Reverend Ref +

SERMON
EPIPHANY 6B
MARK 1:40-45

Sin. We don't particularly care for that word. And more often than not, it seems we use it in conjunction towards other people. A woman who gets pregnant before marriage is classified as a sinful fornicator; but if I am having sex before marriage, I am simply expressing my feelings for another person and exercising my freedom of choice. A man who drinks to excess every night is a sinful drunkard; but if I drink to excess it's because of a defective gene that causes alcoholism. In other words, we are very good at seeing the speck in someone else's eye while ignoring the log in our own eye.

As I read through today's gospel, the image of sin kept coming back to me again and again. First, there is the issue of leprosy. We don't know if this was, in fact, leprosy as we know it, or it if was eczema, an allergic reaction, or poison ivy for that matter; but we do know that this man had some kind of skin problem. And a skin disease, along with other diseases most likely, was seen as a punishment from God for some sinful behavior. So right off the bat, sin, rightly or wrongly, plays a part in this story.

The man, unclean from his disease, removed from the community and feeling the weight of some unknown sin, approaches Jesus, where he kneels and says, "If you choose, you can make me clean." This sounds a whole lot like confession, or, as the Prayer Book calls it, "The Reconciliation of a Penitent." The rubrics say that a penitent may kneel when confessing; and in Form Two, the penitent says, "I turn to you in sorrow . . . receive me again into the arms of your mercy and restore me . . ." In both cases, the man and the penitent are recognizing that it is God who chooses to forgive and welcome the person back into the community of the faithful.

When my wife was baptized, the priest told her, "You have been washed clean and you are now sinless before God. But don't worry, it won't take long before you are like the rest of us." That's exactly what happens here. The man asks if Jesus chooses to make him clean, to restore him to the community of the faithful. Jesus does choose to do so. In that moment, any sin (or perceived sin) was removed, he was made clean both physically and spiritually and he was restored to the community. But it doesn't take him long to become like the rest of us.

Jesus tells him not to tell anyone about what happened and to go see the priest. He does neither. He doesn't go to the priest and he tells everyone about Jesus. Talk about sin, he disobeyed a direct command from Jesus. But before we go looking at his speck, what about our own logs? How are we at following direct commands? How are we at feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless or protecting the widows and orphans?

His sin of disobedience also had greater implications. Last week, remember, Jesus wanted to leave Capernaum and go into the neighboring towns "for that is what I came out to do." Jesus sees his mission as proclaiming the gospel in the towns of Galilee. You might say he thought he was called to urban ministry. But what happens? The man who was ordered to keep silent doesn't, and that disobedience forced Jesus out from the towns he wanted to visit into the country.

The sin of disobedience is found throughout the bible, beginning with Adam & Eve. Add to that the Israelites during the Exodus, any number of kings, Jonah, and the man today, as just a few examples. Sometimes, as with the case of Jonah, we know exactly what we are supposed to do and we intentionally disobey, we intentionally run away. Other times, like today, we know intellectually what we are supposed to do, but our emotions get the better of us and we unintentionally disobey.

Sin, besides being detrimental to us individually and corporately, is a problem for God. Have you ever wondered how things would have turned out if people could just stop sinning? Start with Adam & Eve . . . oops, Plan B. All the way up through today's gospel . . . "Don't tell anyone -- doh! He told."

I wonder how many times God has said, "Well THAT didn't work."

For a long time, these last three Sundays of Epiphany were treated as a pre-Lent. Sort of like the pre-season where the games don't count, but they get you ready for the real thing. As we move towards Lent, may this gospel passage start your thinking process about the upcoming season. How are we disobeying God and falling short of what he asks of us? Is there something we can do towards making the community clean and healthy? Is there something weighing us down that might require us to kneel before God and ask for forgiveness?

Whether we like it or not, sin is a fact of life. But we don't have to be enslaved by it. There are two things I want you to remember. First, even though we are sinners, God still chooses to work through us. God chooses to include us in the community of the faithful.

And second, God's power to clean trumps any power to defile. God's willingness to forgive trumps our ability to screw up.

Like the man in today's gospel, the love of God has made us clean. And like that same man, the next decision is ours.