Take Up Your Mat Isaiah 43:18-25, Psalm 32:1-8, 2 Corinthians 1:18-22, Mark 2:1-12 February 19, 2006, Year B, Seventh Sunday after Epiphany The Rev. William V. Livingston, Rector Church of the Resurrection, Starkville, Mississippi One of the characteristics of the Gospel narratives are their ability in very few words and verses to reveal a phenomenal amount of information. Today’s Gospel text is a perfect example. Let’s go into the text and delve into what all is there. When he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home. After healing Peter’s mother-in-law, he had gone into the desert to pray, to be alone, to discern where God’s call would send him, and God sent him throughout Galilee revealing to all who would listen who God is and what God is like and freeing them from being bound by their sins. As he did so, he encountered the leper, whom as we heard last Sunday, he healed, and the leper became his self-appointed marketing agent, going on every talk show and talking to every journalist about being healed. Then, to keep from being crushed by crowds of those with cancer, cardiac problems, incurable diseases, or just miserable lives, Jesus remained in the countryside. It doesn’t tell us why, but today’s text says he has returned to Capernaum. So many gathered around that there was no longer room for them, not even in the front door; and he was speaking the word to them. Imagine Timothy McVey’s or any other newsworthy trial. The court room is packed; crowds block the entrance; news trailers line the street. They aren’t there to witness justice done; they are there for the spectacle or to make a political statement. Few in that small Capernaum home were interested in hearing his message. Most came with an ailment, a pain hoping he could make the pain go away. Others came merely to gawk. Then some people came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. And when they could not bring him to Jesus because of the crowd they removed the roof above him; and after having dug through it, they let down the mat on which the paralytic lay. We see them in third world countries and large cities: sitting or lying on a mat on the sidewalk – dirty, smelly, missing or twisted limbs, crutches and a small container in which to drop your coins lie next to them. This is the man they carry. They want to the front not for themselves but for the beggar everyone ignored as they entered the house. They shouldn’t have to wait outside; they should immediately be admitted to the front. But life doesn’t work that way. Not only do they not move aside, the crowd resents their ingenuity that allows them to get to Jesus first. “Hey, what are you doing? We were here first! You’re getting me dirty knocking all that stuff from the roof. Wait your turn!” When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Jesus never played by the rules. He doesn’t care they didn’t wait their turn or they interrupted his sermon. Without asking, without the paralytic speaking, Jesus ascertains the situation. He doesn’t have to take his temperature or check his blood pressure nor use spittle, lay his hands on him, or write a prescription for antibiotics. The man on the mat has allowed his guilt to make him an outcast, unloving and unlovable, not allowed him to be whom God made him to be. “Son, your failure to meet your father’s expectations, your sexual misbehavior, the harm you did to your friend or yourself, your divorce, your acting as if God doesn’t exist. It is forgiven.” Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, “Why does this fellow speak in this way? It is blasphemy! Who can forgive sins but God alone? “This guy is not like us. Why are you wasting your time on him? You can’t do it this way. If this is the God you describe, this is not the God we want. Not only does he not deserve healing, he shouldn’t even be allowed in church.” At once Jesus perceived in his spirit that they were discussing these questions among themselves, and he said to them, “Why do you raise such questions in your hearts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven, or to say, ‘Stand up and take your mat and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has the authority on earth to forgive sins” – he said to the paralytic – “I say to you stand up, take your mat and go to your home.” Once again, Jesus knows what’s going on without asking. They don’t have to comment. He doesn’t need to ask what they think. He does ask why – a question he will ask more frequently and passionately as his ministry proceeds. “Why won’t you accept this God of love rather than this God of rules and punishment? Why won’t you accept that God isn’t impressed by your self-righteousness but by the acceptance of God’s free grace? Why won’t you accept God has given me the authority to pronounce God’s forgiveness and to pass on this authority?” And he stood up, and immediately took the mat and went out before all them.” No longer paralyzed by guilt or shame – both self-imposed and heaped upon him by others – he took up his mat, rolled it up and walked out in front of them. So that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!” Even in the midst of cynicism the wonder of God’s grace can break through. All were amazed, but some will go home with transformed lives and some as if nothing was different. What is more amazing about the markan narrator’s ability to provide so much information in so few verses is everything in this scene applies today. Billions of people still look for something to end the suffering and pain and seek it wherever they can find it. Unfortunately we’ve quit telling the story and rather than being so crowded folks can’t get through the door, we have empty pews and space to spare. The daring and persistent faithful still bypass the barriers set before them and lower the dirty, smelly paralytic at Jesus’ feet and although given God’s grace and forgiveness, many still question who can be granted access to God’s Altar. But, through private and corporate confession and absolution the Church still says, “My Child, your sins are forgiven, take your mat and walk.” Two weeks ago we gathered at our Diocese Council, saw a profound video that reminds us through the lens of the new reality of post-Katrina what it means to be One Church in Mission through which the daring and persistent faithful still by pass the barriers set before them and lower the dirty, smelly paralytic at the feet of Jesus. We can see the paralyzed coast taking up its mat and walking, and upon seeing what God is doing in our diocese, in the Episcopal Church and in our nation through being One Church in Mission we can, in amazement, give a standing ovation, implying, “We have never seen anything like this!” And once again, some are transformed, and some are preparing how to lay out the best strategy for our institutional debates. My friends, each Sunday as we gather, the Gospel is not about what happened some 2000+ years ago. It’s about right here and right now. Today, it is an invitation to be daringly and persistently faithful, to bring that dirty, smelly paralytic to the feet of Jesus. It is an invitation, if we happen to be the one paralyzed with guilt – whether over failing to meet someone else’s expectations, over something we wish we had never done, over missed opportunities, or just falling short of our own expectations – to accept the absolution I/Brian will pronounce after the confession as truly an assurance your sins are forgiven and as an invitation to take up your mat, roll it away because you won’t need it anymore and go out of this place transformed. Even though we do it weekly, it is an invitation to come to this Altar to experience the Holy being open to being amazed and leave saying, “We have never seen anything like this!” and to go home transformed.