Searching for God Beyond this Realm

I’ve never been too excited by the 4th of July, it’s a holiday that challenges my values. Independence Day celebrations tend to move beyond the patriotic into nationalism and that makes me uncomfortable. 

What’s more, I hate fireworks. I’m not into glorifying bombs bursting in air no matter how colorful. Fireworks scared me when I was little and they scare my dog and cats today. In this economy of lost jobs and slashed salaries what are we thinking oooing and awing over hundreds of thousands of dollars going up in smoke? But that’s just my opinion. For the most part people enjoy watching fireworks. 

What we find attractive about pyrotechnic displays might have nothing to do with the vivid lights and loud bangs at all. It might be that what we’re really drawn to is the ritual of looking up at the sky together.

As the sun goes down, often after a special meal with family and friends, the community gathers outside. We huddle out on a balcony, or on a blanket on the beach, with a common desire to witness something magnificent. We yearn to behold something awesome. People who might otherwise be happy and content in the privacy of their homes venture out to a public place with expectation. And in unity with complete strangers we gaze up at the heavens. After witnessing the flash and hearing the blast, we vocalize our amazement in unison. 

Sharing an experience of wonder is powerful, bonds are formed and relationships created.  I believe we all desire connect to something bigger than ourselves. I wonder if there is a heaven beyond this reality. Perhaps fireworks appeal to us because they offer a glimpse of a world beyond.
  

Looking up to the dark cosmos we see a brilliant stellar explosion and with stars cascading around us we've transcended, if only for an instant, to another realm. Sounds a little new-agey doesn't it?  

The truth is, the desire to transcend is as old as the hills. 

In fact, Paul talks all about it in his second letter to the Corinthians.

Don’t be fooled by his use of the third person, Paul was writing about himself. We know from Paul’s letters that he struggled mercilessly with the flesh vs. spirit issue. For Paul, the physical body was a burden – an obstacle that separated his spirit from God. 

Paul doesn’t tell us if he stayed in his body or transcended his body, but he lets us know in no uncertain terms that his divine visions were so exceptional that he could not share his knowledge with the uninitiated. 

Paul must tread a fine line because he wants the Corinthians to know of his ecstatic experiences that carried him to paradise – an ability to achieve such spiritual heights would boost his credibility in the eyes of the Corinthians. And at the same time he doesn’t want to be boastful about those experiences because he knows how beguiling the supernatural can be. Truthfully, if it were left to Paul, I think he’d be up there in a state of elation with the angels at every opportunity. God must have realized that too so he poked Paul’s flesh with a thorn.

I know how effective being poked with a thorn can be. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been gardening with my head in the clouds, off in some other world when I’ve brushed my knuckle against a thorn on a rose bush. It hurts like the devil and shatters any meditative state. Nothing can send me crashing down to earth faster than a poke with a thorn.
Paul relates his thorny experience to the Corinthians:

Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”

In this passage, the thorn isn’t necessarily a pointy woody growth on the stem of a plant. Paul’s thorn could have been an illness or physical disability or hardship that served to anchor him in the here and now. I find God’s response to Paul’s multiple pleas especially insightful in understanding today’s gospel. Power is made perfect in weakness.

Remember, Jesus had been traveling the circuit teaching and performing miracles – he was at an all time high, at the peak of his career. He had just raised a 12 year-old girl from the dead. Then Jesus with his disciples arrived at his hometown, and almost immediately the tables turned. At first his home crowd seemed impressed with his wisdom, astounded even. Then Jesus said something that offended his people. We’re not told what he said, but they began to question and insult him. “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary?” And with these doubts cast upon him, Mark says Jesus could do no deed of power in his hometown.

Now this doesn’t make Jesus a failure or any less powerful. In his hometown, Jesus was still Jesus – the Son of God. But the people who knew Jesus as a young boy couldn’t believe it. Their disbelief created a wall of doubt that prevented them from receiving God. 

Jesus could have performed any number of compelling tricks to woo his hometown audience. But Jesus knew that faith based on miracles is fleeting, like fireworks that quickly fade after a thrilling display. So he shook the dust from his feet and continued on.

Paul cares passionately for the community at Corinth, and is therefore insistent they realize the limits of searching for God beyond this realm. While he understands the powerful appeal of a good religious experience, he also knows that unless these revelations and raptures in the third heaven are brought back down to earth, and inspire us to love and serve the world, we are not following in Jesus’ footsteps and we are not growing in faith. So Paul boasts only in his weakness – only in Christ, whose life, death, and resurrection will lead us to a new creation. And this my friends demonstrates the kind of faith God requires of us - a solid faith grounded in Christ’s incarnation and in all that is earthy. And if it takes a few pricks by a thorn to keep us humble with Christ-like weakness, so be it.  You can come to me, and I’ll give you a band-aid.

Proper 9 Year B Mark 6:1 - 13