Division in the Kingdom of Israel

Homily for Friday of the 5th Week in Lent

There is nothing new about divisions. Our society today can be defined by divisions within our population. We divide people into the different races, the different genders, the different faiths, the different sexualities, and different political ideas. The Scriptures speak of divisions through the two readings that we have from the First Book of Kings and the Gospel of St. Mark.

King Solomon is guilty of breaking the first and, perhaps, the most important of God’s commandments. “You shall have no other gods before me.” He has allowed his many wives to pray and sacrifice to their own gods rather than the God of Israel. God tells him that when his son takes the throne, the kingdom of Israel will be divided. Today’s first reading explains how it was divided – 10 tribes in the southern kingdom, and to tribe in the northern kingdom. The southern kingdom is known as Israel, and the northern kingdom is known as Judah. They will remain divided until the end of the Babylonian captivity. In 1 Kings, the prophet meets Jeroboam on the road and tears his cloak into twelve pieces. Ten of them are handed over as a sign that God is doing something new, even in the midst of division and disappointment. Israel’s fracture isn’t the end of the story; it becomes the place where God begins again. God works through brokenness, not around it.

Then Mark shows us Jesus entering the region of the Decapolis—Gentile territory, outsider territory—and healing a man who cannot hear or speak. Jesus draws him aside, touches him, sighs from the depths of his spirit, and restores him. What was closed opens. What was divided becomes whole. What was isolated becomes connected again.

Put together, the readings remind us that God does not abandon us when things fall apart. Whether it’s a kingdom tearing in two or a man cut off from the world by silence, God steps into the fracture. God meets us on the road, in the places where we feel divided, confused, or incomplete, and begins a work of restoration.

The invitation is simple: bring your broken pieces to God; namely, the parts of your life that feel torn, the relationships that feel strained, the places where you feel unheard or unable to speak. God has a way of turning division into possibility and silence into song.

And like the people in the Decapolis, we may find ourselves saying, almost in wonder, “He has done all things well.”