Created Anew: As One With Authority

Steve Lindsley
(Mark 1: 21-28)

Let me ask you something: if you were launching a new initiative – a business venture, a new years resolution, or, I don’t know, three years of ministry as the son of God – if you were beginning something new, what would you want to be your first act, your inaugural speech, your debut?

It’s interesting, the different ways each gospel does this with Jesus. In Matthew, a gospel that highlights Jesus as instructor, his public ministry understandably begins with the Sermon on the Mount. Luke’s justice-minded Jesus inaugurates his ministry with a clear mission statement of good news to the poor, release to the captives, and freedom for the oppressed. John, the most mystical of the gospel siblings, kicks things off with Jesus at a wedding where vast quantities of wine are created and, one would assume, consumed.

And what about Mark – how does Mark have Jesus starting off? Well, in Mark, Jesus begins his public ministry by wowing the temple authorities and getting into a screaming match with a demon. Talk about leaving an impression!

Our passage today comes fast and furious, as most things in Mark do. As the shortest of the gospels, it is known for cutting to the chase. Our story today begins at the 21st verse of the very first chapter; and in the 20 preceding verses Jesus has been baptized, tempted, and called his disciples. Mark does not waste a second getting to the heart of the matter

And what is that heart, exactly? There is no deep secret what Mark wants to focus on here: it is authority. Or, if you want to get technical about the actual Greek, “new authority.” This “new authority” will be a theme throughout the gospel, with references to Jesus’ teaching authority mentioned some 26 times. In our passage alone he brings it up twice, although they come from very different sources.

The first source were those in the temple that day who heard Jesus preach and teach. They were astounded at his teaching, Mark tells us, for he taught as one having authority, and not as the scribes. It’s interesting the way Mark phrases it; that it’s not what Jesus teaches that exudes authority but how he teaches it. It’s not the content that leaves an impression, it’s something else. More on that later.

It’s also worth noting that Mark throws more than a little shade here in the direction of the scribes. Scribes were trained, educated professionals in the religious order, entrusted with specific responsibilities of the temple. And yet it’s a carpenter from Nazareth who exhibits the greater authority.

Now this may not sound like a big deal to us now – it is Jesus, after all. But it might be worth looking at it from a more contemporary angle to see what our reaction might be. Imagine someone visiting a church that’s been around for a hundred years, very established; and after just a few weeks starts showing up at session meetings and the pastor’s study on a weekly basis, offering unsolicited advice on everything from hymn selection to staffing to restructuring committees. After worship every Sunday he’s telling anyone who will listen that he has all the answers and everything would be better if folks would just listen to him. How do you think that’d go over? That sort of misplaced authority rarely goes over well in the church!

And while it’s not an exact parallel, I imagine it’s along the lines of what those scribes and other temple hands felt about this “new guy.” When Mark tells us Jesus presents himself in a way that supersedes the Scribes, he is making a pretty radical statement about Jesus. And again, we’re only 21 verses in!

And if there was any lingering doubt still about the authority of Jesus, it’s certainly put to rest with the other source Mark mentions – this “man with an unclean spirit” who comes bursting into the temple shouting up a storm. Other translations refer to him as a “demon.” We don’t know what to do with this sort of thing in our Presbyterian piety; demons are seen as the stuff of horror movies and Halloween get-ups. What we do know is this man had been overcome by something outside of himself that was not of God. Which makes the fact that he calls Jesus “Holy One of God” all the more profound.

Holy One of God. We tend to skip over that part and cut straight to the convulsing demon coming out of the man because that is the stuff of horror movies. But let’s not forget that it is an unclean spirit – something not of God – that recognizes Jesus’ new authority. Authority greater than the ones typically seen as speaking for God. Authority great enough to be recognized even by something not of God.

That is the kind of a...