by Rev. Carole Horton-Howe
Please note that the following sermon text was provided prior to the audio recording. The two versions may differ substantially.
Mark 10:17-31
As Jesus was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your father and mother.’” He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.
Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”
Peter began to say to him, “Look, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”
I spent time recently with a friend whose father died two years ago. Her mother died long before that. Only recently has she been able to begin the painful work of sorting through the things in her parents’ home and put it on the market for sale. It was so difficult to make the decisions about what to keep and what to donate and what to sell. Everything she touched had a precious connecting memory of the great love her family had shared in this place. She didn’t even realize how strong her attachment was until she was faced with separation from the lifelong security of this house, this address, this front door key, this gossamer anchor to her wonderful childhood.
Taking steps into the future is often a difficult task – getting ready for the first day of school whether you’re a student or an educator; leaving a secure corporate job to start a business; attending a first AA meeting; calling a marriage counselor; these are transitions in our lives can rock our world.
We’ve all had to make some significant changes in the way we look at things over the last 18 months. We have looked at what we truly value, evaluated what is essential and what is not. I think we’ve all gained a deeper sense of the preciousness of all life. We may have even gone as far as the rich young man in the gospel today wondering about eternity and our place in it.
This young man comes to Jesus clearly aware that following rules, even the honored rules of the ancestors, does not satisfy him. He perceives that there is something more that transcends the boundaries of his existence. There’s no implication that he’s being deceitful when he says that he has followed the commandments that Jesus lists all his life. He sincerely wants to find the way to eternal life. His question has a passionate urgency about it. And Jesus heart goes out to him. Perhaps Jesus sees him as being among those who are blessed because they hunger and thirst after righteousness.
The next thing we hear is how very much Jesus loves him. And out of that great love, Jesus calls him to discipleship, to set aside all the things he has that confer status and power over others. Jesus asks him to learn how to be dependent like a child and receive as a gift the salvation that he supposed he could do something to earn.
“Sell everything you own” was a teaching for this particular man at this particular moment. Jesus’ instruction to him hits him so profoundly in his head and heart that it shocks him. We are told that he goes away in sorrow. Perhaps this well-meaning young man realized for the first time that his possessions possessed him.
Jesus does not tell the young man what following means. Like the other disciples – like all of us – he has to learn along the way. But he refuses to take that first crucial step in the journey, rejecting the opportunity to learn and grow. He could not bring himself to accept the invitation. He couldn’t make the transition out of ancient thinking. People in the first century often took wealth as a sign of God’s blessing. But once again Jesus teaches something radical: abundant life offered by God through Jesus Christ is not defined by riches. Many Christians in the first century church who heard Mark’s gospel had had to make a choice between faith and family, but had received a larger family in the community of faith which like this text combines the blessings of living as brothers and sisters in the family of God with the reality of persecution.
The disciples ask “who can be saved?” But the real question is “who can do the saving?” God and God alone. Here is the heart of the matter: eternal life does not come about by anything we do. It is not one bit connected to our being good or our hard work. We have it because God loves us, because God looks at us with love and desires relationship with us. There is nothing we can or must do to inherit salvation but to know that real riches are in the pursuit of a close relationship with God through Jesus Christ and do all that we can to prevent anything to come between us and God.
Does this seem impossible to believe? It’s natural to be skeptical because we live in a world thinks in terms of transactions. You give something and get something in return. But God’s economy is not ours. God’s economy transcends ours. This is Mark’s theme of the impossible possibility: what is impossible for human beings is possible with God. We hear this also from Paul: earning salvation is impossible for humans, even the best of us. But God, who creates out of nothing, justifies the ungodly and raises the dead, can save us when we are at our best and at our worst.
Giving away everything we have is not what Jesus is asking of any of us today. Please don’t feel like God wants you to go home and organize massive yard sale. That would be irresponsible and absurd. But we are called in this scripture to heighten our awareness of where we stand in the socioeconomics of our world. We are privileged people. I suspect that most of us would acknowledge that we have more material possessions than we really need. There’s nothing wrong with material possessions. Only the worship of them. Only when their importance distracts us from what is important to God which is always to build up the Kingdom of God by caring for and sharing with each other, for creation. It’s about living our lives with the same generosity towards others that God gives to us. It’s anything but business as usual.
I wonder what it would be like for each of us if we had the same opportunity as the young man in this gospel story. Can you picture yourself encountering Jesus as he’s walking along with his disciples? Could you courageously step out in front of him and kneel at his feet with the same concern and longing for salvation? What if you were to ask him what you might do so that you might have eternal life? What if you were to ask what you need to set aside?
I have no doubt that he would look at each of us with love. And then he would give us the most marvelous gift – an instruction just for each of us, a sort of 11th commandment to follow, a way that we can grow closer to God both now and forever, a very simple command to accept with childlike joy the gift of salvation freely given. Blessed are you in your hunger and thirst for righteousness.
We don’t know what happened to this young man the next day or the next week. We can hope that his spiritual longing overwhelmed his material attachment and that the end of the story that we heard was a new beginning for him. New life in the Kingdom always allows for first steps. We can hope that Jesus’ words prove to be a rich and strange irritant inside him like a grain of sand in an oyster that eventually produces a beautiful pearl. May it be so for each of us as well. Amen.
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