After Jesus got his vision stretched in the story from Mark 7:24-30, his next move is to travel back through the Galilee (Jewish territory) back to the Decapolis which is primarily a gentile territory. That story is told in Mark 7:31-37. His first encounter there as reported is with a crowd and some people who wanted their friend healed of his condition of deafness. It seems a long trip to another gentile territory if Jesus hasn’t perhaps been stretched by the Syrophoenician woman he encountered before. Don’t get me wrong- I’m glad for the gentile extension since I am myself a gentile but it does seem a stretch and perhaps a new focus to Jesus’ ministry.
Jesus heals the man and once again asks that it be kept quiet. Quiet is not something one can keep if they are suddenly able to speak and hear after not being able to previously. Rather an ironic request from Jesus.
Keeping quiet about Jesus seems pretty easy for us in the United States. When we do speak up about him too often it seems we use him as a club about something someone else is doing “wrong” (rarely do we call ourselves for the same behavior??). What is going to heal my deafness to the cries of people all around me in the world who need hope and love and healing? What will excite me so in the healing that I’ll actually speak of the Jesus I’ve met?
As we began to think and pray about a second site for Saint James, it was also becoming clear to Michael (our assistant pastor until June 2007) that he needed to move on to full time work and serving Jesus as the pastor of a congregation. As that became clearer to him and to us, it was also clear that we needed to make a transition and bring a new staff member on board. Some of us on the leadership team began to pray about it and gradually some things began to be clear about what we were looking for. Where Michael and I shared so many gifts and abilities in common, we needed someone with complementary gifts. I am often visionary but not so good with details; we needed someone who would be good with details. I am bereft of the gift of administration; we needed someone with that gift. We obviously needed someone who had a passion for Jesus and fit with the DNA of Saint James.
God opened a door and in walked Erika. Of course that is a poetic way of saying that as we began to discern what God wanted for Saint James and began to pray more, we discovered that there may be a person who could be interested in working at SJ. Now Erika wasn’t looking for work- she had a job. She was and is in seminary in Richmond and mostly lives there. Nothing would make Erika an obvious candidate since she wasn’t really available from any outward view. However, she was the godparent of a child at Saint James and had been at the baby’s baptism and “felt something.” We had heard about her in several settings and even my wife, Linda, had worked with her in a non-profit setting and was talking about her to me for “God knows what reason.” From any observations, Erika was not even potentially available for several years down the road. Still I emailed her and asked her to pray about a future at Saint James. There were email communication snafus and yet finally it became clear to us and her that we were meant to team up in Jesus-kingdom work.
Erika took the lead in the second site location search from the time she came to Saint James in mid-May 2007. She was undaunted by people’s questions or uncertainty or even by the manager that laughed when she said we wanted to possibly meet in his sports bar! She was and is a key piece of the puzzle God had/has for us in launching a second site.
In my next SJ-Kingstowne article, I’ll talk a bit about how the doors opened for our location at the Franconia Volunteer Fire Department.
