Fr Matthew Reese

‘And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house.” And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands upon a few sick people and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief.’
—Mark 6:4-6

Dear Friends in Christ,

Today’s passage from Mark’s Gospel continues the narration of Jesus’s early ministry. Here, we find Jesus reviled and rejected, not just by his fellow Jews, but by the people of his own hometown. Jesus teaches in the synagogue and the response—at least by some in the assembly—is “where did this man get all this? […] Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary?” (Mark 6:2-3)

It is as much Jesus’ own person as it is his words, that is so incomprehensible to the crowd.

Thus, Jesus “could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands upon a few sick people and healed them.” 

I love Mark’s passing reference here. It’s a throwaway phrase, but it tells us that Jesus does, of course, miraculously heal the needy on his way out of town. One imagines Our Lord, still “marveling” at the unbelief of his countrymen, casually casting out demons and healing leprosy, almost as an afterthought.

Yet his mighty works were destined for somewhere else. 

The unyielding, un-listening character of the people of Nazareth interestingly reframes Nathaneal’s rhetorical question in John 1:46: “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”

The trap in this passage is that we imagine ourselves as one of Jesus’ disciples—one of those with eyes to see and ears to hear. We may be that, sometimes. We may feel sometimes that we are preaching the Good News to unhearing listeners. We may feel sometimes that we alone are trying to live out Jesus’s teachings in a broken and sinful generation. 

But this is not the case.

We are, all of us, also a part of the uncomprehending crowd.

Part of the Lenten discipline is self-examination. We are called in this season to ask earnestly, and reflect honestly, if we are truly following in the way. We will fall short surely. But we must take heart. Even when he has been rejected by his own, Jesus still stops to heal the sin-sick soul.

Yours in Christ,

—Fr Matthew