By the Rev’d Lucy Nguyen

Season: 33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time

Readings: 1 Sam 1:4-20 | Heb 10:11-14 (15-18), 19-25 | Mark 13:1-8

I grew up on fairy tales and fables -princesses and princes, frogs and witches, lost children and wolves, quick hares and persistent turtles, sneaky crows and foxes – it’s a tricky world and the world favours the pretty ones, the clever ones.

Layered on top of my world of fairy tales was the Jesus story – it also seemed like a fairy tale, the story came from a big old book, there was always someone who already knew the story, supposedly I thought the “whole” story and there were tricky lessons to learn. Animals were also involved, and I worried for years (still do on a bad day) if I could handle a lion in the arena (the answer is still “no”) and would I not scream if I was ever nailed to a cross (the answer is still “yes”)? And of course, work hard, serve others, share if not just give away what you have.

Its taking a lifetime to unpack and reimage these stories so they are helpful, not simply terrifying or misleading.

“Oh grandma, what big eyes and ears you have!”

Said …. Little red riding hood to the wolf.

“The better to see and hear you dear girl”

“Oh grandma, what big teeth you have!”

“The better to EAT YOU!”

Oh, Jesus what big stones they are.

Oh, Jesus what big buildings they have.

The better to fall down!

Why is Mark setting down the story of Jesus responding in this way to the disciples, Galilean fishermen probably overwhelmed by their first encounter with the temple, the Holy City and the Roman forces. * A “teaching moment Mark might have thought”. Scholars suggest that Mark is seeking to reorientate the early Christian community, decentring it in relation to the temple rituals and recentring it in relation to Jesus Christ. *

We all need re-centring at times.

I see the hikoi and the current discourse around the te tiriti o Waitangi as an opportunity for something similar, a call for re-centring. Have we wandered off track in this land, where the gap of income and opportunity has become so wide? Have we forgotten or never learned the origin stories of this land and each person’s place in it? For yes, we all do have a place. There is enough.

The caution in reading fables and fairy tales is not that we will forget them and ignore their messages the danger is that we will become too fearful and anxious, suspicious of others and distrustful of our own intuition.

The danger Mark presents is not that Christians will forget the outcome of these stones and buildings coming down, but they will focus only on the timing of when it will happen and the drama that will ensue when it happens.

How many of us work to a deadline; study the night before exam; Christmas shopping on Christmas Eve …?

The concern raised by Jesus in Mark’s story is that the disciples will fixate on the “signs” and be “led astray” by false interpreters and expectations. Interestingly part of the message from today’s reading is the teaching that natural catastrophes and human conflict are not reliable signs of “the end”. Sadly, wars are a tragic occurrence in human history. *

Christian life is not about waiting until the “right time” or the end time to be proven right. To be Christian is about being and doing “it” all the time, regardless of even despite a proposed timeline.

If you’re wanting promptings or reminders of Christian life, pay attention to the “birth pangs”! Living is bloody tragic at times, and it is beautiful – do not resist participation in the kindom. To focus on the end point as the fullness of God’s coming means we will miss God in the present.  

We are to engage in the caring of others now even as we seek to share the message of God’s holy, healing enabling love.

“The purpose of watching, waiting and observing is to experience and be changed by something different from what we have known. It is to be transformed by something beyond us that we can neither understand nor manage.” * It is not about standing still.

The fairy tales and fables are not literal – and there is truth in them.

In Scripture we find both wonder and warning.

There is a framework of God’s time, but to focus on it and try to capture it misses the essence of what it is: we are to live now amid the pain and sorrow, the fear and changes! This time is no different than all the other times. We are to love now! We are to care as in respond to the needs of others are now! Not when we have a bit more to share, not when it feels comfortable for us.

Mark is asking those early believers to trust “that God is transforming the world and that believers are called to participate in God’s saving work…” *

Yes, there are times when we will feel beleaguered, lost or depressed, it’s pretty normal. In these times we lean in to draw strength, not to build walls to divide, rather to rest and recharge, refocus, hear again the stories of our faith, of all the wonder and the signs and be filled with that hope that brings action and change.

Writers say that Mark was writing for a church in transition, and here we are again! We need “discernment, patience and hope to live fully in love in the midst of the tensions of a “passing world”, * between the now and not yet.

May we find our way together, in Jesus the Christ.

• Feasting on the Gospels, Mark 13:1-8, p398-403, multiple sources.