Untamed

The Venerable Joan Clark

Mark 1:9-15

Today’s scripture reads a bit like a Tarzan story. Immediately after Jesus’ baptism, he is driven into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit, where he spends forty days in the wild, tempted. He was with the wild beasts and angels waited on him. Jesus in a sense underwent a “wilderness experience,” a kind of coming of age before entering into his ministry, one that would challenge his mission, his ministry, his very identity.

Look closely. The scripture doesn’t say that Jesus tamed wild animals. Nor does it say he fought them, overcame them, rose above them, or was attacked by them. It says, he was “with” them. He lived “with” them, among them, all the while being fed and nourished by angels, or the providence of God. Like Tarzan, Jesus lived among the animals of the wild, in the wilds of the desert, surviving like an animal of the desert on what he found to eat (or was given by angels), He learned the ways of the wild. He learned about nature and the difference between predator and prey. He learned to understand their community and order. He learned how to survive.

It seems, Jesus, Lamb of God, Shepherd of Israel, before entering into a ministry that would challenge his goals and tempt his soul, would first have to get in touch with his true nature –not the cultivated one of Jewish community expectations, values, and rules, found in the constructed world, but his nature as God’s Son, an original human being, born of a natural community, “wild” and “untamed” as God is untamed, at one with all of creation, tried and tested, raw and authentic.

Like John before him, Jesus must be one with the wilds, before entering into the dangerous territory of “cultivated civilization.”

Some of you may remember the story of the “Jungle Book.” The book was made famous by its Disney adaptation of the story, in which a young boy Mowgli is raised in the wilderness, a place where he understands the laws of nature, a place where loyalty is valued. In the story, “man” is the enemy of the natural world and not to be trusted. The jungle is the peaceable kingdom, and the cultivated world is an unpredictable and fickle “wild” place, where brother betrays brother, and no one is safe.

In the wilderness, you can count on your pack to defend you. You know who your enemies are, whom you can trust, and whom you cannot, and why. And you know your place in the “circle of life,” to quote the phrase from the Lion King.

Jesus needs this reminder of who he is before as Son of God, Lamb of God, entering into the “Jurassic Park” of Pharisees, Priests, Officials, and others, who would test his strength, betray his trust, question his identity, and undermine his authority. For this mission, he would need to be “wise as a serpent, yet gentle as a dove!”

In his wilderness experience, Jesus takes on the identity of Messiah, Shepherd, and Anointed King in the footsteps of his forefather David, who underwent similar wilderness experiences, first hiding from Saul and later dealing with the betrayal of his close friend and advisor, after which he wept alone on the Mt. of Olives (2 Samuel 15:30-34). David had been raised a shepherd, the youngest of sons and the least of his family. Used to living in the wilderness, where he moved about with his sheep among predators and dangers, he learned how to deal with both opposition and temptation. But he also developed the heart of a shepherd and the soul of a lion –brave in battle, strong in faith, obstinate in mission, unyielding in his trust in God’s provision, so much so, that when he faces Goliath with 5 smooth stones and a shepherd’s sling, he sees not a giant but a fool who has nothing against the power and might of the God of Israel.

Both David and Jesus cut their “wisdom” teeth and grew their faith as men of the wilderness, chosen by God, and fit to survive.

The wilderness of Israel were filled with wildlife. Lions, brown bears, panthers, leopards, jackals, cobras, hyenas, vipers, scorpions, porcupines, rats, wolves, and wild dogs roamed the deserts and lived in the same regions as deer, doves, gazelles, and goats.

This was a place that longed for restoration, a wild place, a desolate place. It was also the place where God touched down to recreate the world and launch a plan for kingdom living.

Only three primary places do we find the word, wild beasts, in scripture: here in Mark, in Acts, and most of all in Revelation, all describing a desert-like, desolate environment in which a man-made, cultivated world is destroyed, and God’s re-creation begins.

For God’s restoration always emerges from the depths of desolation. What is built up in aversion to God’s will must first be destroyed before God can restore the beauty of a garden world.

God does not emerge from a cultivated place. But God emerges from a wild and untamed place.

We are a people who like living in a “tame” world, a world that we love to control, an environment we like to construct, and a civilization we like to impose our will upon, often to the advantage of some and the detriment of others.

But God comes from a wild place, a place where every creature, including humankind, lives together in harmony and a natural order, a place where God reigns supreme and God’s will is done, a place where trust in God is paramount and we know who we are, a place where restoration begins with the mere rudiments of faith.

Jesus’ experience in the wilderness tempted him to live as the world lives. But Jesus denied the ways of the world instead opting to trust in God’s provision, God’s leadership, God’s strength, and God’s plan.

When Jesus emerged from his wilderness experience, his message to all was this: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the good news!”

At this initial moment in Jesus’ ministry, this inaugural experience, the kingdom of God touched down in a wilderness place. And there infusion of our original human nature, God’s creative Spirit made real in the world, God’s plan enacted would begin to spread like a weed throughout the cultivated world, creating holy chaos, and reminding people who they were, reminding them of what it means to be created in God’s own image.

You too were created to be “wild.” Obedient to God but averse to the ways of the world, to the constructs of injustice, to the hierarchies of the heart, to the illusions of power and control that dominate the human-created community.

And your church –your church is meant to be a “wild place,” where you get in touch with God, where God can touch you, and where you remember who you are as an authentic child of God and member of the created and natural community.

Jesus will come out of his desert experience to be a “wild card” in the ordered life of everything everyone expected and knew. His disciples would be too.

Don’t let the world tame your God-feisty spirit. Don’t let the world destroy the human part of you!
How wild are you? Isn’t it time you got in touch with your wild side?