Hear the Word of God and Share in the Lord's Supper

Rebecca Sheridan
Sunday, January 24, 2021
Mark 1:14-20

    “Repent!  The end is near!”  Most of us get a sick feeling in our stomach if we walk by and hear someone shouting those words on a street corner – we walk to the other side of the street, avoiding eye contact.  “Repent” is a bit of an ugly word.  Sadly, this is what some people think of first when they think of the Christian faith – that it is all hellfire and brimstone, focused on the sinfulness of humanity and everything that is wrong with us.  A giant guilt trip.  Our first reading for today describes what happens to Jonah after the famous belly of the whale experience, when he goes back to Nineveh as God had originally commanded him to do to warn the inhabitants of God’s judgment of their wicked ways.  It is a classic scene of repentance.  “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” Jonah cries.  And somewhat incredibly, the people respond to this negative warning and actually repent.  They fast and put on sackcloth and turn from their evil ways so that God does not punish them for their sins.  This scene is probably what we first think of when we hear that word, “Repent!”  And yet, our gospel for this morning encourages us to consider more positive aspects of repentance.
    In the gospel, John the Baptist is arrested, and Jesus begins to proclaim and preach a similar message to John’s and Jonah’s, continuing to ask people to “repent.”  But Jesus doesn’t stop at repentance.  He doesn’t just tell people what NOT to do, he invites people to follow him in a different way. As the disciples follow him, he will show them acts of healing, forgiveness of sins, and a ministry to all people, regardless of gender, social class, political affiliation, and so on.  He proclaims the good news of God and says that the kingdom of God has come near, the time is fulfilled, and he asks people not only to repent, but to believe in the good news.  Maybe to our ears, it would be better to use a different word than “repent” to describe more positively what Jesus is asking people to do in following him.  The sense of the word is not simply to tear our clothes, put on sackcloth and ashes and wallow in our guilt.  Rather, Jesus is asking us to turn from evil toward the good, to turn our lives toward God.  “Turn around and follow me,” is Jesus’ basic invitation to those first disciples and to us.  And this is the basic definition of worship, the central practice of all followers of Jesus, our focus for this morning.  When we worship God, we turn our hearts, our minds, our whole lives to God.  We confess our sins, and then receive God’s forgiveness.  We hear God’s word through the Bible, the prayers, the liturgy, the preaching.  We receive God’s grace in remembering our baptism and receiving Holy Communion.  We turn our lives towards God, who promises that we will experience God’s GOOD news, Jesus reminds us.  Repentance is not simply a rejection of the things that draw us from God…repentance is turning toward God to live our lives a little differently so that God is first in our lives, so that we can look to God and realize how many blessings we have received because of his goodness and mercy.
    This is the part of the story of Jonah that we don’t get in today’s short reading.  Jonah is like that street corner prophet who wants God to take revenge and punish the Ninevites.  In chapter four, we hear how Jonah is actually angry because he knows that God is a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and ready to relent from punishing.  Jonah doesn’t want to tell the Ninevites who God fully is, he just wants revenge.  Jesus comes to reveal this gracious and merciful God who is focused on steadfast love and good news above exacting punishment.  When we think about why we worship God, sometimes as faithful Christians our invitations to motivate others to join us can sound like Jonah – come to church or else!  We can lament that fewer and fewer people make Sunday worship a priority, but I don’t think shaming or guilting people into coming to worship works as a long-term strategy.  The miraculous thing is that God works through Jonah’s negative message – the Ninevites do change their ways.  But in following Jesus like those first disciples in becoming fishers of people, we can take Jesus as the more reliable model in inviting people to turn to God in worship.  We can describe to people the joy regular worship is for our lives.  “It starts my week off right.”  “I feel more connected to God.”  “I am inspired by the music and the message.”  “Worshipping with other believers gives me support especially when I’m going through hard times.” We can create opportunities to worship God at other times – a Sunday night or weeknight or online as we’ve been doing – to meet people where they are at.  What would your invitation to worship be to someone who is considering it?  And beyond that, lest we make worship about ourselves alone, how do we paint a picture of who our good, gracious, merciful and steadfast God is so that people hear THAT message above the noise of the media and the street corner preachers that tend to put Christians in a bad light?  In our conversations and actions, what could we offer that invites people to turn toward God?
    We worship God because the regular practice of worship points us to a purpose much larger than ourselves. God is most deserving of all of our praise and worship, especially when we see human efforts fail.  As we discussed last week, we can worship God alone – online or on TV when we are not able to gather in-person, on a beach or a mountain top or in a garden in the day-to-day routines of life when it isn’t Sunday.  But as we remembered last week, coming together as the body of Christ to worship God in community is also important – we hear the word of God and share in the Lord’s supper in a way we can’t do alone.  And when the sermon’s a bit too dry, or the music unfamiliar, or our mind’s distracted and having a hard time focusing on prayer and worship, being together with other Christians helps us again turn toward God in spite of everything around us.  Like the people of Nineveh, like the first disciples, may our commitment to worship help us turn again and again to our Lord who is gracious, merciful and abounding in steadfast love.  May our turning toward God help us discover that rather than a guilt trip, a life of following God frees us from guilt, shame, and fear.  May our following Jesus continue to inspire us to offer others this good news.  Amen.