Beyond our ken

Rhona Cathcart July 13, 2018 0 0

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Mark 6: 1-6

1 He left that place and came to his home town, and his disciples followed him. 2 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! 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?’ And they took offence at him. 4 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.’ 5 And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. 6 And he was amazed at their unbelief.

Then he went about among the villages teaching.

“I kent his faither. And his mother, Mary. She’s a quiet one. 

They’re a big family, the Davidsons

Plain folk, no trouble. 

Except for the eldest. 

Got a bit above himself, he has. 

Thinks he has the authority to preach in the synagogue.

I mean, who does he think he is?

I kent his faither!”

They wouldn’t listen to Mary’s son, 

when he came back to Nazareth. 

He spoke with authority, 

but they didn’t, wouldn’t, couldn’t recognise that authority

Because they didn’t really ken his faither. 

If they had, they’d have recognised his son. 

Unknowable God, you are so far beyond our ken, 

it is no wonder that we struggle to understand you. 

You do not fit within the boundaries of scientific analysis. 

You belong among the undefinables - 

like love, and beauty, and laughter and art. 

Yet by your grace, you gave us a way to find you. 

You gave us Jesus.

You sent him, to Iive as we live,

that we might know the father, through the son. 

That we might recognise in him the divine DNA

of righteous, of grace, of justice, of mercy. 

God of creation, help us, your children, 

to claim the inheritance which comes to us through Jesus. 

Trigger in us the genetic expression of his grace. 

That others may also ken their faither, and ours.

Amen.