Preparing for the 5th Sunday OTB

Preparing for the 5th Sunday OTB

5^th Sunday in Ordinary Time B

Readings: Job 7:1-4,6-7  1 Corinthians 9:16-19,22-23  

Mark 1:29-39

This Sunday’s readings plunge us into the agony and mystery of suffering which in a Christian context can never be rationally resolved, but only sublimated in the paradox of a gospel centered on the cross.  Although never directly mentioned, the healing mystery of the cross looms behind this Sunday’s readings.  The Christian gospel does not eliminate human suffering, so poignantly expressed in Job’s lament and the afflictions of the possessed in Mark’s Gospel.  Rather, it announces the victory over the demonic powers of evil that is won by a crucified Jesus who is more than simply a miracle worker and who calls his followers, like Paul, to become slaves to all.

Job’s tortured lament is a reply to the facile theology of “his friend,” Eliphaz, who has insisted, following traditional wisdom, that Job’s terrible sufferings (see Job 1-2) are somehow deserved because of his sin. “Think now, who that was innocent ever perished? Or where were the upright cut off? As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same”  (4:7-8).  In face of such “ashy maxims,” the innocent Job is forced to struggle for an explanation of his suffering, while maintaining his moral integrity.  In the section of his speech chosen for our reading, he describes the human condition as that of “a slave who longs for the shade” or “a hireling who waits (vainly) for his wages.”  His own sickness does not even allow him the rest of an untroubled night’s sleep.  As his days swiftly pass away without hope, he can only cry out to God: “Remember that my life is like the winds;/ I shall not see happiness again.”  For the author, such a tortured cry to God is more faith-filled than the pious platitudes of Job’s friends (see Job 42:7-9).

In the second reading, Paul offers his own behavior in imitation of the selfless Christ as an example to the Corinthian Christians who were tempted to boast of their knowledge and ignore the spiritual and temporal needs of weaker members of the community (see 1 Corinthians 8-11).  Our reading comes in the center of this section, and in it Paul insists that as an apostle he is under an obligation to preach the gospel and that his recompense is simply to be able to offer it free of charge, rather than making use of the authority the gospel gives him.  As an apostle, Paul has certain rights to things like financial support from the Corinthian community and to marriage, but he has freely given them up in order to be of service to those to whom he preaches the gospel. Just as Paul has made himself a slave to all for the sake of sharing in the blessings of the gospel of the crucified Christ, so he asks the Corinthians to be willing to give up their liberties and privileges for the sake of one another’s spiritual and temporal needs.

In many ways the Gospel reading captures Mark’s unique Christology.  On the one hand, he presents a powerful Jesus who inaugurates God’s kingdom by announcing “the good news” of its arrival and by attacking, in apocalyptic fashion, the dominion of Satan through numerous miracles.  At the beginning of our reading Jesus heals Simon’s mother-in-law of a fever, and, as evening draws on, he cures people of various afflictions and expels demons.  By the end of the selection, Jesus has embarked on a tour of the synagogues of Galilee, preaching the good news and expelling demons.  But on the other hand, the Markan Jesus is not simply a miracle worker.  He will not permit the demons to speak, because they know him.  Jesus’ full identity cannot be proclaimed simply on the basis of his powerful miracles in plundering the dominion of Satan.  This explains Jesus’ withdrawal from the adulation of the crowd to retire for prayer in a lonely place in the desert.  In the second half of the Gospel, he will repeatedly insist that his destiny is to go to Jerusalem to be rejected by the leaders, killed, and then rise after the third day (see 8:31-33; 9:30-31; 10:32-34).  Simon and the other disciples will consistently fail to accept the role of Jesus’ death in his messianic mission (see 8:32-33; 9:33-37; 10:35-45).  Their preference for a gospel of power and glory is already foreshadowed in today’s reading.  When Jesus withdraws to be absorbed in prayer, they track him down and with exasperation exclaim: “Everyone is looking for you!”  Aware that his purpose is not to bask in adulation of those already healed, Jesus commands that they move on to preach in the neighboring villages.  “Let us go on to the nearby villages that I may preach there also.  For this purpose have I come.”

This Sunday’s liturgy is a challenge to face the hard reality of the world’s suffering without resorting to the moral platitudes of Job’s friends

nor the wonders of a miracle working Christ who simply sweeps away the evils of the world.  The Christian gospel is the good news of

God’s victory over the powers of evil, but only through a self-sacrificing Messiah who “did not come to be served but to serve and to give

his life as a ransom for many” (Mk 10:45).