Reflection - A Question of Boundaries

By Rev Clive W Ayre

No matter how far back we go in history, there has been a felt need to establish boundaries. Mark 9:38-50 relates an incident in which the disciples saw someone casting out demons in Jesus' name, and they tried to stop him because he wasn't “one of them”. But Jesus had other ideas. 'Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us.' It was a question of boundaries, and the need to draw demarcation lines.

At the risk of over-statement, I want to begin with the thought of making friends with the enemy; or in other words, trying to understand the disciples' position. As is often the case in Mark, there's a touch of irony here. The irony is that not long before, they themselves had tried unsuccessfully to affect a healing. Now here was someone who was succeeding where they had failed, and he wasn't even a member of the union! No wonder they were upset!  I think we can relate to that!

When it comes to a question of boundaries, God's ideas are much more expansive than ours.  In his reply to the disciples' well-meant attempt to silence an unauthorised operator, Jesus tells us that church boundaries need to be pushed back. This presents a problem for some of us, so that when we see what to us is some very strange ways of “being church”, we may struggle to include them.

Jesus' boundaries are much wider than ours tend to be, and it is possible that there is room for God to work beyond the confines of what you or I may think reasonable or acceptable.  It may even be that Jesus' work can take place beyond the bounds of those who confess his name!  There's no doubt that the story in Mark is affirming, gracious, and inclusive. But it is easier to accept in theory than it is to put into practice. The not-so-amazing truth is that God's love for the world is not limited to us.

But Jesus' message also has implications in the area of social responsibility. It is easy to envisage areas of social responsibility in which people are effectively casting out demons of injustice, and they don't belong to us. This is undoubtedly a difficult area in which opinions may differ widely, even when both sides are claiming the Bible as authority. But with all the difficulty, we also have to say that we can't really have the gospel without it. Think of a Bible without the prophets, and I'm sure that they didn’t find it easy either.

We can easily recall the plethora of non-Christian groups actively involved in social justice issues, and in one form or another, doing part of the work of God. Who can say where the boundaries lie? The gospel pushes us beyond the point of comfort, to extend the boundaries, and to be more inclusive in our attitudes. In this question of boundaries, given our propensity for drawing lines, it becomes a matter of where we draw them. God's love is established in justice, truth, and peace. We should let God's expansive Spirit be at work in us.