You may or may not know about me that I became a mom and was ordained at the same time.  I was seven months pregnant when the bishop ordained me.  Needless to say, there is ongoing debate about whether Simone is also a deacon since she was in utero at the ordination.  But what becoming a mom and becoming ordained at the same time has meant is the patterns of the two vocations are interwoven for me.  So just like on any given day in ministry, my plan for the day can get upended with a phone call, a drop-in visit, or a text, so is the precarious nature of parenting.  I can be in the middle of preparing dinner when a friend-crisis erupts at home for one of the kids.  I can be driving a kid to practice, only to learn from the backseat that the kid is struggling with a bully.  I can be trying to write a sermon, and another kid bursts inside with a bloody knee.  Some folks might see those parenting and pastoring moments as “interruptions” to a day.  But as someone who became a pastor and parent at the same time, that constant feeling of pushed and pulled, interrupted while trying to charge ahead, and even rerouted entirely is part and parcel of living my vocations faithfully.

I think that is why I find our gospel lesson today so compelling.  Jesus has just come off the casting out of demons in the temple that we heard about last week, with everyone awe-struck by his teaching with authority.  Then, today he just tries to go to Simon’s house to chill out, when he is immediately notified about Simon’s sick mother-in-law.  After healing her, Jesus tries to settle back down, but by sundown, the whole town is at the door, asking for healing and cures – which Jesus graciously offers.  In the wee hours of the morning, Jesus goes out to a deserted place for a moment of peace and prayer, and Simon and the others interrupt his moment for more work.  Jesus rallies the troops and off they go, proclaiming the gospel and casting out demons.  Even Simon’s mother-in-law, as soon as she is healed, begins serving Jesus and his disciples.  Not to be confused with some sort of subservient, sexist expectation that women should serve men – no, the word used for what Simon’s mother-in-law does is the same word used for what deacons do:  she serves.  In fact, she is the first deacon in the New Testament[i], and as such, teaches us that life following Jesus is just like following along in this story about a day in the life for Jesus – you are constantly pulled and pushed, invited into service in whatever ways that service shows up on your doorstep.

Yesterday I was a part of a bishop’s election.  Sometimes I think the way we elect bishops is almost cruel – for the community where the candidate serves, they are both incredibly proud of their priest, but also incredibly anxious that they may lose their priest.  All sorts of emotions and concerns get stirred:  maybe my priest doesn’t want to be here anymore, maybe my priest is neglecting her job here, maybe my priest doesn’t care about me or our church.  But getting lost in those anxieties misses what is happening in a bishop’s search.  The priest is simply doing what he or she does everyday:  listening and responding to the call of ordained life, wherever that call pushes and pulls.  Sometimes that means hopping in a car to get to the hospital immediately; sometimes that means stopping the crafting of a report, article, or sermon to listen to a hurting soul; sometimes that means talking for an extended time with a stranger at the grocery store, the gym, or the bus stop because your priesthood doesn’t belong just in the church walls.  But sometimes that means saying yes to serving on a board for workforce housing, saying yes to a bishop’s request that you serve the diocese in a particular way, saying yes to raising funds for your seminary – and even saying yes to discernment to the episcopacy.  Just like there are countless balls to juggle in parenting, there are countless balls to juggle in ordained life.  That’s just what we do when Jesus calls us – we serve.

As we settle into the idea that I will in fact being staying in ministry with you, I see this “Day in the life of Jesus” from Mark’s gospel today as an invitation.  As Debie Thomas describes, our invitation today is to “spend our days as Jesus spent his…living graciously and compassionately in this vast and often terrible in-between.  To offer the comfort of our steady presence to those who suffer.  To encourage those in pain to hang on, because the work of redemption is ongoing.  To create and to restore community, family, and dignity to those who have to walk through this life sick, weak, and wounded – without cures.  To make sure that no one who has to die – and that’s all of us in the end – dies abandoned and unloved, if we can help it.”[ii]  That means as we at Hickory Neck step away from this time of discernment, we do the work of that first deacon, Simon’s mother-in-law.  We get up and we get back to work:  caring for one another, serving our neighbors, sharing the good news with those who need a good word.  Though this call to serve may feel like a frustratingly interrupted time of prayer, in fact, the interruption today is the perfect reminder of the life of Jesus:  being pushed and pulled, interrupted and redirected, and in moments like this – seeing the beautifully sacred in the midst of all our very human feelings.  I invite you today to take my hand, so we can get back to the work of the kingdom.  Amen.

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[i][i] Gary W. Charles, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, Vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 335.

[ii] Debie Thomas, Into the Mess & Other Jesus Stories:  Reflections on the Life of Christ (Eugene, OR:  Cascade Books, 2022), 75.