Desert Healing

Mark 6:30-34, 53-56
Then the apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all that they had done and all that they had taught. He said to them, “Come away to a wilderness place all by yourselves and rest awhile.” For many people were coming and going and they had no time even to eat.

So they went in the boat to a wilderness place by themselves. Now many saw them going and recognized them and they ran together by land from all the cities and arrived before them. Upon arriving he saw the great crowd and had compassion on them for they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began to teach them many things…

Upon crossing over to the land, they came into Genesserat and weighed anchor. When they got out of the boat, people immediately recognized him and ran about that whole region and began to bring the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was. Wherever he went, into villages, cities or farms, they laid the ill in the markets and called to him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment. And all who touched it were healed.

The story takes place in the desert. And beyond. Jesus’ disciples have returned from their mission. Do you remember their mission? A few weeks ago we talked about the ministry of moving in and that’s what the disciples have been doing – moving into homes and villages and proclaiming the good news and healing the sick and casting out demons. They have amazing stories to tell of what has done. They all want to tell the story.

“Jesus, you’ll never believe what happened! Jesus, the demons obeyed us. Jesus, people walked. People spoke. People believed!”

But they couldn’t tell the story. Jesus had become so popular now that the crowds were gathering in every town he entered. They could not even sit down to a meal now. The crush of people was that great.

It was an ominous time. John the Baptist had just been killed by Herod. The disciples may have worried that if Jesus attracted the same sort of attention that John had attracted, his life would also be in danger. So when Jesus suggested that they head out into the desert, away from the crowds, so that they could tell their stories, they agreed eagerly.

So they got into a boat and set out from shore, headed to a deserted stretch of the lakeshore where they could be alone. It was just Jesus and the Twelve headed out to the wilderness, like Moses and the Twelve Tribes so many centuries before. But Moses discovered on that trip out of Egypt that going to the desert didn’t mean that things were going to get quieter. The needs of the people still remained. They complained because they had no water. They complained because they had no food. They complained when Moses went up on the mountain to receive God’s word. They seemed always to be in need.

Finally God led Moses up on a mountain, Mount Abarim, to look at the land towards which they were traveling. It was a land he would never enter and Moses knew it because God had told him that he would not go in. Moses was concerned about the people he had led these many years. He spoke to God and said, “Lord, the people need someone to lead them into this new land. They need someone to lead them into battle, to listen to their complaints, and to direct them in your ways. Otherwise the community of the Lord will be like sheep without a shepherd” [Numbers 27:12-17]

God heard Moses’ concern and told him to find Joshua, a man of charisma, to lead the people. So Joshua became a shepherd for Israel. Now you need to know that the name Joshua, when it was translated into Greek, sounded a little different. It was translated as Jesus.

So now here is a Jesus once again leading people into the wilderness. But it’s not just the disciples he’s taking. The people in the towns see him in the boat and they follow. They run along the shoreline. They head out into the wilderness with no food, no provisions for the day. Why are they running after Jesus? Because they have needs. They have hurts. They know that they need to hear his teaching, to feel his touch, to just touch the hem of his garment. These people – these thousands of people – follow because they have found life and they refuse to let it go until they are made whole.

So when Jesus and the disciples land, hoping for a quiet retreat, there are five thousand men there, plus women and children. Jesus looks at them and has compassion on them, because he sees, like Moses, that they are like sheep without a shepherd. He teaches them, feeds them (the whole crowd with five loaves and two fish!), and sends them on their way.

But they show up again in the next town. And the next. They show up on roadsides and on farms. They are in the city and in the desert. These poor, wounded, lost souls will always be seeking Jesus because they know what they need. They need to live. They need to really live.

Henri Nouwen, who was a great contemporary spiritual writer, talks about how awareness of our brokenness can lead us to life. We are all broken people, Nouwen says, and many of our conversations with one another are dominated by stories of how broken we are. But our temptation as human beings is to walk away from the pain and suffering we are experiencing when the path to healing is to step toward it.

Nouwen says, “My own experience with anguish has been that facing it and living through it is the way to healing. But I cannot do that on my own. I need someone to keep me standing in it, to assure me that there is peace beyond the anguish, life beyond death, and love beyond fear. But I know now, at least, that attempting to avoid, repress, or escape the pain is like cutting off a limb that could be healed with proper attention.”[i]

Why did all of those thousands go to the desert to see Jesus? Why did they seek him out in the streets, and houses and byways of the land? Because they sensed that Jesus knew. Jesus would not ignore their suffering or minimize it or pretend that it wasn’t there. It was safe for them to unbind their wounds in Jesus’ presence. They did not need to fear being vulnerable. They did not need to cover over the pain. If Jesus was coming into their lives, he was going to enter their lives at the point where they needed him the most.

But, of course, Jesus didn’t just heal them so that they could be relieved of their pain. Jesus is not content merely to take away something that we don’t want. Jesus is not some spiritual morphine making us forget the pain so that we can go on in lives that are prone to delusion and distortion. When Jesus heals, he wants transformation not pacification. Jesus wants new life not old habits. Jesus wants you to be a new person conformed to the image of Christ. Things will change.

There’s a Burt Reynolds movie that is now almost thirty years old called The End. In the movie, Reynold’s character, Wendell Lawson, receives word that he only has six months to live. Wendell decides that he doesn’t want to wait for the end to happen to him so he begins to contemplate ending his own life. The movie is actually a comedy and it ends when Wendell decides that he’s going to end it all by swimming out into the ocean and drowning. He’s that miserable.

As we see him swimming away from the shore we get to hear Wendell’s thoughts. Initially his thoughts are all about finally carrying out his plan to do himself in. He gets many, many yards from shore and he realizes that he has gone so far that he probably couldn’t get back now even if he wanted to. But he also realizes something else. He wants to live.

So he turns back to shore and he begins to pray to God. He’s bargaining hard: “Oh, God, help me! If you’ll only help me get back to shore I’ll change my life. I’ll start going to church. I’ll give fifty percent of my income to the church. Fifty percent, Lord! I’m talking gross!”

He’s starting to see the land get closer now and he suddenly realizes that he’s going to make it back. He says, “I’m going to make it, Lord! I’m going to live! I’ll start giving that ten percent, Lord!” Before he even makes it back to shore, Wendell is stepping back from changing too much. The question still remains, “Does he just want to escape the pain or does he want to really live?” If he really wants to live, he’s going to have to accept that God will do some messing around in his life.

What is it that you would take into the desert for Jesus to heal? What wounds are still open? What relationships are broken? What grief is still lingering? What anxiety is still unrelieved? What illness is holding you in its grip? What demons are keeping you in their power?

Maybe it’s something you’ve been praying about for a long time. Maybe you’ve asked others to hold you in prayer as well. And maybe it seems like these prayers have gone on for many, many days.

Maybe it’s something you’ve been trying hard to conceal and that you find it hard to admit even to yourself. You’re not sure how you can open your hands to offer it to God. You’re not sure you even want it to be taken away because if it were gone it would require some major changes and change is hard. But our choice is the same – Do we merely want to escape the pain or do we want to really live? To really live requires accepting the healing that Jesus has to offer.

Some say healing is something lost to early Christian history. They say it is a carryover from an age that still believed in supernatural power and transformations that could now be explained scientifically. But don’t tell that to people who have experienced healing – who know that what God wants is not us at our best but us as we are – with all the hurts and wounds that we must have from being human. If we conceal those hurts because we believe that’s the part of us God can’t do anything about, then we have given up the heart of the gospel. Christ came, not because of our merits, but because of our wounds. That is what we are called to offer to God.

So come to the desert. Come to seek the balm of Gilead. Come to seek the sun of righteousness that rises with healing in its wings [Mal 4:2]. Come to seek the Christ who walks among us, who has compassion on his people, and who will not leave us like sheep without a shepherd.

What do you have to bring? Jesus is waiting. For you. Thanks be to God.

[i] Henri J.M. Nouwen, Life of the Beloved, [New York: Crossroad Publishing, 1992], p. 95.