Galileo was imprisoned for challenging it.  Edwin Hubble’s observations seemed to corroborate it.  Contemporary scientists deny that it is even a legitimate question.  While the citizens of Tulsa declare it to be clearly true.  Are we the center of the universe?  Does everything revolve around us? 

In the 1630s, Galileo publicly agreed with the theories of Copernicus that the universe, or more particularly the solar system, was heliocentric, not geocentric.  That the earth revolved around the Sun and that the Sun, not the earth stood at the center.  In response, The Inquisition condemned him as a heretic and sentenced him to house arrest until his death. 

Now every schoolchild knows that the earth revolves around the sun. But in the 1920s, Edwin Hubble observed that every distant galaxy appeared to be moving farther away from us.  On the surface Hubble’s discovery seems to corroborate the idea that our galaxy, solar system, and planet might, indeed, stand at the center of the universe.

Enter modern physics into the discussion.  Einstein’s theory of general relativity predicted a universe that is either expanding or contracting.  A universe with no edges.  A universe in which the vacuum of space is not merely the backdrop for general relativity, but itself is expanding and contracting.   Contemporary astronomers and astrophysicists, following Einstein’s theory, have theorized that the universe has no center, but is expanding and contracting only from a point in time, not a place in space.  These modern cosmologists have declared all questions about the center of the universe moot.

Meanwhile, the City of Tulsa, Oklahoma has declared itself to be the Center of the Universe.  A pedestrian bridge, rebuilt after a fire in the 1980s, exhibits a remarkable acoustic anomaly.  If you stand inside a thirty-inch concrete circle surrounded by a concentric circle of planters and benches and speak, your voice echoes back and is amplified.  Noises from outside the circle are distorted.  And anyone outside the circle cannot hear what is said inside the circle.  The spot, dubbed by city fathers as “The Center of the Universe,” attracts tens of thousands of visitors each year.

And so, the debate continues.  Are we the center of the universe?  Does everything revolve around us?  No matter where we stand cosmologically, we often act as though we are the center of the universe.  That everything should revolve around us.  Our sinful take on God’s creative purpose to give man dominion over the cosmos tempts us to confuse stewardship with kingship.  And we lose sight of who is at the center and fail to remember that the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.

This failure is often true in our worship.  This is why our service always begins with a “call to worship.”  We need to be called into worship because we are prone to think we are already at the center of all things. So, God takes the initiative and calls us to come and worship Christ who is the center. We also struggle with who is the center as we read the Scriptures, thinking surely, they are principally about us.  And while they are certainly “breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work,” we must acknowledge that while for us, they are not about us.  Jesus, not us, is at the center of every passage.  Even those that seem purely instructional.  

Mark 6:7-13 is a good example of the temptation to forget who is the “main thing.”  Jesus is beginning his third preaching tour of Galilee.  In the first he called fishers of men.  In the second, he called out the Twelve.  And in the third, he sends the Twelve on their first training sortie for the Great Commission.  But they would face real sickness, real provisional need, real rejection, and real demons.  And while we might be tempted to view this is a paradigm for our own gospel ministry, the focus should be on what Jesus does.  What he gives, commands, and expects. 

Of course, discipleship involves disciplines.  But the essence of discipleship is not in honing disciplines, but “fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith.”  Disciplines are means of grace, but never its ends.  Reading Jesus’ instructions in Mark 6:7-13 we might be tempted to look for procedures, preparation, and paradigms.  But let us look instead to Jesus who calls, sends, provides, empowers, and receives again his beloved disciples.

Join us as we examine Mark 6:7-13, and Mark 6:30 to consider what Jesus does, gives, commands, and expects when he calls us to follow him.  We meet Sundays at 10:30 am on the square in Pottsville, Arkansas right next to historic Potts’ Inn for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join our livestream on YouTube.