Posts Tagged ‘Leadership’

From being unknown to being knownm

July 20, 2019

The Feast of Mary Magdalene – 2019
John 20:1:18
Marian Free

God of boundless love whose ways are not our ways and whose thoughts are not our thoughts. Amen.

In the 7th century, Pope Gregory the First made the assertion that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. He came to this conclusion by conflating Magdalene with Mary of Bethany who anointed Jesus’ feet before his death. In turn, Mary of Bethany was confused with the unnamed ‘sinful’ woman of Luke who interrupted a dinner party in order to anoint Jesus’ head. The problem (apart from the fact that there is no reason to think that these three women are one and the same) is, that even if Magdalene could be proven to be the ‘sinful’ woman who anointed Jesus, we are not provided with a single clue that would allow us to draw a conclusion about the nature of that woman’s sin. There is nothing in our gospels, except perhaps the suggestion that Mary was a woman of independent means, to suggest that she was a prostitute. Yet, despite the lack of evidence, it has been almost impossible for Magdalene to shake that image and for centuries Mary has been depicted as a prostitute in art and in commentaries.

Indeed, our biblical evidence for Mary Magdalene is scarce. That said, she is mentioned by name on twelve occasions which is more times than any of the apostles are mentioned! She presumably came from Magdala and, according to Luke, she was one of the three women who provided for Jesus out of their own resources (8:2-3) and one from whom seven demons had gone out (cf Mark16:9). All four gospels agree that Magdalene was one of the women who went to the tomb on the first Easter Day and that with them she was commissioned to tell the disciples (who were men) that Jesus had risen. In John’s gospel, Mary’s role is even more significant. She goes to the tomb alone, and it is to Mary, and only Mary, that Jesus speaks and commissions. Mary’s place in the gospels then, and especially her position in the Gospel of John, implies that (whatever her demons may have been) she had a leadership role in the early community.

This view is supported by the position that Mary is given in the non-canonical writings – the most tantalising of which is the Gospel of Philip. In these books Mary’s closeness to Jesus is a cause of tension with other disciples – in particular with Peter. We read: “For it is by a kiss that the perfect conceive and give birth. For this reason we also kiss one another. We receive conception from the grace which is in one another.

There were three who always walked with the Lord: Mary, his mother, and her sister, and Magdalene, the one who was called his companion. His sister and his mother and his companion were each a Mary.

And the companion of the [Lord was?] Mary Magdalene. [He?] loved her more than all the disciples, and used to kiss her often on her [mouth?]. The rest of the disciples said to him “Why do you love her more than all of us?” The Savior answered and said to them, “Why do I not love you like her? When a blind man and one who sees are both together in darkness, they are no different from one another. When the light comes, then he who sees will see the light, and he who is blind will remain in darkness.”

Here and elsewhere we are told that Mary is not only given information that is given to no other disciple, but that she is particularly intimate with Jesus. The closeness of the relationship between Mary and Jesus (both in the non-canonical writings and in today’s gospel reading) has led some scholars to speculate that Mary and Jesus were married. They suggest that the wedding at Cana was in fact the celebration of the marriage between Jesus and Mary. Why else, they ask, would Mary the mother of Jesus, take such an interest in the catering and presume to have authority to instruct the servants? (No one – even today – would presume to give orders to another person’s staff and a woman in the first century had no authority, let alone in the home of someone else.)

Magdalen’s role as the apostle to the apostles in John’s gospel and her significant place in the synoptic gospels, along with the references to Magdalene in the Gospel of Philip and elsewhere combine to suggest that Mary had a significant leadership role in the early community and a closeness to Jesus not extended to anyone else. It would have been easy for the gospel writers to exclude her from the story or to downplay her part in the resurrection appearances. By the time the gospels were being written the place of women in the Christian community was being substantially diminished (but that is a story for another day). The gospel writers could have easily named members of the twelve disciples as the first to see Jesus and as those who were commissioned to tell the others of the resurrection. That Mary retains this role in the gospels suggests that her position within the community and her contribution to the life of the community was such that the memory of her was still strong and that any attempt to write her out of the story would have been met with resistance.

Of course, we will never be able to properly separate fact from fiction or speculation from evidence, but there are some things that we can say with some certainty. Mary, who was possessed by seven demons, was set free. Having been set free, she not only followed Jesus, but she supported him financially. Alone, or in the company of others, Mary went to the tomb on Easter Day, and alone, or as one of three, she was instructed to proclaim the resurrection to the disciples. She journeyed from darkness to light, from exclusion to inclusion, from being unknown to being fully known, from being held captive to demons to being captivated by Jesus’ love and from being no one, to being the bearer of the good news.

Being in relationship with Jesus is life-changing. We too are brought from darkness to light, from the outside to the inside, from isolation to relationship, from captivity to freedom and ignorance to proclaimers of the gospel.

Faith is both a privilege and a responsibility. We are called into a relationship and sent out to share the good news.

Tags:, , , , ,
Posted in John's Gospel, Mary Magdalene, Uncategorized | Comments Off on From being unknown to being knownm

Not just sheep

May 10, 2014

(Please remember in prayer the 180 Nigerian girls who remain in captivity, their families and all women and girls who are trafficked or who are victims of violence.)

Easter 4 2014

John 10:1-10

Marian Free

In the name of God who calls us by name and who trusts us to know the shepherd from the thief. Amen.

I wonder just how much you absorb when you hear the gospel read on a Sunday morning? How well do you think you would go if I threw a good old-fashioned comprehension test at you today? My suspicion is that none of us would achieve a particularly good result – myself included. Today’s gospel is full of confusing and inconsistent metaphors and allusions. There are gatekeepers, thieves, bandits shepherds and gates and the difficult question is – what represents whom? Presumably, the thieves and bandits are the Pharisees, but is Jesus the gate, the gatekeeper or the shepherd or all three? Who are the strangers – are they the same as the thieves and bandits or do they represent someone else? One problem is that the text seems to jump from one idea to another – gate keeping, following, listening, destroying, giving life. It is difficult to work out just what Jesus is trying to get across. No wonder even Jesus’ listeners were confused (10:6).

If you were in my New Testament class and we were examining today’s gospel, the first thing I would suggest is that you read and reread the text, preferably in Greek.

Once you were familiar with these ten verses, I would suggest that you read them in context, that you investigate what comes before and after the text and whether those passages shed light on what you have just read. In this instance it is obvious that what comes after is important for our understanding of the passage. The theme of shepherd continues in some way or another until the end of chapter 10. However the connection with Chapter 9 is less evident. Only if we take a closer look does it become clear that what we know as chapter 10 is in fact a continuation of Chapter 9. The first sentence of chapter ten continues Jesus’ conversation with the Pharisees and the connection between the two chapters is strengthened when we see that 10:21 refers to the discussion about the healing of the blind man.

What all this means is that if we really want to understand the ten verses set down as the gospel for today, we have to read from the beginning of Chapter 9 to the end of Chapter 10 and to try to make sense of the relationship between an account of healing and a discussion about shepherding.

A number of things are going on here, but the key to the relationship between the two chapters is the controversy about Jesus’ identity and the argument between the man who was blind and the Pharisees. The blind man whose sight has been restored is convinced that Jesus is a prophet sent from God. He holds firm to this view in spite of the Pharisees trying to convince him otherwise. Not only that, he identifies Jesus as God – in response to Jesus’ question: “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” he acknowledges Jesus as Lord and falls down and worships him. The Pharisees however, refuse to accept that Jesus can have been sent by God let alone be God. They prefer to believe that Jesus is a sinner (9:16, 24,31) or worse still that he is possessed by a demon (10:20,21). Jesus threatens their position and what they believe about God and God’s way of relating to the people.

At the heart of the discussion then, is an issue about leadership and authority. Who can be trusted to lead the people of God – the priests and the Pharisees or this itinerant teacher/healer – and who decides between the two? The eyes of the blind man have been opened. He can see that the true leader, the true shepherd is the one who is trusted by and who cares for and respects the people. The Pharisees demonstrate their blindness, because they cannot see Jesus for who he is.

Contrary to expectation it is not the Pharisees who have the authority to determine who is or is not from God – that authority belongs to the people. The fact that the man born blind identified Jesus has demonstrated that the “ordinary” people, those of no status in the Jewish worldview, are able to make up their own minds about God and about God’s representatives. No matter how hard the Pharisees try, the blind man refuses to be cowed, or to change his opinion about Jesus. He does not need to be told who to follow. Whatever arguments the Pharisees use, he knows that Jesus cannot be a sinner because God does not listen to sinners – only to those who know and obey him. He knows (despite the Pharisees’ statements to the contrary) that if Jesus was not from God he would not be able to do anything (9:33) let alone give sight to the blind.

The question of true authority, true leadership is decided by the people. They (the sheep) will not follow a stranger nor will they listen to thieves and bandits (the Pharisees). It is the people, the sheep, who recognise where true authority lies. They know instinctively who it is who will lead them “in right paths” and allow them “to go in and go out and find pasture”. Their eyes have been opened to the true nature of their religious leaders. They are thieves and bandits, strangers whom they will not follow.

Jesus (the good shepherd) is not a benign, harmless figure in the world of first century Palestine. Quite the contrary – he is a revolutionary who turns everything upside down. Not only does he undermine the authority of the Pharisees he also makes the radical claim that the sheep – the ordinary, uneducated people – are able to make up their own minds as to whom they should follow. It is they, not the religious leaders who are able to recognise the true nature of the Pharisees and of Jesus and to decide between them.

Jesus – the gate, the shepherd – has made it possible for us to have a relationship with God that is not mediated by Temple rituals, a priestly caste or by the observance of the law. It doesn’t matter whether we are ordained or lay, well-educated or poorly educated, professional or manual laborer each of us through Jesus can have direct access to God. The gate is open, the shepherd is calling us by name. All it takes is for us to respond.

Tags:, , , , , ,
Posted in John's Gospel | Comments Off on Not just sheep

Raising up people to lead

October 27, 2012

Pentecost 22 (Simon and Jude)

Luke 6:12-16

Marian Free

 In the name of God, Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, one God in community. Amen.

From quite early on, readers of the Bible have noticed the differences between the four gospels and there have been a number of attempts to resolve the differences. Human beings do this for at least two reasons. Firstly, as the Bible is the holy text of the Christian faith, many people are uncomfortable with the idea that there is not ONE story about Jesus. (This is exacerbated by the fact that the existence of multiple accounts can be a source of embarrassment in the face of external criticism.) Secondly, it seems that the human mind is uncomfortable with and wants to resolve the differences.

One of the earliest responses to the “problem” was to conflate the four to create an integrated account, that is to use all four gospels to create one single version. The problem with this approach is that it doesn’t allow us to explore and value the different approaches of the writers. Other responses have been to come up with explanations for the differences between the gospels. For example, a popular explanation has been to compare the gospels writers with witnesses to say – a car accident. As each witness will remember and report in different ways, either because of what they saw or the perspective they brought to it, so it is with the gospels. The difficulty with this approach is that it doesn’t take into account the community which told and re-told the stories or the ways in which the stories were transmitted.

The gospels as we have them were not written down until about thirty years after the death of Jesus. In the meantime the community which formed in Jesus’ name repeated the stories of his life, the stories he told and the things that he did. Given that people met in separate groups and in different places it is more extraordinary that the accounts are so how similar than that they have differences.

What happened it seems is that each community told and re-told the stories that captured the imagination of its members or which were important for its communal life. So for example, a community that was experiencing persecution – as is sometimes supposed of the community for whom Mark wrote – may place different emphases on the stories from a community which is not experiencing persecution.

Today’s gospel comes from the Gospel of Luke. An important thing to know about the writer of Luke is that he wrote two books – the gospel and the book of Acts. Luke’s primary concern was to write a history of the church from tis beginning in Jerusalem to its reaching the centre of the Roman Empire. For Luke then, the Gospel is something of a prologue to the story of the early church. More than the other gospels then, Luke has his mind not on the life of Jesus but on the formation of the faith community which comes after his death and resurrection. This information is particularly important as background for today’s gospel – Jesus’ choice of the twelve apostles.

If you were to read the accounts of the choosing of the twelve apostles in Matthew, Mark and Luke you would discover some significant differences between the three. All are agreed that Jesus chose twelve from among those who were following him and  all precede the account with the call of Peter and Andrew, James and John and of Matthew (Levi). Mark and Luke  agree in situating the choice of the twelve on a mountain. However, while in Mark and Matthew the twelve are equipped for mission – authorised to proclaim the message, heal the sick and to cast out demons – in Luke they are not. Perhaps the most important difference is that in Luke Jesus chooses the twelve after spending a night in prayer.

By his placement of the account, his inclusion of Jesus’ prayer and his naming of the twelve as Apostles, Luke is setting the scene for his second book – the Acts of the Apostles. The Apostles are to play an important role not only as Jesus’ off-siders during his lifetime, but also as leaders of the early church. The second verse of Acts affirms this. Before Jesus is taken up into heaven he instructs, through the Holy Spirit the Apostles whom he had chosen. We are also told that the early community devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and prayers. “With great power the Apostles gave testimony to the resurrection to the Lord Jesus.” Not only this but Acts tells us that the Apostles performed many signs and wonders among the community.

In the Gospel, Luke is establishing the authority of the twelve, making it clear that their role in the emerging community was conferred by Jesus himself. The Apostles are, in Luke’s mind, the direct heirs of Jesus’ and legitimate leaders in the early church. They will not only continue Jesus’ work and teaching, but will guide the believers through the difficult time of forming community, raising up leaders, facing persecution and imprisonment and working out how to respond to the increasing number of non-Jews who are moved to faith by the Holy Spirit. It is the seriousness of their task which causes Jesus to spend the night in prayer before setting the twelve apart. The teaching which follows their selection – the sermon on the plain – will provide guidance for the community. Jesus’ teaching will provide guidelines for living together and for relating to the world.

The choice of the twelve is a very serious decision. Their role, according to Luke, will be not only to carry on the mission of Jesus in his absence, but to build on it and to ensure that through those who come to believe, a community will be formed which will ensure the continuity of Jesus’ work and message.

Luke’s history may be idealized and formulaic, but whatever else it does, it places the Apostles firmly at the centre of the emerging church and as it does so ensures that the church is in safe hands – hands that have been chosen and set apart for the task by Jesus himself. Through the Apostles the emerging community was steered through its early difficulties and teething problems into a distinct and lasting expression of faith which became the church which exists to this day.

Jesus’ wisdom in sharing the burden of leadership and his vision and foresight in providing leaders for the future ensured that his message was not lost but continued to spread and grow. Let us pray that leaders continue to be raised up so that the gospel may continue to be shared, faith communities be formed and strengthened and individuals be encouraged and built up. Amen.

Tags:, , ,
Posted in Apostles, Luke's gospel | Comments Off on Raising up people to lead

Putting others first

October 20, 2012

Pentecost 21

Mark 10:32-45

Marian Free

 

In the name of God for whom the greatest is the one who serves. Amen.

I wonder what would be the result if I asked you to write down what you thought were the requirements for a good leader.  What would you value more highly – getting the job done or ensuring that everyone felt that they were making a contribution, forging ahead regardless or waiting for the slower ones to catch up, insisting that the task be done a particular way or seeking feedback from everyone else?

If you google “leadership” you will come up with at least three sites that claim to tell you the ten characteristics of a good leader and another that could come up with only seven. The site that caught my attention was strangely enough called Compare Business Products. Its definition of leadership was: “one’s ability to get others to willingly follow.” Vision was identified as a key characteristic of this style of leader: “A leader with vision has a clear, vivid picture of where to go, as well as a firm grasp on what success looks like and how to achieve it.” A good leader it says must also be able to communicate his or her vision and have the self discipline to work single-mindedly towards that vision and inspire others to do the same.

As well as vision, this article recommended that a leader have integrity, dedication, magnanimity, humility, openness. creativity, fairness, assertiveness and a sense of humour. An alternate site listed mission, vision, goal, competency, a strong team, communication skills, interpersonal skills, a “can do, get it done attitude”, inspiration and ambition as the qualities required by a superior leader.

Yet another felt that a good leader needed an exemplary character, enthusiasm, confidence, functioning in an orderly and purposeful manner, being able to tolerate ambiguity while remaining calm, an ability to think analytically, and a commitmentto excellence.

It is intriguing to note how different the lists are. I wonder to which, if any of these, Jesus would have given the stamp of approval.

In today’s gospel Jesus is making his way towards Jerusalem. His disciples are both amazed and afraid. It is in Jerusalem that Jesus is most likely to come into conflict with the religious leaders. It is in Jerusalem that his ideas will be most exposed to scrutiny and it is in Jerusalem where his popularity will be most threatening to the leaders of the church and to the might of Rome. No wonder the disciples are amazed. No wonder they are afraid. No wonder that they let Jesus go on ahead while they hang back! If he is in danger so are they.

Jesus’ leadership is one that includes his followers. He is not so focused on the future that he has forgotten those whom he leads. So he calls the twelve out of the crowd and explains what lies ahead for him. He tells them that he will be handed over to the chief priests and scribes who will condemn him to death and then to the Gentiles (the Romans) who will mock him, spit on him and kill him.

This is the third time that Jesus has told the disciples that he is going to die and for the third time the enormity of the revelation and the disciples’ complete failure to comprehend leads them to respond foolishly. This time it is James and John who respond foolishly. Despite Jesus’ previous teaching and despite the fact that more than once Jesus has used a child as an illustration of the ideal disciple, the two brothers ask to be elevated to positions of status or rank – not on earth – but in heaven! Did Jesus’ announcement make the brothers so anxious and so frightened that they wanted to assure their future –to be sure that following Jesus was going to be worth the risk? Or were they really seeking their own agrandisement at the expense of the other disciples?

Of course, we’ll never know what prompted their question. What we do know is that their request, not surprisingly, made the other disciples angry and led to Jesus to teach them about leadership. He points to the examples of leadership with which the disciples are familiar, in particular to the Romans who are ruling Palestine and whose rule is maintained by force. In the Empire power was in the hands of a few amongst whom there was fierce and sometimes violent competition for recognition and status.  Those who became rulers by wealth or by stealth ensured that they received due recognition for their status, and demanded subservience and submission from those whom they considered to be beneath them.

Jesus’ model of leadership is entirely different. In fact it is not leadership or authority that is to be prized among Jesus’ followers, but servanthood. The disciples are to stand out from the crowd, not by achieving notoriety or rank, but just the reverse. Instead of seeking recognition and status, the says, hey are to be as servants or slaves to others. This would have been an entirely novel idea in the first century, as it would be for many of our own generation. Just as it is difficult for us to get our head around the idea that the last will be first, so it a challenge to understand that in order to be the greatest in our community, we must be a slave to all.

Being a slave didn’t make it to any of our lists of the characteristics of a good leader though the first did include magnanimity and humility. The example Jesus set and the model Jesus asks us to adopt is that of putting others first – encouraging and building up those for whom we have responsibility – rather than demand that they follow our vision or do as we say. Leadership in the Jesus’ movement has nothing to do with self-agrandisement and everything to do with supporting, upholding and enhancing the lives of everyone else.  Honour is not something that can be bestowed or earned, but those who give of themselves for others, those who seek the well-being of others before their own are those who contrary to their own expectations, may discover themselves to be the greatest.

In the community formed by Jesus, there is no place for competition, no need to strive for elevation or promotion. Following in the footsteps of Jesus we relinquish all ambition and need for recognition and find our sense of purpose and meaning in putting others first.

Tags:,
Posted in Mark's gospel | Comments Off on Putting others first

Jesus’ topsy turvy world

September 22, 2012

Pentecost 17

Mark 9:30-37

Marian Free

In the name of God who turns everything on its head and asks us to serve those who are least among us. Amen.

 

I didn’t watch much of the recent Olympics. However, what I did watch led me to conclude that there was a considerable difference between Australians competing in the Olympics and those competing in the Para-Olympics. Of course the competitors in both competitions shared the will to win, but it seemed to me that the former had a much greater investment in winning and the latter seemed to understand that simply by being at the Olympics, they were already winners.

I was particularly perturbed by the media coverage of the Olympics which implied that anything less than a Gold Medal was not good enough. There was little celebration of the silver and bronze winners and a focus on how much a competitor lost (in terms of endorsements) if they had not come in first. This was followed by a focus on the trainers and the training programme and how they had let the team down – particularly in the swimming.  It is true that Australia has done well in the pool in the past and we have come to expect a large medal tally. At the same time we are a relatively small country and it is perhaps irrational to assume that we will always dominate the rest of the world in any one sport.

The desire to compete and to win is perfectly natural, but the failure to accept loss on an individual, team or even national level takes away some of the pleasure that comes from participating. If the newspapers are to be believed, this attitude permeates all levels of competition. Parents watching children’s games have become so aggressive that their behaviour has to be controlled and some are taking extreme measures such as sending their children to psychologists to “cure” them of anxiety or any other characteristic which might limit their determination to win.

How different these attitudes are from that advocated in today’s gospel in which three distinct episodes are recorded to portray the expectations of leadership in the Jesus’ movement. The section begins with Jesus’ prediction of his handing over and death, it continues with the disciple’s discussion about who is the greatest and concludes with Jesus’ response. It seems highly likely that the author has deliberately placed these accounts together in order to make the point that the Christian ideal of leadership is the exact reverse of that of the world.

The disciple’s discussion as to who is the greatest throws into sharp relief their complete failure to understand what Jesus has just said. The leadership Jesus exercises will not lead to power and glory, but to disgrace and ignominy. As leader of this group of disciples, Jesus will provide an example of leadership that is completely contradictory to everything they know about leadership and authority. Jesus will not exert power over others, just the reverse, he will allow himself to be handed over and killed.

Jesus’ prediction of his death seems just too hard for the disciples to bear, or perhaps they simply cannot get their heads around something so radical and unexpected. Either way, they were so frightened and confused that they were afraid to ask him what he meant.  Their complete lack of understanding of what Jesus has said is demonstrated by the argument which follows. This lack of understanding is typical for Mark’s gospel. Jesus’ prediction of his death and resurrection is, on each occasion followed by an illustration of this disciple’s complete failure to understand. In an earlier chapter, Jesus’ announcement is followed by Peter’s insistence that he (Jesus) is wrong and after a third prediction of his death and resurrection, James and John, having learned nothing from today’s discussion, ask Jesus if they can sit at his right and left hand in heaven! The disciples are, apparently, completely nonplussed by a leader who expects to die rather than conquer and one who serves rather than demanding service.

Their misunderstanding is highlighted by their argument about greatness. For some reason Jesus is not with them for the discussion, but the way in which the narrative continues suggests that Jesus has some idea what is going on.

When Jesus and the disciples arrive at Capernaum they go into a house. Jesus asks what it was that they were discussing on the way. Their silence indicates some embarrassment.  Jesus has just told them that he is going to die at the hands of humans and their response was to argue about was which of them was more important than the others. Jesus calls the Twelve apart and tells them: Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.”  This is completely contradictory to us. It was even more so in the first century when distinctions between social groupings were more clearly drawn. In world in which people are distinguished by rank or achievement, how can being last possibly be the standard against which one is measured? How can being a servant set one apart from the crowd? It jut doesn’t make sense – not in the first century culture and not in the culture in which we find ourselves.

Even more shocking and dramatic was Jesus’ illustration of this teaching. He took a child in his arms and claimed that whoever received a child received him, whoever serves a child serves him. The impact of this statement can only be understood when one remembers the first century attitude towards children that is reflected for example in Proverbs or in the Greco-Roman literature. In the first century, children and servants had no legal status. They were considered willful and undisciplined. They needed to be instructed and formed. Children were the property of their father no one would think of being their servant any more than we today would like to put ourselves in a position of being told what to do by those with so much less wisdom and experience than ourselves.

The disciples must have been shocked and affronted by what Jesus said.  Could Jesus really mean that they had to put themselves in the humiliating position of serving even children?

Of course, this is exactly what Jesus meant.  Jesus introduced a completely new way of being in community. The old ways of measuring status and achievement are completely overturned. Jesus is establishing a community which will operate by completely new standards and criteria. It will stand out from the world around it by the way in which members serve each other rather than lord it over each other.

This Is the standard to which we are called to aspire and by which we are to be distinguished from the world around us. Contrary to the standards of the world we are to be known by the way in which we put others (including the least deserving) before ourselves, our willingness to serve rather than to be served and our readiness to be last rather than first.

Tags:, ,
Posted in Mark's gospel | Comments Off on Jesus’ topsy turvy world