Poor vision

       This passage of Mark is a real slice of reality.  It isn't a parable but relays what really happens in the world to this very day. It surely is something we should be on guard for.  Jesus is the home boy and he's come home to preach. Clearly they see the knowledge, wisdom and holiness of Jesus. Then as if to say , Nah, can't be, this is that carpenter boy. The community holds him down, spiritually, perhaps emotionally and eventually physically and onto death.

        How often do we refuse to see things as they are because they don't jive with what we want to believe? So many examples today in what the world is like.  Take almost any woman in politics. If they are tough and knowledgeable, they are labelled as harsh and bitchy. A man would be labelled - as a man.  I know that from my background I cannot fully appreciate the depth of hate and dismissal that Barach Obama received because he was intellectual, well spoken and a black.  The depth of that hate has only come to full light and been unleashed by the likes of  Mr. Trump who seems well at ease with hateful rhetoric and ignorance.

          What if you are a gay person, a member of the LGBTQ rainbow? How are you perceived? What do people see or expect to see? There is a whole list of attributes from sexual predator to free sex to a lack of morals to disease ridden. As a member of the LGBTQ community I am well aware of the hate and expectations, the judgments and marginalization. 

         Jesus told his disciples that if they were not welcome in a place, to shake the dust off their shoes as they leave and not look back. We may have to do the same. Live our lives witnessing and leaving the offer to learn on others. We can witness to our goodness and witness to the love of God in our lives but we cannot force anyone to see anymore than Jesus could. The losers are those who refuse to see, who do not even make an effort to expand their vision and try to see things from a new and enlightened perspective.

        What we have to do as people and especially as LGBTQ members is to make a concerted effort not to be like those who do not see or see only what they want to see. That should not be us. We are all about love and being the holy creations of God. Witnesses to the glory and diversity of God's creation.

Mark 6:1-13

He left that place and came to his home town, and his disciples followed him. On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, ‘Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! Is not this the carpenter, the son of Maryand brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?’ And they took offence at him. Then Jesus said to them, ‘Prophets are not without honour, except in their home town, and among their own kin, and in their own house.’ And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief. 

Then he went about among the villages teaching. He called the twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He ordered them to take nothing for their journey except a staff; no bread, no bag, no money in their belts; but to wear sandals and not to put on two tunics. He said to them, ‘Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave the place. If any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them.’ So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.