He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

— Mark 9:35-37

Some of the best leaders, teachers and priests I have ever met are people who serve others, and the worst leaders I’ve ever met are people who want to control others with fear and intimidation. A good leader asks the people, “What gifts has God given you, and what would you like to accomplish with those gifts?” Leading in this way leans into an asset-based community development approach, a philosophy that guides Episcopal Relief & Development’s work.

Today’s Vespers reading contains three stories in which Christ educates the disciples and also us modern believers about how religion, government and all systems of the world should operate. He chose to be incarnate on earth at a time when the hierarchies of society were fixed and when humans had chosen to assign different values to different human beings. Slavery was an integral part of the ancient world, and slaves were considered to be of lowest value. Children had low value in society because they were dependent and not yet productive.

In his ministry, Jesus turns that entire system on its head and reminds his disciples that no one is greater than another. He rejects their question about who among them is the greatest by saying, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.”

Reflect: Can you imagine a world in which all humankind is of service to each other? What would that look like?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

Someone from the crowd answered him, “Teacher, I brought you my son; he has a spirit that makes him unable to speak; and whenever it seizes him, it dashes him down; and he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid; and I asked your disciples to cast it out, but they could not do so.” He answered them, “You faithless generation, how much longer must I be among you? How much longer must I put up with you? Bring him to me.”

— Mark 9:17-19

Whenever I hear this passage read aloud in church, I have to stifle a chuckle when Jesus says, “How much longer must I put up with you?” Who among us hasn’t either said that or thought it at some point when we are frustrated with the people around us? Jesus has tried to explain to the people who he is. He has performed many miracles, and the disciples have witnessed astonishing things, and yet, the people still do not fully believe that he is the Son of God.

When I began my studies as a hospital chaplain, one of my Sisters in the Convent told me about a prayer practice she had learned while working as a nurse, which involved thanking God for healing instead of asking God to heal. This approach can be used for others as well, so I began praying for people in the hospital by saying, “Thank you, God, for this healing miracle” instead of asking for one. I asked my Sister, “But what if I thank God for the miracle and then the patient dies?” She said, “That means that God has healed the person into the next life instead of healing them in this life. That, too, is a miracle.” This prayer practice reinforces what Jesus does in his healing miracles. He makes it a participatory exercise instead of just putting his hands on someone and being done with it. Many times in the Gospels, he points out that the person’s faith brought them healing. In today’s story, the boy’s father begs Jesus, “If you are able to do anything, help us!” and Jesus responds with, “If you are able!—All things can be done for the one who believes.” The boy’s father then utters one of the most profound pleas in all of Scripture: “I believe; help my unbelief!”

When we appeal to God for healing and transformation, we are active participants in that healing through our faith. Later in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus says, “So I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours” (Mark 11:24). This kind of faith can be ours, especially if we ask of Jesus, “I believe; help my unbelief.”

Reflect: How can you be an active participant in healing? What holy habits might help in this journey?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them.

— Mark 9:2

The Transfiguration is another one of those wonderfully visual stories where it is relatively easy to put ourselves into the scene and imagine it happening right in front of us. The Transfiguration is recorded in all three of the Synoptic Gospels—Matthew, Mark and Luke—and it provides us with another glimpse into the unfathomable nature of God.

Jesus asks Peter, James and John up to a mountaintop, and there they see Jesus transformed into blinding white light. Moses, who also went onto a mountaintop and encountered God in the flaming light of a burning bush, appears along with the prophet Elijah. Jesus speaks to Moses and Elijah as Peter, James and John stand awestruck. Peter wants to make three tents to contain the three, just as the Israelites made a tent and then the temple for the presence of the Holy of Holies. Just then, though, God’s voice declares that Jesus is his beloved son just as he did at Jesus’ baptism.

In this story, as in yesterday’s reading, Jesus is revealing who he truly is in stages. First, he asks, “Who do you say that I am?” and Peter recognizes him as the Messiah. Then he speaks of God’s will for him in the cross and resurrection, and now he appears to them in full glory, which leaves them no doubt about the enormity of their situation.

Our own journey of faith also involves getting to know Jesus in stages. When I was a child, growing up in the Southern Baptist Church in the late 1960s, I thought of Jesus as a cool, laid-back hippie cousin of mine. Jesus was my buddy. I talked to him. We prayed to him at church, and everything was positive and easy. We did not observe Holy Week at our church—just Christmas and Easter with all the candy and celebration.

As I matured in my faith, however, I began to understand the deeper meaning of Jesus’ identity. When I became an Episcopalian, I avoided going to Holy Week services because they were too upsetting to me. When I finally decided to face the uncomfortable feelings of Holy Week, my faith deepened significantly, and I began to comprehend the Good News of Jesus Christ: God has power over death.

Reflect: Who was Jesus to you as you grew in faith? How has your concept of Jesus changed since you first began to believe?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?”

— Mark 8:29a

The tone of Mark’s Gospel changes dramatically at this point from the exuberant joy of crowds and miracles to a sober warning of suffering and death. Peter declares that Jesus is the Messiah, and Jesus then tells the disciples that he must face rejection, be killed and rise again.

After this shocking revelation, Peter takes Jesus aside and rebukes him. This story is also told in Matthew, where Peter says, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you” (Matthew 16:22b). Jesus responds by rebuking Peter harshly: “Get behind me, Satan!” Peter is doing what any good friend would do, but Jesus reminds him that the concerns of God do not conform to the limits of human thought.

Whenever I ask for God’s help with a tough situation, I intentionally visualize what I want, I visualize five other possible outcomes and then I leave a space for the Holy Spirit. Over the years, I have realized that if I cling too tightly to my own version of the outcome, I am rigidly following my own will instead of submitting to the will of God. Whenever I remember to leave room for God’s plan, God always comes up with a much better solution than I ever could.

Peter loves his friend Jesus. He does not want him to suffer and die. He wants to do everything in his power to protect Jesus from this terrible fate. Even though Peter is acting out of love, Jesus admonishes him, reminding him that God’s will must be done. Peter’s own will, in this situation, is set against God’s plan just as Satan and the forces of destruction are set against it.

All of us want to prevent bad things from happening, but we often fail to recognize how everything we encounter, both good and bad, is part of God’s larger, eternal story.

Reflect: Are there any situations in your life story where God’s solution was better than what you wanted to happen?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

Now the disciples had forgotten to bring any bread; and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. And he cautioned them, saying, “Watch out— beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.”

— Mark 8:14-15

Well, here we are talking about bread again.

One of the many gifts of the Divine Office is the consecutive reading of Scripture passages, which provides continuity and context as we follow Jesus on his way to the Cross. Yesterday, there were seven loaves of bread. Today, the poor, distracted disciples forget to bring enough bread, so they only have one loaf. We might expect Jesus to multiply this bread, too, but instead he uses it as a warning. He has just rebuffed the Pharisees who asked him for a sign, and he cautions his followers to watch out for the yeast, or teachings, of the Pharisees. Being fully human and fully divine, Jesus gets as exasperated with the disciples as he does with the Pharisees, asking, “Do you have eyes, and fail to see? Do you have ears, and fail to hear? And do you not remember?”

Jesus and the disciples then go to Bethsaida, where there is indeed a man who has eyes and fails to see. The man is brought to Jesus for healing. Jesus spits on the man’s eyes, and when he asks if the man can see anything, the man replies, “I can see people, but they look like trees, walking.” This wonderfully vivid response is so clear that we can easily visualize the scene. He is beginning to see, but like the disciples, he is only about halfway there. When Jesus puts his hands on the man’s eyes, he can see clearly.

I have been attending church since I was about a month old, and I have studied the Bible throughout my life. However, I am still only about halfway to understanding the nature of God and the full significance of the Incarnation of God in Jesus. I am like the blind man, about halfway there. I also relate to the disciples and the Pharisees who struggle to comprehend what Jesus says and does. His wisdom is so much greater than human understanding that I know I will still be only about halfway toward seeing it clearly at the end of my life.

The good news is Jesus never gives up on us. Just as he did with the blind man, he keeps trying to heal and transform us.

Reflect: What are some of the teachings and actions of Jesus that you have trouble understanding? Can you bring those questions into your prayer life and ask God to give you eyes to see?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

Then he ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground; and he took the seven loaves, and after giving thanks he broke them and gave them to his disciples to distribute; and they distributed them to the crowd. They had also a few small fish; and after blessing them, he ordered that these too should be distributed. They ate and were filled.

— Mark 8:6-8a

I am not a foodie. When people start waxing rhapsodic about a recipe and rattling off all the ingredients to me, or they list every element of a wonderful meal they had, my mind goes to static. I couldn’t possibly care less. I eat to stay alive. I enjoy eating, but I do not have any interest in cooking or pondering myriad ingredients and oven temperatures.

When I try to understand the importance of food in the ministry of Jesus, though, I sometimes need to put myself in the shoes of someone who is a foodie. I challenge myself to view it through the lens of someone who has a strong, profound connection to cooking and feeding. For people like that, food is far, far more than just something you wolf down to stay alive. Food, for them, contains a whole universe of taste and smell and symbolism. It is a holy ministry, in their perception, to feed people.

Jesus feels compassion for the people who have traveled far to see him. His soft heart knows that they must be hungry and tired, so he wants to feed them. The wisdom of God is the spiritual food that nourishes and strengthens us, and Jesus adds to that by providing tangible food that strengthens our physical selves. God always seeks to nourish us and tend to our needs.

Reflect: What does food symbolize to you? How do the two feeding stories in Mark shape your understanding of the spiritual food of God?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

They were astounded beyond measure, saying, “He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.”

— Mark 7:37

As part of my training for the ordination process, I worked as a chaplain intern in a large hospital for nine months. Over the course of those months, I often Reflected on how a hospital is a place where people of all faiths, economic backgrounds and cultures live under one roof. As a Christian chaplain, I had to learn ways of relating to all the patients I visited, despite our superficial differences.

When I was called to the bedside of a man who was dying, I looked at the religious affiliation in his chart and saw that he was Muslim. I immediately thought, “Uh oh. This guy does not want a Christian chaplain to visit him.” When I arrived at the bedside, the man’s son, daughter-in-law and toddler grandson were there. Despite my fear of offending or upsetting them, they welcomed me. They even trusted me to babysit their adorable toddler while they called friends and family. In that place of healing, there were no walls between us.

Today’s reading from Mark contains two stories of healing. Jesus casts a demon out of the Syrophoenician woman’s daughter, then heals a man who was deaf and mute.

The woman is not Jewish, so Jesus tells her that his miracles and teachings are not for “the dogs,” code for those who are not God’s chosen people. She persists in her pleas, though, and Jesus grants her request, saying, “For saying that, you may go — the demon has left your daughter.” The deaf-mute man is part of the chosen people, but he is an outsider because he is perceived as defective and sinful because of his physical imperfections. Jesus does not refuse to heal either of these people Instead, he shows us the real meaning of God’s Law.

Reflect: How can you find common ground with those who are different from you or who may be considered “outsiders” in a social setting?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

And he said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

— Mark 7:20-23

I have always considered this passage a perfect message for Lent. The Pharisees see Jesus’ disciples eating with unwashed hands, and Jesus replies to their rebukes by quoting Isaiah and telling them, “You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.” Jesus is not just bashing the Laws of the Jewish people here and being disobedient. He is talking about hypocrisy.

There are so many times in my daily life when I wish that people I encounter would “act better” or “do the right thing.” Jesus reminds me that I have no control over other people’s words and actions. I can only control my own words and actions by setting healthy boundaries and responding thoughtfully instead of reacting impulsively. I sometimes fall back on my old pattern of “Well, he made me mad,” or “She made me feel judged.” But then I remember that no one can make me feel anything. My feelings are based on my own thoughts and perceptions of what enters my heart from the outside. Transforming my reactions into healthy responses is something that happens deep within.

Jesus reminds us to avoid the hypocrisy of following the Law in a superficial manner. He tells us instead to follow God’s Law within our hearts and cleanse ourselves of inclinations toward destructive behaviors. The Pharisees’ judgment of people who don’t wash their hands is superficial compared to their uncharitable behavior. Many of Jesus’ followers were probably poor or lacked access to ritual cleansing vessels and clean water. The Pharisees would have done far better to help the poor in front of them rather than condemning them for breaking the Law.

Reflect: What are some ways that you have learned to transform destructive reactions into charitable responses?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

And wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.

— Mark 6:56

In today’s reading, Jesus first walks on water, then, when the boat lands at Gennesaret, he begins healing the sick. He had gone up a mountain to pray, as his disciples went ahead to Bethsaida, but then nearly scared them to death by appearing to walk on water as the wind tossed their boat around.

My favorite part of this passage is “He intended to pass them by,” which evokes a hilarious image of Jesus strolling casually past the boat when the disciples see him and think he is a ghost. This story is a bit difficult to understand, and it unfolds in a somewhat comical way because the disciples are so human in their confused reaction. They remind me of all of us. I think we’d all react in much the same way as we tried to wrap our primitive, human minds around the incarnation of the Divine.

When the whole confused band of disciples arrives at Gennesaret with Jesus, great crowds bring people to him for healing. These people, too, do not fully understand who this miracle worker actually is. The idea that any man could be God, come to earth in human form, is just beyond them. To them, he is simply a human who can heal.

Reflect: When was a time in your life when you were truly surprised by God’s presence?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development

Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to his disciples to set before the people; and he divided the two fish among them all. And all ate and were filled; and they took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and of the fish. Those who had eaten the loaves numbered five thousand men.

— Mark 6:41-44

As a child, I used to wonder, “If Jesus could perform miracles and God has power over everything, why would he just… feed people?” Why, I wondered, didn’t he overthrow the Roman Empire? Why wouldn’t he bless the ground so that there would be an abundance of food every day? When I delved deeper into the symbolism of this story, I began to understand the importance of this miraculous feeding of the five thousand. In the story, Jesus looks at the crowd and has compassion for them because he sees that they are like sheep without a shepherd. He wants the crowd to stay so he can teach them, but his disciples tell him they need to disperse the crowds and move on, because there is nothing to feed them. It would be better, they say, to allow all these people to go somewhere else and get food. Jesus says, “You give them something to eat.” Then they begin asking questions about logistics. Jesus solves the problem by dividing the five loaves and two fish into enough for everyone.

The COVID pandemic closed down the world in March 2020, only three months after I had been elected Superior. We had to shut down our retreat house and our guest ministry, and the parishes where we worked were closed indefinitely. Without our guest ministry income and our outreach to the church, I was seized by a deep terror that our Convent would not survive or worse, that our Sisters vulnerable to respiratory illnesses might die. Nearly every day, I prayed to God, “Please help us.” The parish where I served stepped in and provided us with donated food from local grocery stores. Our friends and associates dug deep into their pockets and donated twice their usual amount. They also helped us learn how to do ministry online and reach more people than ever before. With God’s protection, we survived. None of our Sisters were lost to COVID, and we had a miraculously generous amount of food and support.

There are many meanings to this miracle, but my current understanding is that it means God always supplies enough for everyone. It is only through greed, war and injustice that people are made to starve. “You give them something to eat” is God’s message to us. There is always enough. We just need to devise a system in which everyone has all they need, and people step in to help.

Reflect: Where have you seen examples of corrupt systems that cause poverty and hunger? How can you play a role in forming a more just system?

This Lenten Meditation can be found at Episcopal Relief and Development