Mark 10:2-16
October 6, 2024
I sat there feeling terrible and hopeless.
Shame and guilt washed over me in relentless waves. The topic of our
conversation at this meeting had shifted, and one person dominated the
discussion. What is wrong in our society, he declared, is that our kids are
coming out of broken homes. Homes with single moms, he said, and no fathers in
sight. It is these broken homes, these homes led only by mothers, these broken
families that are at the root of our crumbling culture.
This was about 12 years ago in a
ministerial association meeting that I was hosting in the church I served. The
person who was talking was another minister in the community, and although I
didn’t know it at the time, he was divorced and remarried at least twice. What
I did know was that I was newly separated. I had become that single mother and
apparently my kids were doomed because of their broken home.
As this minister continued to talk
and talk and talk, I just got quieter and quieter. I didn’t know where to look.
Catching the eye of another colleague was out of the question. I didn’t want to
look at them. I was too ashamed. I just bowed my head toward my hands, closed
my eyes, and prayed that this rant would soon be over. I prayed that he would
either run out of steam or that another minister would interrupt him. I don’t
remember now how it all ended; I just know that it finally did. I held it
together until everyone left, then I sat and cried.
I suspect that this other minister
was not intentionally trying to shame me. I would like to believe that had he
known my situation, he would have shown some sensitivity, perhaps a modicum of
compassion. But even if he had done that, I doubt that my shame and guilt would
have been abated. Even if he would have said nothing at all, my interior
monologue was on a roll. I didn’t need to hear a sermon about the evils of
divorce. I was preaching that sermon to myself on a regular basis.
Hearing this passage from Mark’s
gospel, at least the beginning verses of our passage, may bring out those kinds
of sermons in our heads; sermons that condemn and judge and denounce. How often
have I heard from people going through a divorce that they stop coming to
church because they feel as though they aren’t good enough to be there. They
feel the shame and the sting of these words from Mark’s gospel. And at first
glance, it seems that this passage is designed for just that purpose, to make
sure that people who are divorced understand what terrible people they truly
are. But there is more going on in this passage than I think we can understand
at first glance.
Jesus
was on the move once more. He has traveled into the region of Judea and beyond
the Jordan. As always, crowds were flocking to him, and he continued to teach
and preach them. Into this crowd, some Pharisees came to test Jesus. This might
be a clue to us that this passage is not just another way to condemn those who
have failed in their marriages. The Pharisees wanted to test Jesus, and we know
that whenever Pharisees wanted to test Jesus, there was more at stake than at what
first meets the eye. Testing was another way to trap Jesus, and the Pharisees
hoped to catch Jesus in a trap of the legal kind.
But Jesus refused to be trapped or
tricked. The Pharisees asked Jesus a question about divorce, which was a legal
issue, and Jesus turned the law back on them. They asked him,
“Is it lawful for a man to divorce
his wife?”
Jesus responded, “What did Moses
command you?”
“They said, ‘Moses allowed a man to
write a certificate of dismissal to divorce her.’ But Jesus said to them,
‘Because of your hardness of heart, he wrote this commandment for you.’”
Because of your hardness of heart.
It wasn’t that Jesus didn’t take divorce seriously, or marriage seriously for
that matter. Jesus quoted from Genesis to show the divine intent behind
marriage. But he was pushing them, challenging them to see something bigger.
Although the Pharisees asked about
the lawfulness of divorce, the legality of it was not really in question. True,
divorce was not to be sought out, but it was assumed that it would sometimes
happen. It was perfectly legal for a husband to divorce his wife. All that was required
was that he write a certificate of divorce. As I understand it, that was
basically the husband writing down, “I divorce you.” And what we know as
prenuptial agreements weren’t unheard of then either. Marriage didn’t have to
be about love. It was essentially a contract between two families. There were
clauses provided for separation of property, etc., in the original contract.
But Jesus wasn’t interested in
countering the Pharisees with more legalism. Jesus wanted them to see that in
this and in so many other ways, the Pharisees and many others suffered from
hardness of heart. People were stubborn and persisted in knowing the ways that
a relationship could be broken. But that wasn’t what God intended. What God
intended was for people to be in relationship, to support one another in
relationship. That divorce was allowed was Moses’ way of acknowledging that we
are mulish, hardheaded and hard hearted human beings who struggle with being in
relationship, and too often we are about broken relationships. I think that
Jesus understood that marriage was more than just contractual. It was a
promise. In this encounter with some Pharisees, he challenged them to think
beyond Moses to Genesis, and the intention for marriage stated there. God
intended for us to be in relationship.
A
divorce was and is a breaking of relationship, and that breaking of
relationship left the most vulnerable in that society even more vulnerable. Women
had no status or power outside of their husbands. To be divorced or to be
widowed was to lose the protection of a man. To be divorced increased women and
children’s vulnerability exponentially.
Divorce was a breaking of relationship
that caused harm, real physical harm to those who were left in its wake. That
is still true of divorce today. Maybe this seems like a verification of what
that minister said so many years ago; that all of society’s troubles stem from
broken families with only the mother at the head. But here’s the thing: divorce
happens. And it hurts. And it can cause harm. But brokenness and broken
relationships are not limited to divorce and divorce alone. We are all damaged
by the struggles of life. To live is to eventually be broken. To live is to
eventually experience broken relationship and broken hearts. You do not have to
be divorced to understand or know that.
But Jesus wanted the Pharisees and
those who would hear to understand that it is our hardness of hearts that gets
us in trouble every time. And just after this encounter with the Pharisees, we
see the disciples showing their lack of understanding and their hardness of
hearts as well. People were bringing their little children to Jesus to touch
them and to bless them. But the disciples were trying to prevent them. They
were scolding the parents for bothering the Rabbi with requests for him to
bless children. But when Jesus saw this, he became indignant! He was indignant
with the disciples for stopping them and made sure they heard – again – that
the kingdom of God belonged to little ones, and that we all better be more like
these little ones if we want to be welcomed into said kingdom.
But I also wonder if Jesus wasn’t
indignant with the disciples because they still didn’t get it. This isn’t the
first time Jesus has welcomed a child and told the disciples that children
matter. This isn’t the first time that Jesus tried to impart to the disciples
that the vulnerable matter to God. But still the disciples tried to keep the
parents and the children away from Jesus. They still thought their job was to
be gatekeepers, deciders of who was in and who was out. But Jesus wasn’t having
it. He wasn’t having any of it.
The Pharisees wanted to trick and
test him with a question about the legal ways relationships can be broken, and
the disciples wanted to make sure they controlled the guest list, the who’s who
of the in crowd. And it seems to me that it all comes back to the hardness of
their hearts. Jesus wasn’t having any of it.
We all are guilty, in one way or
another, of this same kind of hardness of heart. Our relationships break. We
think we know who should be in and who should be out. We approach life as
though there are always going to be winners and losers, but I think that Jesus
wanted us to understand that when it comes to God and when it comes to the
realm of God, none of those dynamics work. We need to consider the ways our
hearts are hardened. We need to remember that the vulnerable and the least and
the last will be the first to be welcomed.
Look, I can’t stand up here today
and condemn or shame anyone for being divorced. I know the sadness of divorce
personally. The particular kind of broken relationship that is divorce is hard
and painful and comes at a terrible cost. Jesus didn’t pull any punches when it
came to talking about it. His words are hard, and we must wrestle with them.
But I also fiercely believe that God’s love is bigger and wider and deeper and
higher than our brokenness. No matter how broken we are, no matter how hard our
hearts become, God loves us and wants to be in relationship with us. Love and
relationship are the foundation and heart of creation.
It is interesting that this passage
comes up in the lectionary on this specific Sunday, World Communion Sunday. When we approach this
table, we are welcomed with love and called to love one another. We are called
to come to this table forgiving those who have harmed us and asking for
forgiveness for those we have harmed. We are called to and welcomed at this
table, not because we are perfect but because we are broken. And how powerful
and wonderful it is to know that all around the world God’s children, broken as
we are, are gathering at tables like ours. If we could just see each other
through the welcome and the forgiveness that this table embodies, if we could
see one another with the love that we remember and celebrate at this table, I
think our broken relationships might be mended, and there would be no such
thing as insiders and outsiders, and our hearts, our hard and struggling hearts
might be softened if only just a little bit. But that little bit might make all
the difference. Thanks be to God.
Let all of God’s children say,
“Alleluia.”
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment