Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two
and gave them authority over unclean spirits.
He instructed them to take nothing for the journey
but a walking stick—
no food, no sack, no money in their belts.
They were, however, to wear sandals
but not a second tunic.
He said to them,
“Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave.
Whatever place does not welcome you or listen to you,
leave there and shake the dust off your feet
in testimony against them.”
So they went off and preached repentance.
The Twelve drove out many demons,
and they anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them. –Mark 6:7-13
I’ve read the Gospel for this Sunday numerous times, and each time something different comes to light. This week, it is the last three lines that are replaying in my mind and turning over and over again in my heart. It struck me that they went off to preach repentance. Often we hear that the disciples preached the good news, which I think of as an announcement, a truth, a reality. Jesus died and was raised from the dead. Life wins. God loves us. We are promised eternal life with God. It is too good to be true, so the disciples must preach it over and over again so we remember to live out of that radical joy.
Repentance I think of as an active verb. It is something we do that leads to deep transformation in our hearts and in the world. It is part of our faith practice, part of what Jesus calls us to do, but the wording here in Mark puts it at the utter center of what it means to follow Jesus. The disciples went out to preach repentance. How interesting to think of our preachers now focusing week in and week on repentance. How curious to think how repentance and the good news may be connected and at times interchangeable.
And then we learn in the following lines that demons were driven out and people were cured in this preaching of repentance. It is easy to hang onto anger without realizing it, or shutting out the hurt we have caused others. Not tending to these times when we have fallen short, the hurt can fester and grow methodically. We can think too highly of ourselves. We can live without letting God in to refine our being. Repentance is difficult, messy, time-consuming, and often scary. There are real consequences in the work of repentance. We can find healing and rest. We can know peace. We can retrieve joyful quiet in our minds and hearts and bodies. There is real physical, emotional, and spiritual transformation in the act of repentance. God offers us freedom.
The Gospel of Mark is calling me to focus on repentance this week. What demons am I clinging to? What healing can I know and claim if I am brave enough to ask for forgiveness and be open to the change of heart that will flow from God’s unconditional love?
Keeping Faith Today 