Mark 1:4-11 Big Brown Paper Bag
James McTyre
Lake Hills Presbyterian Church USA
Jan 11, 2009
Today's sermon is brought to you by, "Big Brown Paper Bag."
When you've got a multitude of sins to cover, get a Big Brown Paper
Bag.
[skit]
Man seated at table. Woman standing
nearby.
Man: Mmmm. I do love these ribs. Slathered with sauce
and dripping with golden goodness.
Woman: Thanks, darling.
Nothing's too good for my sweetie.
Man: And thanks for this
brand-new tie from the Men's department at Wal-mart. It looks like it
cost a bundle.
Woman: Oh, I know it's an unnecessary expenditure.
Sometimes I go a little crazy with the debit card. I just think of it
as my personal jump-start to the economy.
Man: Fashionable, and
fiscally responsible. Honey, you're too good for me.
Woman: Have
some more ribs, dear. I have another slab in the oven.
Man:
Mmmmph. Mmmmmph. OH NO!
(cue the organ. soap opera
stunner.)
Woman: Sweet pea! What's wrong?
Man: I can't tell
you.
Woman: Go ahead. Say it.
Man: I accidentally dripped a
huge rib sauce stain on my brand-new tie. Whatever shall I do?
Woman:
Eeeek!
Man: I know. I saw this on TV once. If I rub it with
the palm of my hand, the stain will transfer to my
skin.
(rubs)
Woman: OH NO!
(cue the organ. soap
opera stunner.)
Man: That didn't work. I know. I saw this on
the Internet. I'll cover it with a Post-it note.
Woman: OH
NO!
(cue the organ. soap opera stunner.)
Man: Now the
Post-it note is soaked with rib sauce stain, too. I know. I saw this
on SportsCenter. I'll shout it out. "Out with thee, darn
spot!"
Woman: OH NO!
(cue the organ. soap opera
stunner.)
Man: That didn't work, either. I know. I saw this on
HGTV. I'll pound it out. (pick up hammer, hammers on tie).
Woman:
OH NO!
(cue the organ. soap opera stunner.)
Man: That
didn't work, either. I don't know what to do! Can somebody please
help me?
Woman: Don't worry, dear. I have just the thing right
here. (picks up large brown paper bag) It's something I picked up at
the grocery store yesterday, for just such an emergency.
Man:
What's it called?
Woman: It's called... a big brown paper
bag.
Man: Oh honey. You're the greatest. How does it work?
Woman:
It's so simple. Here. Just put the big brown paper bag over your
head. That way, you can't see the stain, and if anyone else does,
they won't know who you are. (puts bag over his head)
Man: Wow,
sweetheart! This is perfect. (stands)
Woman: Our lives are now
complete. One more stain disaster solved!
Man: (wandering around)
Thank you. And thanks to a big brown paper bag!
(cue the
organ. soap opera finishing note)
Woman: Just watch out for
the basement stairs, dear.
Today's sermon is brought to you by, "Big Brown Paper Bag."
When you've got a multitude of sins to cover, get a Big Brown Paper
Bag.
That's right, folks. When you've got a multitude
of sins to cover, get a Big Brown Paper Bag. Available at fine
grocery stores everywhere. Not to be confused with Thin Little
Plastic Bag, which is bad for the environment and may be dangerous to
your health. Don't use Big Brown Paper Bag if you're claustrophobic,
pregnant, or carrying small children. As with any remedy, consult
your doctor to see if you're healthy enough for Big Brown Paper Bag.
If you experience shame or guilt lasting more than three hours, call
your minister immediately. It's ready for you when you're ready to
hide. Big Brown Paper Bag.
In this world, it's easier to write comedy about
how we hide our sin than a serious sermon about its implications. I
don't know about you, but I stopped watching the news this week.
After a while, it just gets to be too much. Ash spills in Roane
County. Businesses closing left and right. In Gaza, children found
clinging to their dead mother's arms. If that's not enough to make
you want to stick your head in a paper bag, I don't know what is.
You think, we don't come to church to be made to
feel bad. We get enough of that the other six days of the week. We
come to church to have our burdens lightened. To feel better about
ourselves and about our future. To get our sin removed. Rubbed out.
Shouted out. Transferred out. We come to the waters to be refreshed
for our journey, renewed so we can make it through the wilderness
outside. I know. I do it, too. It's time we take our head out of the
bag.
I'm not exactly sure why Jesus came to John to be
baptized. He didn't need it. He didn't have any sins to confess. I
don't know exactly why Jesus came to be baptized, but I'm pretty sure
it wasn't so he could feel better about himself. I'm pretty sure he
did it at least as a demonstration of how to take off the bag. I
think Jesus was getting baptized not so his sins could be washed
away, but because he wanted to show us a way of life where we didn't
wander around blindly stumbling into the sin we chose not to see. I
think Jesus was showing us all how to take our heads out of the bag.
If you go to the children's section at the
discount store, they have socks with the days of the week printed on
them. You wear Monday's socks on Monday, Tuesday's socks on Tuesday,
and on for each of the seven days. They ought to have these for
grown-ups. It would help you remember what day it is. If you got up
one morning and put Monday on one foot and Wednesday on the other,
you'd know right away there was disorder and chaos in your life. Back
in Genesis, in the first chapter, that's what God did. God separated
the watery chaos from itself. God put Monday where Monday should go,
and Tuesday where it should go, and day and night where they should
go. And God said it was good. Separating the waters from the waters,
the days from the night, separating the light from the dark, the
dirty from the clean. That's good. Separating what's the right path,
and what's the wrong -- how much of your time does that take?
Wouldn't it be good if you had someone to do that for you?
A couple of trillion years later, Jesus rose up
from the water. He shook his head and splashed the water to the left
and to the right, and God said, "That's my boy." That's
what God did a million years before. Jesus did it again. Except that
Jesus didn't make a new world out of nothing. He took the nothing
that had sneaked into the world and made it worth something. Jesus
took what was broken and out of sync, and put it together in a new
way.
Once we take our heads out of the bag, we realize
how much we're broken. We see the stains of our own sin pasted onto
us in the most embarrassing places. We can try to cover it up. Beat
it up. Shout at it and make ourselves and the people around us
miserable. We can ignore the sin. Just put the bag back on and go on
as though everything's OK. You can do that most places. But if you
think you can get away with that stuff with the baptismal font and
the table of the Lord's Last Supper in front of you, if you think
that's stuff's worth anything when you look at the cross, you know,
you've come to the wrong place. Jesus isn't gonna buy it. And he's
sure not selling paper bags.
The point of baptism, the point of church, isn't
to make us feel good about ourselves. The point of Jesus being
baptized wasn't to show off what a good son he was. The point is
realizing we don't know which way is up and which way is down. Not
really. Not on our own. The point is admitting to ourselves that on
our own we're lost. We need God to separate the waters from the
waters and lift us out.
If your life is filled with collisions, take off
the bag. In the end there's you and there's God. One more thing about
what God said to Jesus at the moment of his baptism. God said, "I'm
pleased with you." In the gospel, Jesus hadn't done anything
yet. He hadn't preached, teached, or been crucified. Why was God
pleased?
I'm sure God is pleased when we do great, good
things. I'm sure God is pleased when we help install clean water
systems. I'm sure God is pleased when we get along with each other
and get along with the earth and the people in it. But I also think
God is pleased when we stick our heads out of the chaos. God is
pleased when we lift up our eyes to God and say, "I can't work
this. I can't work this on my own. I can't work this without you,
Lord." I think that's what really pleases God. More than all the
good we do and more than all the evil we avoid. I think God is most
pleased when we lift up our eyes and see God. We can't do that if
we're busy cleaning ourselves up and making ourselves look good. We
don't have the skills to pull off that many things at once.
If you want to please God in the coming year, stop
worry about pleasing God in the coming year. Set aside all the fears
and concentrate on pleasing God today. And when tomorrow comes, you
can think about pleasing God on that day. Separate the days from the
days. Separate the waters from the waters. Let God pull you out of
the muck. Just get your head out of the bag. And see.
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