Rising 192 feet above campus, integrating earth and sky sits a 2 ton Celtic cross, the highest point on Milligan College. For 50 years, she’s been an icon in the community, representing God’s reign over this little corner of the world. The cross’ history dates back to Scotland and the Celtic monks on the Island of Iona, who are credited with saving western civilization through their diligent preservation and protection of Ancient Hellenic manuscripts. Alongside their conservation of classical culture, they also carried on the Christian tradition immediately following the withdrawal of the Roman army and the collapse of civilization at the hands of the Angles and Saxons.[i] Their mystical style of Christianity still shapes modern thought. There is a Celtic axiom declaring heaven and earth to be but three feet apart, but in the ‘thin places’, that distance is even smaller. These ‘thin places’ exist where the veil separating heaven and earth is pulled back, revealing the glory of God. Sitting there, you reach out your hand and expect to feel Him, it’s that palpable. These are not simply places where God’s presence is felt, but hallowed ground where heaven and earth are one, giving us a tiny glimpse of God’s kingdom, regenerating creation all around us.
Mark’s gospel, written circa 66-73 C.E, is a story about and for a community living in ‘thin places’, whose very lives point to the nearness of God through their commitment to His redemptive work of justice, peace, compassion and liberation.[ii] By living according to the rules of this new kingdom, Christ’s community reveals the glory of the living God right here, right now. Doing so requires the shedding of cultural and normative values that so many of us simply take for granted. Mark therefore demands a redefinition of our view of power, the role of government and geopolitical conflicts, class struggle, family dynamics, economic principals and sexuality by taking a fresh look at life through the lens of God’s Kingdom.
Kingdom living is so subversive, so revolutionary that it can only be accomplished by wiping clean the slate, starting life from scratch with the process of new creation. Only a new earth has room for this new kingdom. Therefore, we shouldn’t be surprised with Mark entitling his work “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Messiah”[iii] “It can hardly be doubted that the arche ( beginning) of Mark 1:1 has a paradigmatic or metaphorical relationship to the arche of Genesis 1:1…There is another first time despite the fatigue of world-history.”[iv] Mark boldly states in his prologue that Jesus is ushering in a fundamental regeneration of salvation history through his life, community, vocation and death by delivering the coup de grace to Caesar and his reality. Gospel itself is a first century Hellenistic term translating “news of victory”, uniquely applied to military or political battles.[v] Herein lies yet another hint of Mark’s seditious story, this gospel is challenging imperial Roman authority and their way of life through heralding a new king and kingdom. Specifically, the public action of Jesus’ baptism ushers in this new imperial model.
“In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John into the Jordan. And when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased’.”[vi]
If redemption discharges past social obligations, the symbolic act of Jesus’ baptism should be viewed in social terms:
“It is a genuine act of repentance. As such it ends his participation in the structures and values of society. It concludes his involvement in the moral order into which he was born…the totality of the Jewish-Roman social construction of reality, has been terminated…He has become wholly unobliged.”[vii]
Jesus’ baptism inaugurates new creation and the possibility of thin places existing here, forever destroying Platonic dualism. He renounces the old order by declaring his kingdom come to earth as it also is in heaven. Because of this, thin places don’t just exist on the mystic moors of Scotland, they exist everywhere Jesus’ kingdom ethics are lived out. The veil between heaven and earth is torn asunder when wealth is redistributed through tithing, when third world debts are cancelled with the celebration of Jubilee, when broken hearts are healed, when liberty is proclaimed to the captives, when evangelism spreads through love and not coercion, when governments exalt the good and punish evil, when the old are not left alone, and the strong learn to care for the weak, when paternalism and hierarchy are replaced with egalitarianism, when justice reigns and truth finally wins, when there is no poverty or crime, when work is rewarding and rest is sweet, when the color of our skin won’t get you in or keep you out[viii], when children are safe in their homes and the cult of narcissism is replaced by self-sacrifice. Scattered throughout the four corners of this world, individuals and Christ-following communities reveal thin places daily; they are a small glimpse into the new heaven and new earth.
“For I will create a new heaven and a new earth; the past events will not be remembered or come to mind. Then be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating: for I will create Jerusalem to be a joy, and its people to be a delight.”[ix]
[i] Email from Dennis Helsabeck, Milligan College Professor. November 13, 2011.
[ii] Myers, Ched. Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus. (page 11).
[iii] Mark 1:1.
[iv] Via, Dan. The Ethics of Mark’s Gospel-In the Middle Time. 1985.
[v] Myers. Binding the Strong Man. (pg. 123).
[vi] Mark 1:9-11.
[vii] Waetjen, Herman. The Construction of the Way into a Reordering of Power: An Inquiry into the Generic Conception of the Gospel according to Mark. 1982.
[viii] Mullins, Rich. Song lyrics: The Maker of Noses.
[ix] Isaiah 65:27-28.
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