Matthew 9.35-10.23: Of Feet and Tires

The disciples are sent out in Matthew's gospel (9:35 - 10:23). And despite the fact that Jesus' friends are professional fishers of fish, I'm not sure Jesus knows how to bait a hook. The prospects for the mission on which Jesus is sending the disciples sounded pretty good at first: cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. If Jesus had stopped there, it would be a pretty appealing prospect.

But Jesus didn't know when to leave well enough alone. He had to go on and tell them that they would be significantly unwelcome in some places, they weren't taking any money with them when they left his presence, and that they could compare themselves to sheep whose guard dog turns out to be a wolf. Jesus should have quit while he was ahead.

Jesus tells them the whole story, though, and that's who Jesus is. He'll give you all the news, even if it isn't all good news.

So when you get to a town where you aren't welcome, Jesus advises the disciples, just leave. Shake the dust off your sandals and move on to a place that welcomes Jesus and these gifts of healing and wellness.

It's never been on my bucket list to re-enact Bible scenes in my own life, but I'll admit I have given this text a spin. One of my educational experiences was far less satisfactory than the others have been. After the last of my obligations was done on campus, after my apartment was packed up, after all fees were paid and graduation was secured (though I did not walk), I drove away. And, purposefully, after I had passed the city limits, I pulled into a car wash and washed my car. I cleaned it all over: the body, the hood, the roof, doors, sideview mirrors, and trunk. I even used the hand-held wand to get the dust off the tires. It was a good feeling.

I've been back to that town only once in the decades since that day. A friend was getting married, and I went to the wedding. But on my way out of town after the wedding, I was pleased to see that the car wash was still there. And I had plenty of quarters.

Photographs by Lynn Miller in Fort Morgan, AL. 

Mark 10.35-45: Prepared for Whom?

It is for those for whom it has been prepared. That's what Jesus tells James and John when they ask to sit beside him in glory. To sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared. But it begs the question: For whom has it been prepared? 

In art, Jesus in glory seems to be most-often surrounded by a host of angels or by symbols of the four gospels (and remember their relationship to Ezekiel's creatures and the creatures in Revelation). Annibale Caracci's "Christ in Glory" (below left) has Peter on Jesus' right and John on Jesus' left. At least one of the brothers made it in that version. A search for "Jesus in Glory" or "Christ in Glory" often shows the Transfiguration - where Elijah and Moses flank Jesus. No disciple emerges as a favorite in those depictions.

Another thought process says that if Jesus is seated at the right hand of God, then God would be sitting on Jesus' left. The best candidate for whom would be on Jesus' right is his mother Mary, often depicted as the queen of Heaven. The rightful place for a queen is at the king's right hand. In the thirteenth-century mosaic shown here, Jesus is enthroned, with Mary standing at Jesus' right hand and St. Mark is at his left hand. The mosaic is located on the main portal of St. Mark's Basilica in Venice. Again, James and John miss out. 

(Left) Annibale Carracci. Christ in Glory. 1597-1598. Florence, Italy: Palazzo Pitti. (Right) Main portal mosaic. c. 1250. Basilica di San Marco, Venice, Italy. 

There is, of course, a time in scripture where two people are given places on either side of Jesus. And though James and John promised that they could drink the cup and be baptized with the baptism, they probably didn't have this in mind. Jesus is crucified between two thieves. At least on the day of crucifixion they were the ones on Jesus' left and right. Is that something like the last being first?

For thoughts on Job 38, click here. 
For additional thoughts on the disciples' request for greatness, see this week's Facebook post. 

Mark 6.1-13: Clean Feet, Dusty Feet

Jesus goes home in the gospel reading for Proper 9 (14)B/Pentecost+7B (Mark 6:1-13). Home...but it doesn't go well. Jesus then calls the disciples and sends them out with instructions for what they can do if they visit a town and things don't go well. The directions are clear: shake the dust from your feet.

Dusty feet - and making them un-dusty - is a subject that bubbles up in Hebrew and Christian scriptures. Abraham offers water to the three visitors that they may wash the dust from their feet (Genesis 18:4). David instructs Uriah (Bathsheba's husband) to wash his feet when he returns home (2 Samuel 11:8). Several different stories relate when Jesus' feet were washed (Luke 7). And, of course, Jesus washes the disciples' feet (John 13).

The intention of those clean feet is the opposite of the instruction from Jesus in Mark 6. Washing the feet of guests is a sign of hospitality and welcome. What Jesus instructs the disciples to do is to not look back, to take nothing from the town that would not offer them welcome. They are to completely disassociate themselves - and by extension Jesus - with those places.

We are not provided with a list of places on the disciples' "dust-free" towns, but we can imagine that if Jesus' hometown didn't receive him well there would be places where his disciples would be unwelcome. Jesus' experience would give them a guide. Though Jesus didn't literally shake the dust from his sandals as he left Nazareth, he could do no "deeds of power" among them other than curing a few sick people. He took little to nothing of the townspeople with him, and he left way less of himself than he had hoped. As is always the case, Jesus went ahead as the pioneer and then spoke back to the disciples following him.

The painting here is actually an interpretation of the story of the travelers returning to Emmaus. The composition (both of the painting and the story) are not unlike the Mark 6 text: two travelers, the presence (if not the visible person) of Jesus, and a very dusty landscape. There appears to be a structure and an open door through which shines a light warmer in tone than the landscape. It is, perhaps, a light of welcome for Jesus and these two who believe he is the One.

Janet Brooks-Gerloff. On the Way to Emmaus. 1992. Bienenberg Mennonite Study Center, Bienenberg, Switzerland.

New Use for Nets

Immediately they left their nets and followed Jesus. So we hear in this week's reading from Mark's gospel (1:14-20, Epiphany 3B). Jesus' pitch for the new job spoke to who they were and to what they knew - in other words, Jesus knew how to bait a hook. Had his invitation been, "Come, follow me, and I will make you traveling theologians" they might have had second thoughts. But he said, "Instead of fishing for fish, let's fish for people." Apparently they understood his message and the figure of speech. We can imagine that Andrew and Peter's colleagues, and a few steps later Zebedee the father of James and John just sat there, nets unmended and abandoned, as the four former fishermen walked off with Jesus.

Fishing equipment. Shapinsay, Orkney, United Kingdom.

Jesus would, indeed, teach them to cast a new kind of net - a net of love and compassion, a net of teaching and healing, a net of salvation - over the people they met. But it never would have happened if they hadn't left their fishing nets. 

In the 1990s artist Janet Echelman picked up fishing nets. In Mahabalipuram, India, to be precise. Spending a Fulbright year in India, Echelman had shipped her painting supplies ahead of her arrival. But they never arrived. Struck by the art and design qualities of the local fishing nets, she began to formulate what would be a new sculptural language by suspending and coloring the nets.

Her fishing net sculptures are cast over multiple city blocks. They can be a big as a building - hundreds of feet long, hundreds of feet wide and hundreds of feet tall. They register every breath of wind and move and change in appearance depending on the weather, the time of day and the position of the viewer. The fluidity of the materials contrasts with the rigid buildings that often surround Echelman's urban work.

People stand under these nets while they have picnic lunches, while they wonder, while they marvel at these nets. From such intricate laciness  - flimsy, one might think - comes a massive thing that attracts the attention of and speaks to national and even international audiences yet retains an ethereal quality. All from people who understand fishing nets. Who could have imagined.

  

Upper photo: Her Secret is Patience. 2006. Phoenix, AZ.

Lower photos: Skies Painted with Unnumbered Sparks. 2014. Vancouver, BC, Canada.

See more of Janet Echelman's work at http://www.echelman.com

Check this week's Art&Faith Matters post on Facebook for thoughts about fishing in Jesus' time. It's not cane poles and crickets for bait.

For thoughts on the Epiphany 3B reading from Hebrew scripture,  Jonah 3:1-10, click here.