Blinded

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I know everyone is familiar with Superman, and his alter ego, Clark Kent. One of the late night television shows did a spoof on this once. Clark Kent is sitting at his desk at the Daily Planet, and he takes his glasses off to rub his eyes, and someone yells out, “Superman! Wow! When did you get here!” And Clark puts his glasses back on to look around for Superman, and the person goes, “Huh? Where did he go? He was just here!” Clark gets wise, and pulls his glasses off again, and the person yells, “Oh! There you are!” What follows is Clark Kent taking his glasses off and on, with people seeing Superman, and then suddenly blinded to his presence the moment Clark puts his glasses back on. They thought Clark kind of looked like that Superman guy, but obviously, Superman didn’t need glasses, so it couldn’t possibly be him. They doubted what was right in front of them, and so they were blinded to reality.

Who’s Scruffy Looking?

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Psychology tells us that we are hard-wired to think that beautiful people are smarter than those that don’t fit into society’s norms of beauty. And that we think that tall people are more capable of leading, just by virtue of their size. And that people who smile are more trustworthy than those who frown or who keep an expressionless face.

And while psychology tells us that this is our initial, hard-wired reaction, it is good that we are thinking and rational creatures, because each of us has experienced a wolf in sheep’s clothing, a salesman with a winning smile who is intending to sell you a lemon. Our hard-wired brains lie to us initially, but it is our thoughts and our understanding that helps us to see beyond the outer facade.

Can You Hear Me Now?

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The Gospel goes out of the way to make sure that we know that the person who came to talk to Jesus is a woman, a Gentile, and not only any Gentile, but a Syrophoenician. This is a woman of standing, in what Jesus and his disciples could call “enemy territory.” 

Over the years, we have all probably used some slurs when speaking of others. But also, over the years, we have matured, and we have come to understand others better, and more importantly, we understand ourselves and our own insecurities and fears better, so that we no longer use these slurs. 

Which makes Jesus using this term “dog” to describe not only the Syrophoenician woman, but all her countryfolk sound like fingernails on a chalkboard to us when we hear it. And it demands that we figure out an answer to what is happening.

(╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻

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“Too many of you are competing to sit at a table that Jesus would have flipped over.” Some random meme Recently, that meme popped up on my Facebook feed, and I had to pause for a minute to reflect on it. It wasn’t funny enough to chuckle at and maybe share; it wasn’t stupid enough…

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Who Are You?

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And they took offence at him. His very presence in the synagogue, “pretending” to be a spiritual leader, incited their wrath, and they were scandalized by his presence there as one who would presume to teach them.

They knew him from when he was but a boy, and here he was taking on more authority than he ought to, more than he was allowed to, given his history, given what they knew about him.

And the result, Mark says, is that he did not do many works of power there. Instead, Jesus marveled at their disbelief. 

Add a Little Manure

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When I was a pastor for a small church up in the pacific northwest, I received a phone call one day. The call came from another pastor in our diocese, who wanted to let me know that he had a “word of knowledge” for me.

For those of you not particularly versed in the charismatic / pentecostal nomenclature, a “word of knowledge” is a personal prophecy, or discernment, regarding what God is doing in the life of another person. These can at times be very powerful, when truly directed by God. When not directed by God, they tend to take on the likeness of a battering ram.