GREAT THINGS ENTERPRISE
CLAUDE BLACK
Mark 5:6
Anticipation
During the years Alice and I were employed at Emmanuel College, now University, in Franklin Springs, Georgia, Alice organized and led mission teams to several destinations—Latin America, Africa, the Far East, and Europe. One trip was longer than usual. On the arrival date, I took a van to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport to await the team’s arrival and bring them back to the college. I saw the plane touch down, taxi to the terminal, and the jetway extend toward the plane. Several minutes later, passengers began coming through the door into the terminal. The team must have been sitting in the back of the plane because they were about the last passengers to disembark. But at last, there they were. I greeted them, but there was one person I hugged and whose presence filled my heart with joy.
My awaiting the arrival of Alice and the mission team has some similarities to the story St. Mark told of a man separated from society, living among the tombs in the hills near the Sea of Galilee, and screaming and injuring himself daily. Mark wrote, “And when he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and bowed down before him.” (Mark 5:6) It appears that the man in this story saw the small flotilla as the boats landed and was moved to run toward them. There are several pieces of information that would be helpful in this story: What motivated a man, separated from society, to run toward these people? What distinguished Jesus from the crowd so that this man bowed before him? What was the reaction of the small crowd when a naked, wild, perhaps bloody man came charging toward them?
Whatever the case, there must have been a sense of anticipation in this man to run toward Jesus and bow before him. The word Mark used for “bowed down” (προσεκύνησεν, prosekynesen) is usually translated “worship” throughout the New Testament. It presents the image of one on his knees with his head touching the ground in humble submission.
This man seems to have been motivated by a feeling of anticipation much like what I felt as I watched the plane land and taxi to the terminal, bringing the mission team home. It seemed like a long time between when the plane parked at the terminal and the passengers streamed into the terminal. Finally, Mark’s story teaches that there is no situation so desperate that it cannot be brought to Jesus.
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