We've had a lot of “call stories” of late, encounters in which Jesus invited his disciples to leave their nets and books and follow him. They likely left not only their livelihoods, but whole networks of family and community who relied upon them. We get a glimpse into the extended family of four of Jesus’ closest disciples in this week’s passage:
As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.
Andrew, Simon (Peter), James and John are the four fishermen whom Jesus called from their nets to follow him. These two sets of brothers lived and worked together, and Simon and Andrew lived with their extended family in the same household. And clearly Simon Peter was married. It's likely the others had wives and children as well.
So the call to follow Jesus implied sacrifice from others, not only the disciples who traveled with him. I saw a poignant reminder of this in an excellent but short-lived TV series, Nothing Sacred, about a Roman Catholic priest. In one episode, we keep coming back to a statue of a woman waving, and we don’t know what it means until the end, when we learn it is a representation of Peter’s wife, waving goodbye. (I can't recall which episode, but someone has put the series up online, if you can’t get it another way…)
We don’t know if Peter’s extended family affirmed faith in Jesus Christ – but there they were, hosting and serving his entourage. The moment Jesus heals Peter’s mother-in-law of her fever, she gets up and makes dinner. They were drawn in by virtue of their relationships, and thus were part of the community of faith, no matter what they believed.
I know many who have been part of a church community in which their spouse does not participate. They exist in a special tension between living out their faith with the fullness they’d like, and not taking too much time away from their families and partners. This can also have an emotional and spiritual consequence; I’ve watched people hold back on going deeper spiritually because they don’t want to get too far “out in front” of a less believing partner. If you know someone who is on their own in their faith journey, in terms of their family system, remember to pray for him or her, and find ways to “be family” for them at times.
And if you are in that situation, you might pray that the grace and strength you feel in your connection with God would come through you into your household, whether or not the others in your family name it. God’s peace is God’s peace, and it works its wondrous way even when we don't recognize it as such it. Then it doesn’t have to be a tug-of-war, but a way to blend without imposing. And maybe in that space, the partner can find room to move toward God. There are passages in the New Testament in which Jesus or one of the apostles clearly states where the priority between faith and family should be. And there are others, like this one, where we see the healing power of Jesus move into a whole household and bring transformation to a whole family.
Or maybe he was just hungry and wanted Peter’s mother-in-law to make her special meatloaf! What do you think?
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