"SOME PEOPLE WILL DO ANYTHING"

Some people will do anything! And thank God for that! I thank God for people in this church who will sing with joy and abandon...who will serve with gladness...who give out of their gratitude...who pray without ceasing and who give thanks in all circumstances! We are truly blessed to have so many people who will do anything to celebrate the powerful presence of Christ in their lives, Amen?!

Now truly, outside of the church as well, some people will do anything! Unfortunately, it's not always God for whom people are doing the amazing things they do. "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" Some people will do anything. "Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?" Some people really will do anything. About three weeks ago, I saw a story on the T.V. news show "20/20" about a group of people who were going to let this guy perform what he called, I believe, "trephination" on them because, he claimed, it makes you feel high and happy. (This "guy" was not a doctor and this procedure was being done not in a hospital but in someone's basement.) "Trephination," it turned out, is drilling a hole through one's skull. And if you live, you'll feel good! (I think you'll probably feel good because you lived!)

Some people will do anything. That's the lesson of our Scripture reading this morning from the Gospel of Mark. There is a group of four people who will do anything to help their paralyzed friend have a chance to get close to the miraculous healer named Jesus. There is a group of religious scholars who'll do anything to catch this Jesus commiting some crime against their tradition. And there is a man in need of healing and forgiveness...who'll do anything Jesus tells him to do...including accepting God's gift of love and going back to live out his life in wholeness. As we review this story, a question for each of us is, "Which of these kinds of people am I?"

Jesus, the Scripture says, was back in his old neighborhood. Word of his teaching and all the healings he had performed had spread around the countryside and so now a huge crowd filled the house where He was to capacity and jammed the pavement around the door; they were all eager to hear what Jesus had to say. By the time the group of four arrived, canying their friend, who couldn't move or speak, on a kind of stretcher, they couldn't get near the door, much less into the house.

But they had a strong, determined, persistent faith that made them extremely creative. They climbed the narrow staircase on the outside ofthe house which led up to the flat rooftop of this typical Palestinian home. Then they moved the brush and branches from a section ofthe roof, dug out the packed clay from between two support beams, tied some rope or cloth to the four corners of the stretcher and lowered their friend into the house...rid~t at the spot where Jesus was speaking!

Can't you just imagine being in that room? Jesus is standing there speaking to the crowd when he looks up and sees this guy being lowered down from a hole in the rooftop? He must have laughed to himself and thought, "Some people will do anything!" But he must have also looked up and given those four an understanding smile and wink of appreciation for their great, determined faith!

How many of us are willing to be that bold...that creative...that persistent in making sure that someone else has the chance to get into Jesus' presence? When we fmd a way for people to come into this church, that's what we're doing, you know: making a way for someone to get into Jesus' presence. Now yes, it's true that God is everywhere and Christ is always with us. But it is also true that the church is meant to be the Body of Christ in the world today. And so, no matter how much people protest that they can worship God just fine by themselves, thank you...it is here, among the Body, that people can best hear and see and experience the teaching and healing presence of Jesus Christ.

Are we willing to do anything to make that possible? If it means continuing to gently invite those seeking but skeptical friends to come and worship with us, will we do that? If it means squeezing in tighter in the pews, will we do that? What if it means parking over across the street and walking a ways so that tentative newcomers (who could easily let the absence of a parking space be their rationale for not coming in) will come in and have the chance to meet Jesus here? If it means being inconvenienced and challenged to find ways to schedule meetings and find space... and if it means getting used to not knowing everyone and otherwise "ripping open the rooftop" of our church to let in the hurting and seeking...will we do it? Thank God for people who are like those four...who will do anything, out of a strong, determined, persistent faith, to make sure that someone who needs the healing Christ offers can get it.

Some people, on the other hand, will do anything to hold on to things the way they like it and the way its always been. Those "teachers of the law" - the religious scholars - who were sitting along the sides of the walls in the house that day scrutinizing Jesus? They, too, had heard about what He had been domg. They knew why the crowds had come. And they weren't about to let Him get away with it! You see, as the experts in Jewish law and the custodians of the sacred traditions, they saw their task as establishing clear-cut guidelines and boundaries. They would decide what was acceptable and unacceptable to God in all spheres of life. To have this guy Jesus healing people and even pronouncing them as "forgiven," why it was "blashphemy."

Now many of us here have had more experience than we care to remember with folks who will do anything to preserve their traditions, and who keep some people away from wholeness and a loving relationship with God if things aren't being done "their way." And these attitudes are usually enacted in the name of "right religion" - just like it was for those "teachers of the law."

Some people do this kind of thing to us. Sometimes we do this to ourselves. Sometimes we sit off to the side and scrutinize Jesus and become skeptical and questioning. "How can He truly be the Child of God? How can He forgive my sins and bring healing to my life? How can God - whom Jesus Christ is supposed to be - love me?" Some people will do anything to avoid resolving those very questions...because accepting the possibility that those things are true may mean throwing out some old tapes...unpacking some beatup baggage...and admitting that maybe, just maybe, your Papa or your preacher or your next door neighbor Mrs. Jones was simply WRONG! Not that they weren't sincere. The "teachers of the law" were quite sincere. It just so happens that it is possible to be quite sincerely wrong!

Both then and now, some people who hang out around Jesus, it turns out, are more skeptics than seekers. It was for the skeptics - then and now - that Jesus said, "Why are you thinking these things? You think about the 'theology' of things; I change people's lives. Think about that for a while.

I feel sure the guy on the stretcher was thinking about that. He hadn't come looking for theological debate; he had come seeking healing for his life! The first thing Jesus said to him was, "Child your sins are forgiven." Does that mean that sin causes sickness? People in those days believed that.

Today, of course, we know so much more about diseases and injuries and we don't equate sickness with sin, but the reality is also that sometimes "sin" can cause sickness. Have you ever been paralyzed with guilt or fear? We're not meant to live guilt-filled, fearful lives but lots of folks do and it holds them down just the same as paralysis would.

This much we know: not many medical conditions are caused by sin...but not every kind of "sickness" is due solely to a physical ailment. The healings of Jesus simply reveal that God can bring healing and, therefore, can work through medicine and surgery as much as faith and prayer, but faith and prayer must also not be neglected. Author Leonard Sweet writes, "The healing forces of faith, hope, and love are not incidental to health and medicine. Like an antibiotic, faith, hope and love enter the system quickly and do their work slowly. Curing or the removal of disease, may take place with medical means alone. But healing, or the triumphal re-entry into one's total environment as a whole person, only takes place in partnership with faith. Medical healing is the knowledge of God manifested through science. Spiritual healing is the knowledge of God manifested through faith. It is the same knowledge. It is the same God."

Some people will do anything to make that healing connection with God. We heard these words from Psalm 42, verse 1. "Like a deer longing for streams of cool water, my whole being longs for you, my God." One of my favorite stories is that of the man who was searching for God. He went to a world-renowned spiritual teacher and said, "Tell me how I can find God!" So the teacher walked with the man down to the edge of a river and took him gently by the hand and led him into the water until they were about waist deep. Then the teacher reached up and grabbed the man's head and shoved him under the water and held him there...a few seconds, a few more...more than a minute passed. The man under the water was straining and splashing. His cheeks puffed out and his chest and throat began to burn and ache terribly. Just when he was on the verge of passing out, the teacher released his grip. The man jerked up out of the water and stumbled, gasping and coughing, to the shore. When he could speak, he shouted at the teacher: "Are you crazy? Why did you do that?" The teacher calmy answered, "You say you want to find God. Well, when you want God the way you just wanted air, you will find God!"

The heart and spirit of that man on the stretcher, dangling in front of Jesus that day, must have burned and ached with that same incredible longing. How else could he have been so ready to hear Jesus say, "Your sins are forgiven. Get up, go home...reclaim your life and know that God loves you. Believe that...and you will be made whole."

Some people will do anything. Which of those kinds of people are you? Will you help open the way to Jesus' healing presence? Will you remain in the bondage of skepticism and doubt or will you accept the forgiveness and healing and love that Jesus is offering you today? God has extended to us the free gift of wholeness and life through Christ. Here's another question for each of us: Will we do anything to respond? Amen.

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