Memorial of Saint Agatha, Virgin and Martyr

 Lectionary: 325

Endure your trials as “discipline”;
God treats you as his sons.
For what "son” is there whom his father does not discipline?
At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain,
yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness
to those who are trained by it.

 J esus faced a form of discipline along with his family, neighbors, and childhood friends as he returned to Nazareth, his native place. He and they were disappointed with what they found. If he was glad to see his old companions, people he'd known since his infancy, they were confused and distressed by what they saw and heard from him. 

He was inexplicably speaking with confidence, authority, and astonishing insight about a religion they thought they knew and thoroughly understood. His talk of God's Kingdom being here and now made no sense to them. They saw only the dreary familiar, and there was nothing new or special in that. His message and his presentation should be only the same old, same old with nothing fancy or schmancy. 

We cannot say how he saw them. The Evangelists do not probe the mind of Jesus beyond saying he was happy or sad. The Son of God remains as inscrutable as God the Father. As Isaiah said, 

Who has directed the spirit of the LORD,

or instructed him as his counselor?

Whom did he consult to gain knowledge?

Who taught him the path of judgment,

or showed him the way of understanding? (40:13)

But Saint Mark indicates this homecoming was a trial for Jesus: "...he was not able to perform any mighty deed there.... He was amazed at their lack of faith."

Discipline, like suffering and grief, usually has an unexpected quality about it. If I thought I was ready for it, I find that I am not. It's more demanding than I expected; it wants more than I thought I was ready to pay. The disappointment, however, may be short-lived if I quickly recognize its familiarity, rise to the occasion, and set my mind to obedience. Despite his disappointment Jesus healed "a few sick people by laying hands on them." 

The recent change in federal administration will demand much of many Americans. We are going a direction they did not want or expect. They consider the changes unreasonable, unjust, and unfair. Perhaps they have been persuaded by a deterministic ideology that says history must progress in a particular, predictable order. But that future that seemed so certain is passing, and will soon be irretrievably lost. The Kingdom they foresaw might not be God's Kingdom after all. 

Others will be disappointed that the excellent future they expected with Republican control of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government does not appear. I suppose that no one will be especially pleased with the way things happen. 

And so we ask the Holy Spirit to give us more discipline than we like, more patience than we can muster, and more generosity than we intend to give.