lives. We hear the key word in Mark over and over. The people were amazed at Jesus’s teaching, for he taught as one with real authority. The people are further amazed when Jesus casts out the demon. And they ask what kind of teaching this is because it has such authority. Even the evil spirits obeyed him.
God has that kind of authority, but it begs something from us—trust. Every problem comes down to one big question for us. Do we trust God’s authority and strength over our lives and struggles, in God’s time and in God’s way. Sometimes we have to admit that our biggest problem, which brings together not listening, bad advice, and self-doubt, is that we just don’t like how God is handling things. It hurts our ability to trust. But sometimes we also expect God to handle things the way we want, but we don’t necessarily want to do our part as well. That starts with being able to trust in God’s authority and accept the good and bad in life as part of a brilliant plan. If we believe that God intelligently designed the entire universe, then we must trust God’s authority to work through our lives as part of that universe.
I think of the scripture in Job where his wife comes to offer support. After losing everything and being stricken with illness, her best advice to Job is to curse God and just die. Problems are part and parcel of life and the human experience. They are awful, annoying, and sometimes painful. But in the end God has authority and wisdom, and we must have trust that even in struggle God has the ultimate authority both here and now and hereafter.
I want to leave you with a quote by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. If you don’t know that name, he was a German Lutheran pastor who preached and stood against Hitler during World War II. He was eventually accused of plotting to overthrow Hitler and imprisoned. He was ultimately executed by the Nazis less than one month before Germany surrendered. He had these words of encouragement: “I am sure of God’s hand and guidance…You must never doubt that I am thankful and glad to go the way which I am being led. My past life is abundantly full of God’s mercy and, above all sin, stands the forgiving love of the Crucified. Ultimately all authority on earth must serve only the authority of Jesus Christ over humankind.” At all times, may our trust in God’s strength and authority never waiver.
For us there are three big problems—we often don’t listen; when we do listen, we listen to bad advice; and on top of it all we live with struggles of self-doubt. So, what do we do when we run into problems? The words in Mark’s gospel are clear. Jesus has authority and strength, and we, ultimately, must learn to trust that authority and strength both here and now, and for the hereafter. God does not make mistakes, and that includes you and your life too.