It just ain’t happening ... (Part 4 - of 12) ... faithfulness, wisdom, & prayer...when the miracles don’t come. Mark ch9v14-29 (to open in a new window, hold control down as you click the link)
One recent publication that was
trying to understand the storytelling nature of the Gospel of Mark, has noted
in their latest edition: “Recent New Testament research has recognized that
first century Mediterranean societies were predominantly oral/aural cultures in
which probably no more than three to five percent of the people were able to
read or write. So, for the people of the time, the Gospel of Mark was the oral
performance they experienced. ..the stories were told in lively and meaningful
ways. Mark was also performed in this way we assume by committed followers of
Jesus using all their best story-telling skills to enable others to hear about
Jesus, to understand the presence of the rule of God, and to become people who
follow Jesus in spite of opposition and risk… As such the written text of the
Gospel of Mark functioned as a script for Storytelling, much as a script functions
for a play or sheet music for a musical performance.[1]
I think Mark is here following (Peter, following) Jesus’
example, in whetting our appetite to want to follow Jesus - in his prayer life.
Mark has already told us that ..
Jesus has been praying, so far in the story..
Firstly, after large-scale acceptance,
casting out demons & healing “the whole town” of Capernaum[2],
Jesus disappeared “before sunrise, off to a lonely place, where he prayed” (Mark 1:35-39), and after this we see Jesus
having a clear sense of purpose & definite direction, rather than the
becoming a slave to fame.
Secondly, Jesus suggests to his worn-out
disciples after an intense time of mission – (throwing out demons & healing
diseases): “Let us go off by ourselves to some place where we will be alone and
you can rest a while” and then “they started out in a boat by themselves
to a lonely place”. He there extends their commission from a) heralding the
news of their emperor's rule (the euangelion), b) throwing out demons, & c)
anointing people with oil & healing them, to now also include d) feeding
those in need whom God sends to them. They baulk at it, Jesus involves the
twelve anyway in feeding the crowd of about 5,000 people, with 5 loaves & 2
fish. Then he says goodbye to the people, sets the disciples rowing home to
listen & learn from that episode, & then spends the night “alone” up a hill – praying, until about 3am
(Mark 6:30-32; 45-48), when he shows them an
even further revelation of God's capacity to enable obedience in pressured situations
(by walking on water towards the other side of the lake).
Thirdly, Mark is the only one to tell us
a story about another deaf-mute (that may in fact be alluded to in the Epistle
to the Romans). When people brought him, as a grown man, to Jesus asking Jesus
to do the expected Rabbi thing, to “place his hands on him”, Jesus did
something strange… Mark says; “ So Jesus
took him off alone, away from the crowd, put
his fingers in the man's ears, spat, and touched the man's tongue. Then Jesus looked up to heaven, gave a deep groan[3], and said
to the man, “Ephphatha”, which means,
“Open up!” At once the man was able to hear, his speech impediment was removed,
and he began to talk without any trouble. Then Jesus ordered the people not to
speak of it to anyone; but the more he ordered them not to, the more they told
it. And all who heard were completely
amazed. “How well he does everything!” they exclaimed. “He even causes the
deaf to hear and the dumb to speak!” (Mark 7:31-37). Another mention of people being
amazed, but no mention of a demon here, or
even of the word prayer, but Mark opens up the way for us to see in Jesus a
deep empathy and the kind of spirit who himself pleads with God for those
brought to him, in groans that their own words cannot express[4].
Then the authoritative command. The crowd’s amazement at the deaf made to hear
& the dumb speaking may indicate to us something of their cultural un-expectation
of God doing these things.
And now in the wake of these, this
“incidental” reference… to prayer (being the only way this kind can be
overcome), after he throws out a tricky[5]
demon, that has been the nemesis of his disciples.
I think that Mark (following Peter, following Jesus) was
learning how to use the remez (or hint) as applied to another audience than
Galileean Hebrews. He was at least baiting
his readers/listeners (like a good ‘fisher for people’), maybe also giving them clues (or, maybe many would
have understood at that time & in that culture), especially in the wake of
Jesus’ teaching on prayer[6].
In this way a number of Mark’s descriptions of solitude, small references which
may appear to us quite oblique[7]
may function as euphemisms for prayer[8].
At least this passing comment about prayer (from Jesus at first, then
subsequently from the teller/writer/public-reader/orator of “Mark's Gospel”)
might have elicited some questions later in the evening (as Mark tells us often
happened with Jesus’ storytelling
methods [Mark 4:10; 33-34]) and the clues were there in
the story, not to “tell”, but to “show”; maybe not even so much to “show” as to “hint at” the answer.. (which for all I know may even have been that Jesus was
praying every time he was alone, or talking with a few good friends, or on a
hill, or in a house or…)
If
when Jesus went “to a deserted place” he was praying, & when he went up a
hill “to be on his own” he was praying, and when he took a man “off alone, away
from the crowd”, he then “looked up to heaven, and gave a deep groan[9]”;
then maybe if he were to take his three lead disciples up a mountain “to be
alone”, it would be in order to … pray? [10]
[1] Mark as Story: An Introduction to the Narrative of a Gospel (Third
Edition) by David Rhoads, Joanna Dewey, & Donald Michie. Published by
Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 2012, p.2.
[3] cf Ps 123; &
Lk 18:13
(it sounds like according to Jesus, in his story on prayer, the tax collector’s
shame was all that stopped him doing what he would have otherwise done rightly
)
[4] See Romans 8:26 for the Apostle Paul’s
commentary (possibly corollaries from meditating this pericope) on the way the
spirit of this Christ works on the behalf of other deaf/dumb members of Gods’
creation.
[5] Tricksy: Literalistic,
confident, “smart-alec”
[6] e.g.Matt6:1,5-6. Note Mark is NOT compiling
Jesus’ teaching (cf. Papias), so much as illustrating it.
[7] e.g. might it not be
possible that Mark is using (either because it would have been natively
understood, or because he wanted to initiate his hearers into) various
euphemisms for “prayed”: “went to a remote place”, “retired on his own”, “travelled
only with his disciples”, “was in a deserted place”; as with Jewish euphemisms
for prayer: “I lift my hands up..” (+see paragraph below on Moses & Elijah)
See Appendix 1 for some of the evidence for this.
[8] See Appendix 1 for a list
of some cases of this that may back up this case for Mark using a euphemism for
prayer.
[9] cf Ps 123; &
Lk 18:13
(it sounds like according to Jesus, in his story on prayer, the tax collector’s
shame was all that stopped him doing what he would have otherwise done rightly
)
[10] For a poetic response to such praying as Jesus shows us; appreciated through story: http://the-euangelion.blogspot.com.au/2013/05/look-at-jesus-then-more-respond-to-his.html
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