Two Kinds of People

Sermon for Sunday Feb 5, 2012…. Mark 1:29-39

There is a “Pontius Puddle” comic strip that begins with…. "I wonder if God can really hear me." The next frame shows Pontius praying: "Hey, God! What should I do with my life?" The third frame has a voice from heaven saying,

"FEED THE HUNGRY. RIGHT INJUSTICE. WORK FOR PEACE!"

"Just testing!" Pontius replies.

"Same here," God speaks back.

Prayer:

There are two kinds of people in the world…

People who need help and people who need to help.

Put another way…. There are two kinds of people in the world…

People who need care and people who need a calling.

Of course, you could describe two kinds of people in a variety of ways, and it can be said, that we all have been both kinds of people at any given time in our lives.

So…I ask you, “Which of these two kinds of people are you today”?

Are you are person who needs help or care… or are you a person that needs to help or needs a calling?

Pause…

If we knew what kind of person you are… we could direct or connect those who need help with those who need a calling.

Then we could move out from the church to care and help our community. Can you imagine what could come from this?

Maybe you’re not quite ready to pursue this radically simple practice, so let’s look at how Jesus demonstrated this act in our gospel reading from Mark today.

Yes… we are still in the 1^st chapter of Mark… So far…Jesus is baptized, deals with Satan in the wilderness, calls some fishermen to follow him, confronts a demon possessed man whom he heals… now he goes to Peter’s house to perhaps get some rest. However, Peter’s mother-in-law is sick, so I guess… Jesus’ work isn’t quite finished after-all. Just as an aside…. I’m wondering why Mark doesn’t tell us Peter’s mother-in-laws name. He just says it’s his mother-in-law!! I wish he would have recorded it because it would have made the story more personable. So for our purposes today… lets name her Esther because there are already too many Mary’s found in the bible.

So… Jesus heals Esther and he does it is a fashion like resurrection. Jesus takes her hand and she raise up… she sits up. Then she immediately, as Mark is fond of saying, goes and makes dinner. I don’t know about you, but if I was sick and the fever broke I wouldn’t be fixing anyone dinner. In addition, please don’t place your own biases on Esther here. She’s not doing this because of her gender. This isn’t some form of servitude being played out.

As Lutheran Theologian Sarah Henrich points out… [I]llness bore a heavy social cost: not only would a person be unable to earn a living or contribute to the well-being of a household, but their ability to take their proper role in the community, to be honored as a valuable member of a household, town, or village, would be taken from them. Peter's mother-in-law is an excellent case in point. It was her calling and her honor to show hospitality to guests in her home. Cut off from that role by an illness cut her off from doing that which integrated her into her world. Who was she when no longer able to engage in her calling? Jesus restored her to her social world and brought her back to a life of value by freeing her from that fever. It is very important to see that healing is about restoration to community and restoration of a calling, a role as well as restoration to life. For life without community and calling is bleak indeed.

You see… this was a person (Esther) who had a calling, but needed care so that she could resume her calling. Folks…. Do you see the correlation? We all fall into both categories throughout our lives. We all have roles to play and we also have to care and be cared for.

Word gets out and the whole community descends on Peter’s house and Jesus and by association his friends help and care for many people. This was exhausting to say the least. Think about it. You find yourself sitting in a hospital with a loved one. You’re just sitting not doing much. Your there to love and support your loved one, then, friends and other family members come and when you leave your tired and exhausted. This must have been what Jesus felt like when the people needing care left.

So Jesus gets up early and goes out to be alone and pray. By-the-way, this is something we should all be doing… all work and no pray is not all that healthy. Jesus’ friends get worried and begin looking for him and when they find him, Jesus tells them they must be moving on to other places to share the good news and that is why he came. Do you see the duality? Jesus does both, he cares for people and he has a calling.

So… there you have it. Two kinds of people… people who need help and people who need a calling….And at any given time we could be any of these two people and Jesus demonstrates this by fulfilling both of these.

This got me thinking and wondering about this community in caring and needing a calling. Maybe you’re doing this and if so I praise God for your effort. Nonetheless, in what ways might we imagine our role, our purpose and identity for the way we use our time, resources, the way we run our meetings, and set our priorities. Could Emmanuel be that community that responds to those currently in need and in clarifying those who need a calling?

So… what I would like to do is to have you pull out the 3x5 cards found in your bulletin and I would like to invite you to write down a care if you need to be cared for. Or write down a care that you can provide.

Or write down something you need help with… or some help you can provide.

For example… maybe you need a ride to the Doctor or to the store or maybe you can provide that ride.

Maybe you are Lonely, have a Medical Issue and need an ear, or struggling with Loss, Addiction, or maybe you just need to talk with someone.

Maybe you can provide a listening ear, or have experience with some of these struggle that can bring comfort.

Write down your name along with your care or calling and place it in the offering basket and Pat will go through them and make the connections to place the people with cares with the people who have a calling.

Can you imagine how this might change this congregation… then branch out into the community, can you imagine how profoundly this would change this community.

There you have it… Two Kinds of People… Which are you today?