“A Fishwife's Tale”

These verses from Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians remind us of the “great commission” Jesus gave to all Christians.  Not just preachers and teachers, and not just those first 12 disciples – but we are all called to go out into the world and proclaim the Gospel.  Paul calls evangelism an obligation, and he says he has made himself a slave to all people so that he might win them over to the Way of Jesus Christ. 

Unfortunately, that’s not us.  That’s not our church.  It’s not really our style.  We’re not quite as obsessed as Paul was with what evangelical churches like to call “soul winning.”  But we do share the Good News of God’s transforming love with the world, in many ways:  we worship, study, pray and sing in our church every Sunday; we share with our offerings and mission trips and outreach giving to our community; we extend extravagant welcome to all who come in through our doors.   It’s just... we’re polite Christians who are not going to beat people over the head with the Bible, or scare people into heaven with threats of hell.  But even if we know full well what we are NOT going to do to proclaim the Gospel, that doesn’t exactly let us off the hook.  The purpose of the church of Jesus Christ remains – we are called to be “fishers of humanity” no less today than 2000 years ago. 

I think today’s passage from Paul could help us imagine what our "brand” of evangelism might look like – because Paul tells us that we have to match our Gospel message to our ministries, and to the people we’re trying to reach.  For instance, my last church wanted to build up its youth groups, but they wouldn’t in a million years have called that “evangelism.”  Most people just knew that having a strong youth group had made a big difference in their own lives, or in the lives of their children now grown, and so they wanted a youth group to be available to the next generation of Christians. 

It turns out one of the best youth evangelists for that church was a young woman I recruited as a youth leader who had run away from an evangelical mega-church in Southern California.  After she joined us, she started bringing her grandmother to worship, and her parents. But she really showed her gifts for evangelism as a senior high youth group leader.  Remember what Paul wrote to the Corinthians about how he learned to adapt his Gospel message to whatever audience he was trying to reach?  Paul says, “I have become all things to all people...for the sake of the gospel, so that I may share in its blessings.” Well, it turns out that many high school boys enjoy hearing the Gospel message from a really hot 20-something Southern California blonde – under her leadership, our youth group started to double and triple in size!

Now we laugh, but it is a real challenge to go fishing for Jesus.  The things that we find interesting in worship may not be to the taste of teenagers or others new to church.  This was the challenge I worked with back in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s when I was starting out in youth ministry.  But one form that really did seem to engage everyone with the Gospel was church drama – whether acted in or watched.  That’s why I ended up writing my master’s thesis about Biblical drama.

So I want to close this sermon with one script I wrote in seminary way back in 1991 – the assignment was for us to briefly re-tell a Bible story from the perspective of a character “invisible” or “off stage” in the story.  So now we will hear our Gospel Lesson, from the first chapter of Mark:

Mark 1:29-39 

²⁹As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. ³⁰Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. ³¹He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.

³²That evening, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. ³³And the whole city was gathered around the door. ³⁴And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him. ³⁵In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. ³⁶And Simon and his companions hunted for him. ³⁷When they found him, they said to him, “Everyone is searching for you.” ³⁸He answered, “Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.” ³⁹And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.

“A Fishwife’s Tale”

By Bryn Smallwood-Garcia, ©1991, revised 2012

1.      The man I married. You know, when we get married we never know exactly how it’s going to turn out.  We’re so young, and if we’re lucky we’re in love – so what do we know...really?  My parents, I know, wanted the best for me when they matched me up with Simon.  He wasn’t a real ... looker, you know... but he came from a good family ... solid, honest ... fishermen.  He had his own boat, his own business.  And so we made a little life for ourselves here in Capernaum, by the sea.

2.      His family, and mine. He and his brother Drew, they worked well together.  Our kids ran around, played together in the courtyard.  You can just imagine how my mother loved it.  She was a very grand grandmother – she’d sit there by Simon’s mother, back when she was still alive, and watch over their chickies like a couple of mother hens.  It was a good life – until that Sabbath, when Simon brought the prophet home.

3.       That day we met the prophet. His friends just walked in with him after synagogue, and we had to figure out how to feed them all.  Not that that was anything new.  You know Torah says no work is to be done on a Sabbath – look it up, it’s Exodus 20 – it says no one is to work: neither your son or daughter, your male or female slave, not even your livestock. It’s the law.  But do you have any idea how hard it is to serve people without doing work?  We women have to prepare a whole day to get ready to rest.  So I knew why that day my mother went to bed with a sick headache, a “fever.”  I would’ve done the same thing, if I thought I could’ve gotten away with it! 

4.      What he was like.  And this new prophet was ... a little ... different. A Nazarene, so... you know.  He had been a follower of John the Baptist ... so he’d been WAY out there for a while!  John had just been arrested, but that wasn’t going to stop him.  He loved the Lord!  He loved his religion.  We thought he’d never stop preaching long enough to bless the bread and start the meal.  But get this, when he heard my mother was sick, he just went straight upstairs to her bed.  Straight to her room.  Nobody who knew her would have tried that – trust me!  That’s when I thought it might be true what Simon said about him.  The man had courage – I’d give him that!

5.      What he said to her.  Well, I don’t know what he said to her, but it wasn’t 5 minutes until my mother came back with him, laughing, and holding his hand like a girl with her father on her way to a her first wedding dance.  And she didn’t even sit down.  She started to serve them – it was a miracle!  Our friends couldn’t believe it either – they knew what she was like.  So I wasn’t surprised that the word started to spread after James and John went home.  By sundown, every sick and crazy person in town was at my door!  It was some night, I tell you.  We had to send the children out to the neighbors looking for more food to feed them all.

6.      What I said to him. In the early morning when it was still dark, Jesus went off somewhere to find a quiet place to pray.  Wouldn’t you like to do that sometime, ladies?  But that’s when Simon sat me down to talk.  He said they were leaving town, right after breakfast.  I think I knew already.  They were going out on the road.  I couldn’t stop him – it wasn’t my place.  But I tell you what, before my husband left my house, I pulled him aside, and I looked him in the eye and I said, “Simon.  You go.  You can have my blessing.  But you have to promise, if this prophet ever gets himself arrested and they catch you, just deny everything.  Your family needs you.” 
So they left.  They’re still gone.  But I try to hope.  I hold on to my hope.  I mean, if this prophet could take on my mother, he might just be able to take down Caesar.

This was one story of a character who doesn’t appear of the pages of the Bible.  But when you think about it, none of our own faith stories are in the Bible either.  So my hope for you is that you will find the words to tell your story of how you have met Jesus along the way, and you will do it as I did, as Paul does, "for the sake of the gospel," so that all the world may share in the blessings of God’s love in Jesus Christ.  Amen.

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1^st Corinthians 9:16-23  (selected verses)

¹⁶If I proclaim the gospel, this gives me no ground for boasting, for an obligation is laid on me, and woe to me if I do not proclaim the gospel! ¹⁷For ... I am entrusted with a commission. ...

¹⁹For though I am free with respect to all, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I might win more of them. ²⁰To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though I myself am not under the law) so that I might win those under the law. ²¹To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law) so that I might win those outside the law. ²²To the weak I became weak, so that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some. ²³I do it all for the sake of the gospel, so that I may share in its blessings.