For Sunday, October 4, 2015 – Mark 10:2-16
One of Jesus’ central goals is to wake us up, to heal our blindness, to move us from the land of denial into truth. To wake up to our collusion with sin, without being sent into spirals of condemnation and despair, is a path to freedom. The law can go only so far in bringing us this kind of freedom. Relationships of unconditional love, the kind of love that will not let us stay in denial about our condition, complete the work that the law alone cannot do.
Some of the Pharisees quiz Jesus: “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” Jesus points out that they know already the demands of the law. What matters even more, and what we understand the least, are the demands of relationship. The law seeks to keep our actions in order. Relationship seeks to order our heart. Relationship calls us to remember the bigger story of who we are and from whom we come—who made us male and female, what the purpose of loving union is, how we are no longer individuals but connected more integrally than we know. The law makes it possible to separate from another, yes, but relationship reminds us how precious is the cost of separation.
Speaking of which, they are interrupted by some children, those precious victims of broken down relationships. Have children studied the law? Do they base their judgments of people on what the law allows? No, they respond from their hearts, whether trusting or doubting, holding a grudge or forgiving; all that matters to them is relationship. All they want is to be close, to be seen and acknowledged. So they come to Jesus, sensing in him one who is fully with them, for them, kind and constant in love.
We can be more like them. We, too, can see and know and respond to each other without first calculating the demands of the law. This is the freedom intended for citizens of God’s realm. This is the relationship path by which we become one.
