Teachable Moments
By Rev. Heidi L. Barham | January 28, 2024
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Read Mark 1:21 – 28
Our New Testament lesson today picks up where we left off last week in the first chapter of the Gospel of Mark. As I shared before, Mark is the shortest of the four Gospels and is characterized by a sense of urgency and immediacy…
You may recall that in the verses we looked at last week, Jesus called the first of His disciples… two sets of brothers, Simon and Andrew, and the sons of Zebedee, James and John. And no sooner than Jesus had extended the call for them to follow Him… the text tells us that they set off for the village of Capernaum. [No new members class or orientation… they hit the ground running.]
The Sabbath came soon after their arrival in Capernaum… and according to the text, Jesus lost no time in going to the synagogue where He began teaching… much to the amazement of those who were gathered.
And while the Scriptures don’t tell us exactly what Jesus was teaching… we do get a sense for how He was teaching… “as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law.”
Or as the Message Paraphrase describes it, “so forthright, so confident—not quibbling and quoting like the religion scholars.”
Jesus had a keen command of the subject matter and delivered His message with a degree of clarity and conviction that comes only when someone is speaking the pure, unadulterated truth… not when someone is simply saying what the masses want to hear… or twisting words in such a way as to create a false narrative based on alternative facts.
Now, there really should be no doubt that Jesus would have been speaking the truth… after all, Jesus is the Truth. He said it, Himself, over in John 14:6, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life…”
And even His detractors knew that Jesus spoke the truth. If we look over in Matthew 22, Mark 12, and Luke 20, we can read about a group of Pharisees and Herodians that came to Jesus to try to entrap Him… trying to set Him up so they could hand Him over to the governor on trumped up charges…
But as they approached Jesus with their malicious intentions… even they openly acknowledged, “Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth.”
And so, as we turn our attention back to our New Testament lesson, it is clear that Jesus was teaching in a way that was consistent with the truth of who He is… but according to the text, His teaching was interrupted by a man who was possessed by an impure spirit…
Undeterred by the interruption, Jesus simply cast out the impure spirit… ordering it to be quiet and leave the man… and to the astonishment of those who were watching the events unfold… the impure spirit did what Jesus told it to do.
The crowd began to question what was going on and what kind of teaching they were getting from Jesus… they realized that this teaching came with such power and authority that even demons were compelled to comply with it… and if the even the demons understood that… surely, this teaching was something they should follow as well. And as the last verse of our text tells us… the word about Jesus and His teaching began to spread all across the region.
Now, let me suggest that this passage from Mark’s Gospel contains some TEACHABLE MOMENTS that will serve us well as we, like the disciples, make it our intention to follow the example that Jesus set for us.
But before we go any further, let’s take a moment to define that term, TEACHABLE MOMENT: It is an event or experience which presents a good opportunity for learning something about a particular aspect of life.
In academic and professional settings, a TEACHABLE MOMENT is often used as a precursor before implementing more serious corrective or disciplinary action.
For example, when I am teaching, the first time a student has an issue properly citing their sources, they are given a chance to correct the errors and resubmit their paper. The incident is recorded in their file as a TEACHABLE MOMENT… it is considered a learning opportunity related to giving credit where credit is due.
If, however, there are subsequent instances of failing to properly cite a source… more serious steps will be taken, up to and including expulsion, depending on the circumstances.
In professional settings, the first time an employee violates one of the company’s policies, it may be deemed as a TEACHABLE MOMENT, much like a traffic officer issues a warning rather than giving a driver a speeding ticket. However, if that individual continues to violate the policy or that driver gets stopped again for speeding, more substantial consequences may be applied.
Now the good news for followers of Christ is that Jesus provides us with many TEACHABLE MOMENTS that are not connected to impending corrective or disciplinary actions. Jesus’ life is the consummate example for how believers are to live in a way that pleases and honors God.
The Scriptures are filled with many such TEACHABLE MOMENTS for how we can be more like Jesus, which brings us to our New Testament lesson.
Now, the first thing we can use as a TEACHABLE MOMENT and learn from Jesus’ example in the text is that He wasted no time in getting where He needed to be and doing what needed to be done.
Jesus and the disciples went to Capernaum and as soon as the Sabbath came, Jesus went straight to the synagogue. After all, where else would Jesus go on the Sabbath?
It actually reminds me of the story over in Luke 2 when Jesus was just 12-years-old and stayed behind in Jerusalem after the Passover Festival… although He did so without His parents realizing it.
And when they went back to look for Him, where did they find Him? In the Temple, of course… where according to the Scriptures, He was “sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers” (Luke 2:46b – 47).
And when His mother, Mary, asked Jesus why He had put them through so much distress… agonizing and worrying about Him as they were looking for Him… Jesus responded, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” (Luke 2:49b).
Jesus always made it a point to be where He needed to be in order to do what needed to be done.
But how often do we find ourselves procrastinating… putting off until tomorrow what needs to be done today… knowing we should be out taking care of our Father’s business… whether that is coming to the church for Sunday School and worship… or visiting the sick and shut-in… or volunteering to help those who are in need… But instead, we find convenient excuses to do it later.
But Jesus did not simply sit around waiting for something to happen… He made it a point to get up and go where He was needed. And He encouraged the disciples [and us] to do the same.
Matthew 28:19 – 20 is the passage of Scripture known as the Great Commission:
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.There is work for us to do and we need to follow Jesus’ example to get up and go do it… sooner rather than later.
Now the next TEACHABLE MOMENT we can take from Jesus’ example that we find in this text, is that we need to speak the truth… regardless of what else we may see going on in the world around us. As followers of Christ we have an obligation and a responsibility to remain committed to the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Jesus told the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:23 – 24):
Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.And in his letters to the churches as well as to his young protégé, Timothy, the Apostle Paul often wrote about the truth.
In 1 Corinthians 13:6 we read, “Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.”
While in Ephesians 4:15 we read, “Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.” And a little further down in verse 25, we find, “Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body.”
And in 2 Timothy 2:15, Paul writes, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.”
And while some people may shy away from speaking the truth because they have bought into that old adage that the truth hurts… in reality, the truth has the power to free us.
In fact, in John’s Gospel we find these words of Jesus, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:31b – 32).
This past week, in an historic moment, the Rev. Dr. Gina Stewart became the first woman to preach at the National Baptist Convention USA. Her sermon was entitled, “What Will You Do with Jesus of Nazareth?” The message was powerful and direct in speaking truth to power… challenging issues of injustice and prejudice within religious communities.
As one reporter put it, “This forthright call out of hidden biases under the guise of spirituality was a poignant reminder of the often-unacknowledged issues within religious institutions” (https://vinegarhillmagazine.com/dr-gina-stewart-a-voice-for-change-at-the-national-baptist-convention/).
Her message was a clarion call to stand up for what is right, even when faced with institutional, political, and societal pressures. She highlighted the actions of a woman who is nameless in the Scriptures… a woman who is known only as Pilate’s wife… she was the only one who spoke up for Jesus before He was sentenced to be crucified… she was the only one who espoused His innocence.
Needless to say, the Rev. Dr. Stewart’s message has excited and empowered many… encouraging them to embrace inclusivity and justice… informing listeners of the name of the nameless wife of Pilate… igniting a viral movement #iamclaudia… a way to indicate one’s own commitment to speak up for Jesus.
Unfortunately, Rev. Dr. Stewart’s message did not land well with everyone… upsetting some of the convention goers who were unable or unwilling to accept the truth of what was being said… including some who got up and walked out of the convention hall. Perhaps it was as Jack Nicholson’s character, Colonel Jessup, famously said in the movie, A Few Good Men, “You can’t handle the truth.”
While there are times when it can be hard to handle the truth… it is absolutely what Jesus teaches us that we are supposed to do.
Now the next TEACHABLE MOMENT I want to highlight from the text… another way we can learn from Jesus’ example… is that Jesus shows us how we should deal with disruptions and distractions.
Admittedly, this is something that can be a bit of a challenge for me… particularly when I am standing up here in front of you each Sunday… looking at the expressions on your faces… wondering what I just said that caused a particular look… or catching sight of something in my peripheral vision and wondering what is going on outside the window… or noticing that there is a typo in the manuscript that I need to fix before I post it on the website.
It really is easy to get distracted… but Jesus never allowed distractions and disruptions to deter Him from His mission… and neither should we.
When we stay focused on what we have been called and commanded to do… which is first and foremost to love God and to love one another… distractions and disruptions lose their power to get us off track.
When we are intentional about our ongoing efforts to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, give shelter to the homeless, and care for those who are sick and imprisoned… we honestly won’t have time for distractions.
And let me suggest that even when Jesus was faced with interruptions and disruptions, He used them as TEACHABLE MOMENTS that we can still learn from today… He showed us that wrapped inside any given distraction there is some type of need to be met…
The man who interrupted Jesus’ teaching in the synagogue in our text needed to be delivered from that impure spirit.
That family member or neighbor who calls at an inconvenient time may need to know that he or she is not alone… that there is someone out there who still cares.
That coworker who comes into your office when you are this close to finishing that major project may need a word of encouragement… a word that may keep them from doing something drastic… like quitting their job or even worse.
That stranger who walks into a church before service is over may need to be reminded that there are still kind and considerate people in this world… people willing to extend a hand to help and not hurt.
Jesus teaches us that rather than simply seeing other people as inconvenient interruptions… we should view them as giving us the opportunity to share the love of Christ that has been shown to us… to be a blessing as we have been blessed.
In our text this morning and throughout the Scriptures, we can find many TEACHABLE MOMENTS that encourage us to follow the example Jesus set for us… TEACHABLE MOMENTS that invite us to follow Jesus on the path that has been laid out for us… TEACHABLE MOMENTS that inspire us to follow Jesus wherever He leads us to go… trusting that He will be with us every step of the way.
And it is with that thought in mind that I want to invite us all to stand and join in singing our Hymn of Discipleship: Where He Leads Me #346.
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