Mark 1:14-19:  14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15 and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.’  16 As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake—for they were fishermen. 17 And Jesus said to them, ‘Follow me and I will make you fish for people.’ 18 And immediately they left their nets and followed him. 19 As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets.

Some stories have memorable beginnings. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times” is the well-known first line from Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. “Call me Ishmael” – the first line of Moby Dick. And perhaps the most famous first line of all, “It was a dark and stormy night” - actually made famous through Charles Shultz’ Peanuts comic strip, even though it originated in an English novel named Paul Clifford written in 1830 (by Edward Bulwar-Lytton).

The Bible has a pretty memorable beginning – In the beginning….! As we begin our journey into Mark’s gospel this semester I want us to pay close attention to a certain piece of the story’s beginning – the mention of Galilee. This is a piece that is important for us to understand if we’re going to truly embrace the meaning of the “Good News” and the invitation to repent and believe in it.

We live a long way from the meanings attached to the Galilee of Mark’s world, so the impact of Galilee might be lost on us. In today’s terms, imagine that we are looking to start a movement that would take off and gain a following; given the early buildup to the 2008 election I’ll use the example of a political movement. If we were going to inaugurate a political movement and promote a certain candidate most likely we would start out in a place that had some clout – a place with a strong political heritage or an important role in the primaries – maybe Texas or California or Iowa. We wouldn’t start a high-profile political movement in, say, Idaho. For Jesus’ proclamation of God’s Good News to have it’s beginnings in Galilee, a backwater kind of place, rather than the religious center of the day, Jerusalem, is tremendously shocking for the hearer. It would be like someone starting a movement for the renewal of Michigan’s economy with a press junket in Mass City. It is unexpected. For those who’d been drawn into the Jesus story toward the end and said how did this amazing thing happen, he would’ve read or heard the beginning of Mark’s gospel account and said, “What, the beginning was in Galilee – you’ve gotta be kidding!” For those who’ve worked their to a level of self-assurance and self-righteousness in matters of faith they would expect God to speak from and through the established faith community – not Galilee!

Then there’s this mention of John the Baptist, a guy who wears camel hair clothing, eats locusts and lives in the wilderness, preaching about repentance and forgiveness, baptizing in the Jordan River in the region of Galilee, who eventually ends up in prison. And in case we forgot, he’s Jesus cousin and baptizer – this wild-eyed prophet who stepped on the toes of the powerful and as a result lost his head.

Nothing good is expected to come out of Galilee – just nobodies and nutcases. Later in the story, when Jesus is arrested, he is referred to as “that Nazarene.” And when Peter was asked more plainly if he wasn’t with Jesus since he too was a “the Galilean” he thought it was worth denying – Galilee did not have a grand reputation. Galilee was risky. Jesus is an unlikely candidate for transformation from an unlikely place.

Yet, it is precisely the unlikely nature of the story that allows it to be more than just business-as-usual. Here, the social location of Galilee provides just the right backdrop for an against-the-grain kingdom. Change is in the air. Business as usual, with its symbols of purity and cleanliness that only separate, is no longer the only game in town. A new order is within reach – God’s order – where the first will be last, the broken will be welcomed and touched by God’s healing compassion, and there will be a welcome break from the constant grind of competing, power-seeking, self-indulging ways that seem to offer way less than promised.

The author of Preaching Mark’s Unsettling Messiah tells the story that depicts the established church’s modern day refusal to embrace the Galilee beginnings of the Good News (page 109-110).

As we venture forward in Mark let us not forget the beginning of the Good News – an unexpected and unsettling place out of which comes an unexpected and unsettling message…..   “Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, …Repent, and believe in the good news.”

-René Johnson

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