THIS IS WHY I HAVE COME

By Dar Mikula

Mark 1: 32-39

That evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon-possessed. The whole town gathered at the door, And Jesus healed many who had various diseases.  He also drove out many demons, but he would not let the demons speak because they knew who he was. Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. Simon and his companions went to look for him. And when they found him, they exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!” Jesus replied, “Let us go somewhere else – to the nearby villages – so I can preach there also. “That is why I have come.” So he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in the synagogues and driving out demons.

Did you hear that? The whole town gathered at the door.

Jesus opens the door and finds dozens, possibly hundreds, of sick people who need healing. The whole town is bringing him the worst of its troubled – the diseased and demonized.

And by the way, I did the research.  The smallest town in Galilee at the time of Jesus was estimated at a population of 15,000 people, roughly the size of St Augustine today – not including tourists, of course.

He’s possibly Overwhelmed but he doesn’t show it – Even when he is drawn from his pre-sunrise solitude by his friends who find him and tell him, “Everyone is looking for you!”

Jesus is not there to make headlines or seek stardom. Quite the contrary, he has a purpose and needs to stay under the radar, and to keep the naysayers and paparazzi from exposing him on Nightline, Fox News, or whatever the equivalent was at the time.

And why wouldn’t he be sought after?  In Mark’s account just preceding this he has basically gone into a local hospice care center and told Simon’s dying mother-in-law to get up and go back to work.

And she does!

And just before that he has expelled an evil spirit from a man in the synagogue – a power I wish I had when I see Donald Trump on the TV.

The whole town is clamoring to find Jesus and draw him from his solitude.

Now He could have said, “Go away and let me rest awhile.” But he doesn’t.  His response is “OK let’s move on and see who else needs me, who else I can help.”  There is no time to bask in the local headlines – he must move on to the next Orlando, the next Sanford, perhaps the next Gainesville – the east, west, north and south sides of every precinct in the Galilee province.

He tells them: “That is why I have come.”

Recently, as part of my contractual work with one of the elder caregiving services in Gainesville, I accepted three 7:30PM till 7:30AM shifts in a local assisted living facility.  To my initial surprise, a resident’s relative wanted to pay someone (me!) – in addition to the care already being paid for at the facility – to come in and assist her loved one whenever he had to get up to use the toilet in the night. Turns out he was at a high risk after a recent stroke left him weakened on his right side.  I was to stay awake and help him whenever he had to get up, with my main mission to prevent him from falling.

Now I predict that every one of you today – if you have not already had an experience of a care facility yet – that you will within the next few years.  You may end up being a patient, you may be there to visit a parent – or maybe to comfort the friend who knows you best – or you may even elect to work in one, but some day soon you will have a chance to sit there amongst the diseased, the dying, the ailing, the rehabbing, and/or the dementia-possessed.

There you will be, in Jesus’ Galilee.

For me, this recent workweek was not my first time in a nursing home. My grandmother lived for five years under institutionalized care, and I currently visit two nursing homes in Starke as part of my volunteer commitment with Hospice.

But this was the first time that I was under contract, paid to stay awake for 12 hours, and sit at the bedside of a man who couldn’t remember the breed of his dog or finish his sentence without forgetting the word for his next thought.  All I had to do was to help him walk the 9 or 10 shuffles to the door of the bathroom and back, without falling.

And – to hover respectfully at the door, peering in through the crack to make sure he was taking care of himself while remaining upright and off of the hard and – who knew? – dangerous floor.

I was successful in my task.

But the reason I bring this up is that one sees a lot when having to remain awake in the wee hours in the assisted living subculture.

Here it is: the extremes of the ailing, sick and somewhat demon-possessed. For instance, I was witness to the total helplessness of my patient’s roommate, who had to be assisted into a wheelchair every morning before 7 and then back into bed every night before 10 – He never said a word and he always clutched to the bed rails to complicate the Nurse Assistant’s task each and every time.

The constant crying of the woman across the hall – “Someone please help me! Someone please help me!”

The bony bearded man in the corridor who, with a wild look in his eye, paddled his wheelchair back and forth up the hall – defying sleep at 2 in the morning.

Or, the CNA who was singing aloud to something playing on her Iphone, probably to stay awake through her own graveyard commitment, …and just minutes after everyone else tucked in the shadows had finally found a moment of silence.

So for me it suddenly felt possible to imagine Jesus peering out of his door, pre-dawn, at the whole town in need of healing, in need of some brand of proven freedom from suffering.

Because, after my 12-hour shift, with no healing required and only the miracle of fall-prevention asked of me, I too just wanted to go off and pray and sleep and get back to my own quiet house and my own quilted-top bed with my sateen sheets and my perfectly contoured pillows.

But finally arriving home after daybreak, I would have a dog to walk, a shower to take, a breakfast to eat, a lawn to mow, and a day job at the massage school to report to.  Students, co-workers there too, would be looking for me.

 So, like Jesus, I had to repeat this mantra to myself as I sat upright and attentive through the three successive nights of guardianship for a man who had become ‘my people’:

“This is why I have come.  THIS is why I have come.”

And so maybe you too have a dozen or a hundred people needing you – kids, employees, spouses, family, friends, your aging parents, constituents, your community, your special son, your Baker-Acted best friend…The diseased and demonized, however known….

But wait, there’s more.  God is still speaking. – This story of Jesus is still speaking to us today, isn’t it?  So I wouldn’t dare put a period where Jesus has offered the opportunity for a comma.

 Here we are, the people of UCG – with a “whole town” at our door.

Can we follow, even imperfectly, the way of Jesus in Christ-like care and concern for each other?

As a United Church, we have just approved a three-year plan with one of its priorities stated exactly like this: To Strengthen care for the congregation by the congregation across the life course.

This priority acknowledges that we at the United Church of Gainesville nurture our members through the gifts and strengths of the ministers, yes, and by the members of the congregation itself.

This Priority challenges us to determine and create ways to support community involvement, social connection, service opportunities, and accompaniment in times of significant life events.  To engender resilience and maximize participation by all members of the congregation. To connect, to nurture, and to promote health.

As Shelly referenced in her sermon a few weeks ago — In the postscript, the 3-year plan asks this:

How participative do you plan to be? What is the promise you’re willing to make that constitutes a risk or a major shift for you? What is the gift that you still hold in exile?

And so, like Jesus, Do you know why YOU have come here?

Can you claim your purpose, know it like a mantra, hold it as intention in your morning prayers, consider it in your service to the whole town right inside this room and extended beyond these  sanctuary doors?

And can you, when your United Church comes to affirm that everyone is looking for you, that the whole town – however known – is gathered at your door, can you believe it as true, can you get up and bring forth that gift you maybe still hold in exile – because you know it is what you came here (to UCG) to do?

Like Jesus and for all of us gathered here, I pray that it be so.

Amen.  Blessed Be.