3rd Sunday before Lent – Eucharist – 8.ii.

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(Isaiah 40.21-31; 1 Corinthians 9.16-23; Mark 1.29-23)

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

The poet W H Davies is probably best remembered for just the first two
lines of this poem, which has the title, “Leisure.”

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

People complain continually that they just don’t have the time they need to
do everything they’d wish. But Davies makes the point that the important
thing is not getting everything done. It’s knowing when to stop. And unless
you stop from time to time you won’t know what you should be doing -

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what is truly important. That point is made by the story of a man who was
riding a galloping horse. As horse and rider went thundering along, an old
farmer, standing by a gate, called out: “Where are you going?” To which the
rider yelled back, “Don’t ask me, ask the horse…”

Do you feel like that rider? Do you know where the horse is taking you? Do
you feel that you are just trapped by that overwhelming feeling that every
day you’re at the mercy of what life brings along and demands of you? - that
you’ve got no choice but to keep on getting things done?

Today’s Gospel reading takes us to the beginning of St. Mark’s account of

Jesus’ public ministry. It asks the question, what is it that people really see
in this man? What is it that brings them out in crowds? What is at the heart
of religious faith? The events recorded into today’s Gospel follow straight
after Jesus’ visit to the synagogue at Capernaum on the shore of the Sea of
Galilee. In the synagogue he’d preached with dramatic effect. The people are
amazed and astounded by Jesus’ teaching. They’d heard the “scribes” - as
they’re described here - drone on week in, week out. But now this man has
come into their midst and everything seems fresh: “He teaches with
authority,” they say. And they repeat that conclusion - and then they go and
tell other people too. A man who’s described as having an unclean spirit
yells out at Jesus. And Jesus responds by telling the unclean spirit to be
quiet; he casts it out of the man, and heals him. The news of what Jesus is
doing travels fast. It’s not simply that the people have seen a miracle - “hey,
come and have a look for yourself!” What they’ve found is someone with
“authority” - someone who is different because the man, Jesus, matches up
both with what he says and what he does.

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All this begs the question, what are we looking for in religious faith? More
specifically, what do we want to find in Jesus? Today’s Gospel reading tells
us how Jesus left the synagogue where he’d impressed people so much by
his teaching and went to the home of Simon Peter, where he healed his
mother-in-law. And then there’s no stopping things. People bring loved ones
who are sick to the door of the house. People who have been written off as
possessed by demons come too. And in Jesus they find healing. What Jesus
says and does, everybody wants to know about.

Crowds come to the door and gather round Jesus - “the whole city” is there,
writes St. Mark. But perhaps we need to ask, what will they find? - and what
lasting difference will it make to their lives? The answer might seem
obvious - that Jesus is a great healer, and he’ll be able to draw the crowds
wherever he goes. And that’s a good start. But there’s something more that
needs to be going on. It’s perhaps hinted at in that line of St. Mark’s Gospel
which says that when Jesus cast out all those many demons, “he would not
permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.” Biblical scholars have
debated this verse as to what it means. Perhaps it’s best interpreted as
meaning that in the battle of good and evil, evil recognises its true adversary
in Jesus; the evil spirits know their number is up because the truth of God is
something which now confronts them, something which they can’t resist.
But for the people in the crowd, they need something more than to take the
word of demons as testimony to Jesus. They need to find out the truth for
themselves - that Jesus makes a difference not only in the dramatic events of
life, in a crisis, in time of sickness or with a miracle; but that Jesus makes a
difference and gives us direction in every part of life. Jesus is there for us in
what we consider mundane or boring. We need those special moments, when

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the presence of God seems so immediate that we can’t escape it - that’s
what’s happening with Jesus’ teaching and healing in Capernaum. But we
need to know that Jesus doesn’t desert us when it comes to the grind of daily
living.

What was special about Jesus was not that he could work miracles - it seems
that plenty of people in his time could pull a crowd with claims that they
could do just that,… and there are still quite a few around now. What was
different in Jesus is that what he does and says bears testimony precisely to
who he is. The crowds who turn out for the miracles get a glimpse of this,
but they will also have to listen rather more to what Jesus will say -
including the bits they’re rather not hear: the bits which will demand that
they change their way of living; that they recognise where they’re going
wrong; that demand stamina in lives of holiness as well as enthusiasm for
those times which bring shared joy. And they’ll finally really know him only
at the end of his journey which takes him to the Cross and will bring new
life from an empty tomb.

So… for the moment the people are enthusiastic for Jesus. They come out in
crowds, they go off and tell other people. But this is only the start of their
journey. The verse of today’s Gospel reading which goes to the heart of
what is necessary is Mark 1.35:

In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to
a deserted place, and there he prayed.

It’s what is unseen in Jesus’ life that makes the difference in his witness.
Before anyone else, he gets up and he prays. Not just that… he goes to a

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place where he can get the praying done. It takes an effort to find a place
where he can be alone with the God who is his Father and ours. It takes
discipline - and that’s something we all need.

Lent will soon be arriving. Today is the third Sunday before Lent. If you
want to think of Lent as the time of giving things up, perhaps today’s Gospel
can be a prompt that what is especially necessary is to give up incessant
busy-ness and to take time to consider what should be our true direction. We
need those times which will warm our hearts as we meet for worship, as we
meet Christ who gives us his Body and his Blood in the Eucharist. We need
those times for reading the Scriptures when we can ask what God is really
saying to us. And we need those empty spaces when we can hear him speak.