A sermon for the Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany in 2024

Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.

Knowledge is like a little bird making itself look large by fluffing up its feathers; it warms the bird, it helps the bird, it protects the bird at times; it is all for the bird’s own good.

Love is like the bird that builds a nest, patiently searching for just the right materials to stop the draught and secure the foundation for its family, who stocks it with food when the eggs are incubating, who creates the conditions for new life to flourish. Love is the bird who comes back and starts again when it all goes wrong because of the storms or the predators or the sadness of the world. Love builds up.

Jesus, the Love of God born among us, walked up to the synagogue on the sabbath and encountered a man with an unclean spirit. The scribes knew about unclean spirits, but they hadn’t summoned the authority of God’s mercy to cast them out – I don’t know why. I can only imagine that they were too tired and worn down by working for their own survival to extend themselves further. We can all relate.

Knowledge has the words of wisdom, but love is wisdom, grace, and mercy in action. 

There’s a story in the book of Acts about a group of people who tried to use their knowledge of Christ and his saving power for their own ends and authority. They “tried to use the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits saying, ‘I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.’ … But the evil spirit said to them in reply, ‘Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are you?’” (Acts 19:13-15)

There is nothing wrong with knowledge, but without the humility of love, it is powerless.

Even the demons know who Jesus is; but their power cannot withstand his authority. Knowledge puffs up, but it is all bluster. But love, love is something else.

When Jesus walks into that synagogue, he comes with an authority that astonishes the people. One of the commentaries I read describes that word as meaning that Jesus has the freedom to wield the power that he possesses (The Jewish Annotated New Testament, note to Mark 1:27). He is at liberty to do what he says, to make his actions match his words, his love match his knowledge. He is free to do the will of God, which is to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim and to deliver release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim and to deliver the year of the Lord’s favour (Luke 4:18-19, after Isaiah 61:1-2).

And he, says St Paul, has set us free; Jesus has given us authority to cast out unclean spirits; and what do we do with that knowledge? Only love shows the way. 

The man with the unclean spirit was a member of the synagogue. He was right there among them on the sabbath. He was not an outsider nor an outcast. But he had a problem. He had a spirit that had hitched itself to him, hitched a ride upon his heart and soul, a spirit that itched and carped and kept him from full communion with God and with his neighbours. While the scribes were expounding on the scriptures, this spirit was whispering unsavoury nothings in his brain. While the congregation proclaimed their prayers, the spirit sneered and made his tongue stumble over the promises of God and the hope of God’s people. I think, I suspect that each of us knows that unclean spirit, or one of its relatives.

Just lately, I have heard things I haven’t heard in a generation, blaming this group of people or that for the state of the world, criticizing and carping over other people’s problems, diagnosing sin as that which dwells in them. Knowledge puffs up, but the knowledge or suspicion of other people’s shortcomings will not heal us. Love does not begin the conversation with, “You’ve got it all wrong. You are all wrong,” nor without the knowledge of how much we ourselves get wrong, and how much grace I need simply in order to survive.

I am not talking only about our state legislature that claims to know people better than they know themselves, or their own children, better than their doctors and therapists, better than their prayers, better than God knows them; although that is surely one example of puffing up. Such puffing up cannot, as Dean Owens wrote from the cathedral this week, “take away the truth that you are seen, known, and beloved by God for who you are and who you were created to be,” that there is so much more room in God’s creativity and love than in our limited and often blighted imaginations.

God knows everything, but if that were all, we would only fear him. Because God is all-loving, all-merciful, all-creating, and all-liberating, then we can rest in, and trust, and love God, too.

Knowledge may confess its sins; it is love that makes amends. Knowledge has the recipe; love feeds the world. Knowledge recognizes the tormenting spirit; love frees the captive. We know the redeeming love of Christ and the merciful way of the Cross; do we use that knowledge to puff ourselves up, to tear others down, or to build a beloved community? 

Will we use that knowledge, church, to become a hall of fame for the saints, or a place of healing and hope for sinners? Isn’t that why we come to the table, because God has known us and seen us for all of our uncleanness of spirit, and because Jesus has washed our feet anyway and invited us to his table, freeing us from our shame to be ourselves as he sees us in his love?

Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. And Jesus is the Word, and the Wisdom, and the Love of God. Our foundation is in him.

Deuteronomy 18:15-20; 1 Corinthians 8:1-13; Mark 1:21-28; Psalm 111
The Jewish Annotated New Testament, Amy-Jill Levine and Marc Zvi Brettler, Des (Oxford University Press, 2011)