Sometimes struggling with the Sunday sermon can lead you into some pretty strange places...like an image of the Holy Spirit as a bouncer.
It sounds a little weird, but I'm pretty sure that's what Mark is saying. Jesus gets picked up by the scruff of the neck and tossed into the midst of the wilderness like a two-bit drunk trying to crash a swanky club. And there he lays...on curb of some kind of mean street with all its temptations and wild beasts and angels. Amazing: He comes out of the whole experience proclaiming the nearness of the Kingdom, as though life "out there" could be some kind of transformative experience.
Hmmm. Most of my life has been spent avoiding the wilderness. Maybe I've been wrong about that. Maybe life in the wilderness...life at the edges of civilization...even with all its chaos...is a place where we can learn what it truly means to be the Children of God. Sounds kind of risky.
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