“Amazed, and perplexed”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Thursday, April 7, 2022
Mark 10:17-31 (Forward, p. 68) CEV p. 1040
Jesus’ words really flew in the face of the accepted wisdom and thinking of the times. Applying what is sometimes called the Deuteronomic principle, they believed that ‘what goes around, comes around.” In other words, people are repaid, in this present life, for what they have done. So, if a person is healthy or prosperous, then it means that they have lived a good, respectable, righteous life. And if someone is ill or poor, it implies that God is judging them harshly for having lived a less than noble life. (That was the entire gist of Job’s friends or ‘comforters’ when they judged him harshly in the midst of his terrible calamities and illness. He must have been a terribly bad person to have suffered all those things!)
And so, for Jesus to harshly judge riches in general and to imply that riches could be an impediment to gaining eternal life, would come as a real shock to His hearers. Wealth was seen as a sign of God’s favour, a sign of having ‘made it’ with God. Some manuscripts add the words ‘people who trust in their wealth’, but that is hardly necessary. Jesus was implying that having wealth was simply not good enough. The disciples were astounded, incredulous: “How can anyone ever be saved?”, they asked.
So here Jesus breaks the bubble entirely. Generations of well-meaning, observant Jews had figured that it was ‘up to them’, that their salvation was based on what they did, in particular on how diligently or scrupulously they kept the Law of Moses. (That certainly is the way that the apostle Paul saw it). But here Jesus says that it is something that none of them can do, that it is actually impossible for humans, but that is something that God can indeed do. With God, all things are possible. God can do anything.
And so, using Paul’s own words, it all comes down to a matter of grace, of God’s totally unearned, unmerited favour. It has absolutely nothing to do with how good or bad a person we are. It is simply a gift, a gift from God. However, there is a wee problem here: it is still something that we must receive. Or, to use another analogy, a gift accomplishes nothing if it not subsequently opened and made use of. To put it another way, we have to trust in the giver and fully accept the gift. Perhaps, then, that is why Jesus told the rich young man to give up all his riches. Perhaps those very riches were getting in the way of his placing his trust in God or in Jesus.
So maybe there is a couple of lessons here for all of us. Firstly, to realize that we cannot ‘do it’ –salvation—in and of ourselves but have to trust Jesus to gift us with it. And secondly, to understand that there may well be things in our own lives that impede or get in the way of our fully receiving and making use of that gift--or enjoying it. Amen.
Forward notes: “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” (verses 21-22).
“I have paced many hours, worrying about how I would pay the bills. I have asked family and friends for help. I have sought the aid of churches. And I have faced the consequences of my choices and circumstances when I could not make ends meet. I always thought that the anxiety I felt was about not having enough money.
“But what I really wanted was security. Money equaled—and still equals—security to me. In my mind, having money means being safe, okay, and free. Money and the things money can buy are pretty much one and the same. Maybe that’s why it’s so shocking to hear Jesus ask someone to give away all their money and possessions. I hear Jesus’s words and imagine him speaking them to me. And it makes me anxious. But deep down, I know Jesus is right. Jesus is looking at me with love, speaking truth and offering a different way.”
Moving Forward: “What treasure can you give today so that you might be freer to follow Jesus?”