Mark 10:17-22; The Twentieth Sunday after a; October 10, 2021;
Life in Christ Lutheran Church, Grand Marais, MN;
And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.’ ” And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth.” And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. And Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” And the disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how difficult it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” And they were exceedingly astonished, and said to him, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.”” (Mark 10:17–27, ESV)
Grace and Peace to you from Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
On the school bus the other day, as I was waiting to take the kids home, I had a discussion with a preschooler. I was out of my league. “Why is that there?” Pointing to the knob on the radio. “Uh, to adjust the volume on the radio.” “Why would you that?” “So, people can hear it.” “Why…”. If you go down that dark rabbit hole with them, you’ll get to questions with no good answers. It continued until grace intervened, and I “had” to tell the child to sit down because we were leaving. “Why?” He asked again.
Jesus had a similar question from the rich man in our text.
“Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
It is a nonsense question. He’s made a fundamental error. First, he has assumed the Jesus will be complimented by being called good. As with many in the life of Jesus he speaks better than he knows. He has likely done it because he wants to swap compliments. “Good Teacher.” Yes, “Good Student, rich in this world because you are loved by God and your riches show that.” It is how he saw himself; it is how the average person of the day saw him. From his point of view, he deserved the compliment, so he begins with one for Jesus.
Jesus won’t have it. He points out what the man is actually saying. The truth, but beyond his understanding. Like me and the preschool child. “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.” You don’t know who you are talking to. I am God, but you have mistaken me for a simple teacher who can be bribed by compliments.
Jesus sets him up for a fall. He begins in the way the rich man expects.
“You know the commandments: Don’t murder, don’t commit adultery, don’t steal, don’t bear false witness, don’t defraud, honor your father and mother.”
“Of course, I do. “I have kept them all since I was little.” He must have had a beaming smile on his face. He thought he knew where this was going.
“Well then, Beloved by God. You have done well. Welcome to the Kingdom of Heaven.” But Jesus didn’t say that.
Instead, Mark says, “Jesus looked at him and loved him.” And, as I have said before Mark is the devil for details. CFW Walther said, that distinguishing between Law and Gospel is “only taught by the Holy Spirit in the school of experience. ” Jesus doesn’t need experience. He sees into the heart. And what he always sees in the naked human heart is sickness, pride, and death. And yet, he “loved” him. In fact, he loves him in such a way that he won’t let is pride stay. He knows it must be rooted out, the prideful heart killed and replaced with a clean new one. Jesus pushes the law to the breaking point. It is what this rich man needs.
“You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have …” everything you own, everything that makes you feel favored by God, everything that pushes your pride to the forefront, everything that stands in your way to seeing me clearly for who I am. “and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”
Jesus is perfect in his application. You can see it in the text.
“Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful for he had great possessions.”
Well, “disheartened” doesn’t quite capture it. “Surprised because of something that appears incredible and alarming,” is what the Greek word means. Shocked at the impossibility of it, might be better. He went away sorrowful, distressed. And then its our turn to be shocked. Jesus lets him go. No application of the Gospel to the hurting soul. No saving words of grace. But that’s not what happened in the man’s heart. The law didn’t penetrate. His heart was stubborn, pride was still alive. He leaves because he can’t do what Jesus asks. He leaves because he simply won’t do what Jesus asks. He doesn’t see Jesus as the “good” teacher he thought he was. He is going away to find his compliment elsewhere.
Jesus turns to his disciples. “How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”
And it’s their turn to be shocked. Jesus tells them of the impossibility for even favored human beings (in their eyes) to be saved.
“Children, how difficult it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”
His point is vivid. They know camels, they know needles. Camels are large, needles eyes (even those used to mend sails) are small. A camel won’t fit. You can’t make it. (And forget about the “eye of the needle” being a small door in the wall of a city, that you could enter with a camel with great difficulty by unloading it. It doesn’t exist.) Jesus isn’t just saying it is hard, even for people who have things easy, he is saying the difficulty approaches impossible. Jesus isn’t just talking about rich people. He’s talking about everyone.
The shock shows on the disciples. “Who then can be saved?” If God’s favorites can’t be saved, what chance have I got?”
Jesus could have said, “Here endeth the lesson.” They have gotten the point. People can’t be saved by anything they have, by anything they do, by any personal attribute, or anything they could give to God.
“With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.”
It takes God to save.
How wonderfully miraculous. How wonderfully profound. People can’t do it. You can’t buy it. You can’t earn it. God saves purely by gift.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. (Eph 2:8–9).
Boasting is borne of pride. The rich man had that and wanted to stoke the fire. Jesus says it doesn’t work that way.
So how does it work? Let’s go back to that detail: “Jesus looked at him and loved him.” Jesus saw into his sin sick heart and saw the pride that lurked there. He was sicker that even the rich man thought. Sin was at the heart of his being, so sinful, in fact, that he needed killing. You need killing. Objects in the mirror or more sinful than they appear.
One of my favorite novels is “The Hammer of God: A Novel about the Cure of Souls” By Bo Giertz. Giertz was a Swedish pastor who struggled against Pietism (that is the idea that emotions play the lion’s share in our salvation) in the middle of the last century. In the novel a younger pastor tells an old, seasoned pastor that he has “given Jesus his heart.”
"Do you consider that something to give Him?"
By this time, Fridfeldt (the younger pastor) was almost in tears.
"But sir, if you do not give your heart to Jesus, you cannot be saved."
"You are right, my boy. And it is just as true that, if you think you are saved because you give Jesus your heart, you will not be saved. You see, my boy," he continued reassuringly, as he continued to look at the young pastor's face, in which uncertainty and resentment were shown in a struggle for the upper hand, "it is one thing to choose Jesus as one's Lord and Savior, to give Him one's heart and commit oneself to Him, and that He now accepts one into His little flock; it is a very different thing to believe on Him as a Redeemer of sinners, of whom one is chief. One does not choose a Redeemer for oneself, you understand, nor give one's heart to Him. The heart is a rusty old can on a junk heap. A fine birthday gift, indeed! But a wonderful Lord passes by, and has mercy on the wretched tin can, sticks His walking cane through it and rescues it from the junk pile and takes it home with Him. That is how it is."
The rich man’s heart is the tin can. Your heart is the tin can. Or you could think of the most useless, gross, piece of trash by the roadside. Covid medical waste or Isaiah’s filthy rags). Our Lord, Jesus, sees you, all of you, your sinful corrupt heart and all, and he “loves” you. He stabs you through the heart and takes you home to be his “treasured possession.” There is nothing in you that deserves this outcome. Only God’s grace, the gift of gifts.
“Why?” the preschooler asks.
Well, the answer is easy, and difficult at the same time. He does what he does, because of love.
God’s great love beyond the capacity of human beings. A sacrificial love that brings him to earth as a human being. A sacrificial love that takes him to the cross. You simply cannot understand God great love (his ἀγάπη love, the word Mark used when Jesus looks at the rich man) in any other way than to see him on the cross for you.
Your heart is that hopeless broken dirty tin-can on the side of the road. Jesus is stabbed through the heart for you. He is stabbed through the hands for you. He is stabbed through the feet for you. On that cross he takes the thing that makes your heart so retched. He takes the sin of the whole world on himself. He buries it in death. He buries it in the grave.
Jesus’ resurrection is the most miraculous thing that has ever happened. Dead and in the grave the greatest sinner that ever lived, rises from death through the power of God. Sin, your sin, your pride particularly, is left there to rot. But not Jesus. He comes out of the tomb and carries you with him.
He chooses you at the side of the road and brings you through death to new life. And new life in Jesus is the only way to overcome our pride, our selfishness, our sin. When faith is focused on Jesus, instead of what we can do to save ourselves, the Holy Spirit works in that old slimy, filthy hearts to make it new. It doesn’t happen overnight. You are saved in an instant, faith grows brining you to depend on Jesus more and more over lifetime.
Well, the account in Mark can be a bit unsatisfying. We don’t find out what happened to the rich man. There is an old church tradition that says that he fell on hard times and became a thief, crucified next to Jesus. The one who says, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” I don’t know. Like I said, unsatisfying.
But it is not unsatisfying for you, oh child of God, blessed by God, chosen by God. You have Jesus. You have the Holy Spirit. You are God’s favored position. Amen.
The peace of God that passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
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