Whose Side Are You On?

Text: Mark 3:20-35

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

            Whose side are you on? It’s a common question these days. It seems that everywhere we look, we have to be on one side or another when it comes to every single event, topic, situation, or subject. We see and hear countless divisions, factions, and parties yelling at each other and demanding that we render a verdict, have an opinion, pick a side. Unsurprisingly, this happens even when it comes to the subject of Jesus. There’s hardly a person alive who hasn’t at least heard of Jesus, even if what they’ve heard isn’t accurate or true. But that goes back a very long way. It’s even seen in our reading from the gospel of St. Mark today. Factions form around Jesus when He goes home to Nazareth. Some, those in the crowds, are in amazement at this hometown hero returned. They believe Him to be a prophet, maybe more, so they gather in such large numbers that everywhere He goes, it’s standing room only. Others, like Jesus’ family, think that He’s lost His mind. He must be insane, the things He’s saying—that’s not how the world operates, the things He’s teaching run counter to everything that any rational person would know to be true. They even try to physically restrain Him, out of fear that He might hurt Himself or others. There are still others, the scribes from Jerusalem, experts in the Law, who hold an even darker opinion. They say He’s possessed, or even worse, that He’s in a willing alliance with the forces of hell and the prince of demons. “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” they announce, “and by the prince of demons he casts out demons.” Everyone has an opinion and the boundary lines are drawn.

            But look at how little it affects what Jesus does as He’s going about the work He’s been given to do. The false assertions and assumptions, believing He belongs to this or that camp—it doesn’t stop Him from doing what He was sent to accomplish. He brushes off their accusations about what side He’s on. “How can Satan cast out Satan?” He asks the scribes, “If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but is coming to an end.” Even when it comes to His family ties, those who should have known Him best, Jesus doesn’t take their assumptions about His insanity to heart. He simply says, “Who are my mother and my brothers?”

            It’s common to human nature to assume we know which side Jesus is on. It’s common to assume that we know what He should be doing or saying. He must like the same things we like—comfort, ease, worldly power, clear victory by human standards. He must like the same people and politics and values that we like. And, of course, we also assume that He takes our side when it comes to those things we don’t like. He must dislike the same things we do, those other people and politics and values. We presume to think that we are the heroes in Jesus’ story, that He’ll take our side in every argument, every debate, every circumstance. Because of this, we take it upon ourselves to tell Jesus—and anyone else who will listen—whose side the Son of God must be on…and it’s always our own. And if we run across clear words in His Holy Scripture that contradict us, then we’re all too ready to put a hand over His mouth, like His family tried to do in the reading, to say that those ideas aren’t His, that no rational person would say or think that way, that experience tells us the opposite, He can’t actually mean what He says. Or we’ll do what the scribes do and say that someone else—some villain hidden in the shadows of history—must have put those words into His mouth, like a possessing demon would.

            But Jesus refuses to be crammed into any ideological, political, or philosophical box. He easily knocks over the scribes’ argument about Him being possessed, having some other person or thing speaking through Him. He moves past His family’s accusations of insanity. He even resists our attempts to tame Him and keep Him in our pocket. Jesus turns the question, “Whose side are you on?” against us. We don’t get to demand it of Him. He asks it to us.

            And make no mistake, there are sides. “Truly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the children of man, and whatever blasphemies they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” “Who are my mother and my brothers? Whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.” We might think that we’re the ones to judge which side Jesus is on. But our reading today reveals that Jesus is the One to judge which side you are on. He shows you the danger of calling what is holy unclean, what is good evil, as done with the Holy Spirit, which they called an unclean spirit out of unfaith. He shows us the danger of sitting in judgment of Him and His words, declaring them to be insane, or unreasonable, or foolish, or outdated, or dangerous, simply because they make us uncomfortable, or they don’t mesh with what we want, or we simply don’t like them.

Yes, there are sides—heaven and hell, light and darkness, holiness and sin, God and Satan. And one side will win. In fact, one side has already won. That’s what Jesus tells us in a rather surprising parable, where He styles Himself as a thief. “No one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods unless first he binds the strong man. Then indeed he may plunder his house.” That’s exactly what Jesus has done. He took His side against the strong man, Satan, who had collected and hoarded all the treasures and people of this world. At His cross, Jesus bound that strong man, the old evil foe, took away all his weapons of accusation, put a gag in his lying mouth, and chained him up. Then, right before the unbelieving evil spirit’s sight, Jesus plundered his household, liberating all the souls who looked to Him for rescue, forgiving the sins of the world, taking them from the household of death and slavery to His marvelous kingdom of light and life.

Whose side are you on? Jesus has already shown whose side He’s on. He’s with His heavenly Father. He’s with the Holy Spirit. Will you call unclean what God has called holy? Will you listen to the accusations, the assumptions of the unbelieving world, the lies of the evil one? Jesus will not leave you to that. He’s bound Satan and hoisted you over His shoulder to carry you out of that house of darkness and deceit. He’s poured water and His Word over you to make you His family. He looks at you and says, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and my sister and my mother.” And what is that will of God? It’s when He breaks and hinders every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature, which do not want us hallow God’s name or let His kingdom come; His will is done when He strengthens us and keeps us firm in His Word and faith until we die. And so He gives you the Holy Spirit, not an unclean one. He gives you forgiveness and life in your Baptism, in the absolution. He invites you to the family meal in His Holy Supper. He gives you faith to know and believe what God calls holy is holy and what He calls unclean is unclean. All your sins are forgiven. Believe it is yours in Jesus. See yourself as the plunder that Jesus has given all to win. In the name of Jesus, our brother. Amen.