The Cathedral Church of the Nativity
Sermon
V Epiphany-I Mark 29-39
February 8, 2009
The Very Rev. Anthony R. Pompa


“Wait a minute, it can’t be over, Where is the Redemption!” These are the words that were lifted up behind me and into my ears from a dark movie theatre at the conclusion of a recent film Felicia and I viewed. A complex drama of struggle; personal struggle, power struggle, struggle with integrity, compassion, sexuality, concludes in such a way that leaves the audience, well disturbed, wandering how it all works out, what the truth of the matter is. Unsettling at best, the words waft from a dark theatre amply for sure vocalizing my own unspoken and unresolved sentiment: “Wait a minute, it can’t be over, where’s the Redemption?”

I believe that we, the people of God, created in God’s image, have a story that lives in us that we take to every moment of our lives! When the story in us is challenged we cry out! I believe that message living in us is a story of redemption! A story where the things in our personal lives, the things in our common life, the things in our country, our world, and yes even in the cosmos are whole, free, in union.
Our Gospel story today invites us into this story of the acting upon a message of wholeness, freedom, and union. We learn from the story that there is a miracle, a healing, and that this action is part of the deliverance of a message. What is the miracle? Simon’s mother-in law is ill, in bed with fever. Jesus goes to her at once and lifts her up, the fever leaves her. She is healed. Now, what is the miracle? A colleague at clergy bible study suggested the miracle was that Simon wanted his mother in law healed at all, (not so nice). But, she is healed, restored, and set back into motion in her life of service. The story goes on to tell us then, that all who were sick or possessed with demons gathered around the door of that house, and Jesus cured many and cast our demons of many.
Mark’s telling the story, from chapter one announces to us that in the person of Jesus, our deepest yearnings are met with God’s deepest desire! The miracle is for the first century experience, that those things which held power over people in such a way that distorted and disrupted their participation in wholeness, freedom, and in life, are removed! Simon’s mother in law is healed, and is restored, she is set right, brought back into the fullness of her life, as are those who come to Jesus, crowded at the doorway.
If we now have answered the question, whats the miracle, the more important question to be explored is what the story reveals to us in the next paragraph, Jesus got up, went off to pray (good modeling by the way), they hunted for him (also known as they disturbed his prayertime), and he responded, now we must go on to proclaim the message to the next town! So, we move from miracle to message! Whats the message!
The message I submit to you is found somewhere in the articulation of the young woman’s cry at the end of a challenging life story in that movie theatre! You remember, Where’s the redemption! The message as it were is in the Kingdom principles revealed in the actions of Jesus of Nazareth! It is that story the begs to be lived in each of us! It is redemption-Salvation itself!
Now these are words, words we throw about you and me. They are churchy words, theological words. I submit to you that these words have power and meaning for you and for me. The deepest meaning of these words are already planted in a story that begs to be lived in us through God’s grace! We want the order of things set right don’t we! We want for those things that block, inhibit, imperil, distort the fullness of who God created us to be, to be removed, set right, redeemed is the theological word. We want to be set free from those things that hold us in bondage from knowing the fullness of our potential as creatures of God. We want to be set free form our addictions, our worries and anxieties, our greed. We literally want these obstacles removed so that we might taste freedom- Salvation is the theological word.
There is a story that is implanted in each of us. The story is a story of redemption and salvation. It’s the kind of story that begs to be lived and told, and when it is not, when it is not told, lived, experienced our very soul cried out for it. The messiness of life, of our world, yes even of our cosmos! When out of kilter, we know deep inside ourselves that something is out of order! It is then that our soul sends the cry for redemption and a message if you will meets us where we are-God’s Kingdom desire is that things be set right, set free!