All You Need Is Love, The Love Of God And He Will Do Wonders Through You.

This sermon was delivered to Holy Trinity in Ayr, South Ayrshire, Scotland on the 26th September 2021;

a Scottish Episcopal Church in the Dioceses of Glasgow and Dumfries.

The readings for today are: Esther 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22 Psalm 12 James 5:13-20

Main Reading: Mark 9:38-50

Introduction.

When I first spoke to Ken about today’s gospel reading, Ken read through it very quickly, and went: “oh dear, this is full of hell and damnation … good luck with that one”. Thanks Ken, but once I had a chance to study it, I found it quite uplifting and a positive message, and I hope you will agree.

The verse in the vernacular.

Now, to gain the full understanding of this verse, I find it better sometimes, to translate the verses into the vernacular; a language I am more familiar.

So, our text today could read, “as the disciples went about their daily business, they saw a man casting out a demon in Jesus’ name. They were shocked about this, because he wasn’t one of them, and he hadn’t done his apprenticeship with Jesus. Yet, earlier that same day, the disciples themselves had tried to cast out a similar demon, and failed … and here was a man, a stranger, showing them up. So, the disciples looked at each other and said, “we canny have this”, everyone will be doing it; and we will lose our status.

In fact, the disciples thought, “how dare he”, so they hatched a plan to tell Jesus about this, and for Jesus to sort out, in their favour. So they went to Jesus, and told him what they saw … but instead of Jesus agreeing with them, he went completely off on one, he was absolutely raging … shouting out that this man was doing his work, in his name, and that he was working for him and not against him. … And like us, once Jesus got started, he kept on going. … These disciples had completely disappointed Jesus, and so he was clearly upset at them. … In all the years they had been with him, they had learned absolutely nothing.

And we know this feeling, because that is when we say, why bother, and I am sure Jesus said it, because the disciples had totally missed the whole point of Christianity and their relationship with God.

The real object of the exercise.

Christianity, as you know, is not just a religion, it is a way of life, it is a way of thinking and acting according the kingdom of God, and not according to the kingdom of men. And I am sure you will agree, that sometimes Christianity just does not make sense, and goes against the ways of this world, yet we also know, that it does work, but in a kind of strange way … but rarely in a way we want it work, or a way that makes sense.

For example, our sins are forgiven by God, all our sins. We don’t deserve to be forgiven of our sins, but Jesus died a horrible death to completely free us from both our lives of Sin, (capital S) and … our everyday smaller sins, (small s). No other religion does that, but Jesus died to set us free from Sin, and the penalties of our sin.

Now this can be a hard one to take in, (I still struggle with it at times), but Jesus did this for many reasons, one being, that we are free from sin, enabling us to serve others in his name … rather than in our own name, where in our own name, we can gain a position of authority … a position of self-importance … a position we can use and abuse for our own ends.

And we have all heard the stories of those who have done so, to greater and lesser extents, including those who are absolutely despicable. And this abuse does not apply just to the church on, it applies to all societies, groups, clubs or whatever … and that was why Jesus was so angry, because the disciples were still thinking in terms of self-promotion.

They were focused on wanting that wee stripe on their shoulder or arm, that wee position in church, that wee position of authority just to give them a wee edge, on someone or something … and not, on the poor man who was being delivered, or the man trying to deliver him.

This is exactly what Jesus was raging about in our reading this morning. These disciples had learned absolutely nothing, but they had somehow given themselves a certain position, a certain authority or status because of their association with Jesus, because after all, they were the ones who followed him around, they were the ones Jesus was spending most of his time with, they were the ones closest to the son of God, and they wanted the people to know it. So, we can understand quite easily, their thinking, that they were someone, that they were that wee bit closer to God than everyone else … and they were keeping it all to themselves.