Today we will answer the question of what is important.
As many of you know, I grew up on about 2 acres on the hilltop above St. Marys, WV. When my parents moved there and built their home, it was simply another pasture. In fact, the place was still fenced and actually divided into two by barbed wire and locust post fences. Old Man Wilson grazed cattle on half the land and Dad mowed the other half. When you crossed the fence about a hundred feet outside the back door of the house, you were in a 50 acre cow pasture on a hillside that sloped down to a run that had been dammed up to form a small pond. Across the road in front of the house was an overgrown field, with about a hundred acres, mostly of multiflora rose.
Beside the house, there was about a half acre that was ideal for playing softball or kickball. You know, there are special challenges to playing soccer or kickball in West Virginia.
We’d take a soccer ball or a dodgeball and kick it around using baseball rules. But there was one very important rule that we played with – If you kicked the ball foul, you chased it. Because if you kicked the ball too far foul, it began to roll downhill, bouncing faster and faster, jumping over the barbed wire fence and down through the pasture, hopping over cows and calves, hitting everyone of those parallel cow paths as the ball bounced down, down, down a quarter of a mile to stop on the edge of the pond. If you kicked the ball foul, you had to chase it, and everybody else waited and watched while you jumped down the hill from cow path to cow path, dodging cows and cow patties, and eventually disappearing from sight below the curve of the hill and then five minutes later, your head would appear as you slowly climbed back up the hill, and fifteen minutes later, you climbed across that barbed wire fence oh-so-carefully, lifting each leg high over the top line of wire so you wouldn’t get caught, and then, finally, the game was ready to begin again. We got very good at kicking those balls in fair territory, because that was important!
Years later, I was trying to explain this to some friends in Atlanta. You know, they just didn’t get it, because they had always lived in subdivisions on flat land and played on baseball fields that were several acres in size – once again on flat land. But I knew you’d understand.
In our Gospel story today in Mark 10, Jesus and His disciples had traveled in their regular journey from Caperneaum in the region around the Sea of Galilee to travel south a hundred miles to the area near Jerusalem. They had walked in the towns outside Jerusalem, the area known as Judah, and they had gone down in the Arabah, the great valley of the Jordan and the Dead Sea, and spent time on the other side of the Jordan, in what is today known as Jordan. And then they started on their way back across the Jordan toward Jericho, which lies at the foot of the road which leads up thousands of feet to Jerusalem.
As they started toward the Jordan River, “a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Now, a normal man would have addressed the question before him. But Jesus was no ordinary man and liked to call our attention to details that most people would just skip over. “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.”
This statement sounds almost like a joke at first reading. But Jesus makes two deeply profound theological statements with this point. “No one is good – except God alone.” Jesus answers. People aren’t good, Jesus is saying. Only God is good. The Apostle Paul would take up this theme in the Book of Romans, and 1500 years later Martin Luther would also take up this theme, and the other Reformers such as Zwingli, Calvin, Menno, and Jacob Amish, all of whom established Switzerland as the center of the Reformation, and it has become one of the core principals of Protestant Christianity – as Paul put it: “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”.
We are all flawed – only God is perfect. For the rest of us, in our natural life, we only do good things accidentally, or for selfish reasons. The natural person is not good – a child is not good – an infant is not good. All of us are selfish creatures, damaged by our contact with other people and the world which has been damaged by those people. The rot that began with Adam has spread to all humanity, and “No one is good—except God alone.” And because of this alone, we should all bow down in humbleness before the God who made us.
And the second deeply profound statement was made at the same time. “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.”
“Why do you call Jesus good?” Is it because you recognize that Jesus was indeed good? And if you think Jesus is good – then Who are you claiming that Jesus is? If you think that Jesus is good – and you already know that only God is good – then you must be claiming that Jesus is God – which is exactly what Jesus claimed repeatedly. Jesus is not just a particularly wise man – Jesus is God Himself walking upon this earth! And if Jesus is God, than everything He says and does is particularly important for us to listen to – and when Jesus says to do something, it is truly the Word of God speaking!
“And the Word was with God and the Word was God.” “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,” as the Apostle John put it in the beginning of his Gospel.
After this powerful beginning, Jesus finally answers the man’s question – the question of “What must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Oh, what a question. Entire books have been written on this question throughout the ages. Movies and television shows have been filmed on the question – and you’d heard and seen and read the answers:
The movie and tv shows Highlander – the movie starred Sean Connery – says that immortals dwell among us, but if they are beheaded, they will die.
The movies Armageddon, Saving Private Ryan, The Magnificent Seven, the book “The Greatest Generation” all say that we live eternally through the memories of those people who remember the sacrifices we made for them.
The Buddhists and Hindus believe that everyone naturally lives an eternal life, that every life IS suffering and the goal of every soul is to stop living eternally. A rather sad outlook, in my view.
Existential philosophers say that this question of eternal life is the most important question of existence – How can I be certain that I will continue to exist?
Jesus answered practically:
19 You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not defraud, honor your father and mother.’”
20 “Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.”
And Mark tells us that 21 Jesus looked at him and loved him.
Can you imagine that look! Can you imagine God looking at you with those eyes that have seen everything, Him holding up the hand that would soon have a nail hole in it, His clean brow and clean hair that would soon be filled with blood, the look of love and compassion that Jesus gave to that man? Can you imagine Jesus looking at you with that same look of love?
But the look was tinged with a bit of sadness, for Jesus knew what was coming next as He spoke once more to the man, knowing the man’s innermost heart, his pride, his arrogance:
“One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
22 At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.
The man had been honest every since he was a boy. The man had been kind ever since he was a child. The man had been exceptionally good about following the rules and he had become rich and wealthy and successful and he had a name he could be proud of. He was known far and wide as a particularly good man, a man that you could trust, a man who could give you good advice.
But he was not willing to do the last thing he needed to do to follow Jesus, and he was very sad, for following Jesus is the way to eternal life.
The man was like many of us.
Because our parents and Sunday school teachers taught us the Ten Commandments in church growing up, we often think that following those commandments or other rules are the key to becoming a good person. But Jesus tells us that no one is good, except God.
Perhaps following those rules are the key to success in this world. Perhaps this is true. But Jesus told the man, His disciples, and us that no matter how good you are, no matter how successful you are in this world, no matter who you are – this is simply not important.
What is important is to follow Jesus. Just like kicking the balls in fair territory is important when playing kickball in West Virginia, following Jesus is what is important in life.
And following Jesus does not mean that you take a walk with Him every Sunday. I follow my little dog Brownie several times a day around the parsonage and around the church, but this is not what Jesus meant by following.
Following means that you are focused upon the actions of Jesus and you imitate Jesus and you do what Jesus did that is in your power to do. Like the Twelve, who left everything behind, their boats, their homes, their tax collections, their wealth, their families – a follower of Christ follows Christ – daily, even hourly. They rearrange their lives to become more and more able to do what Jesus asks. They listen closer and closer to the Holy Spirit and to what the Spirit says.
My pastor when we lived in Atlanta was Doug MacIntosh. When he was in seminary, Doug and his wife lived in a high-rise dormitory in Dallas with other seminary students. As graduation approached, one particular man became troubled because he could not discern what the Holy Spirit wanted him to do with his life, and so about 11 o’clock every evening, he would start praying in his dorm room – loudly. “God, what do you want me to do with my life!” he would shout.
After a week or so of this, one evening Doug, Cheryl, and some friends were in the room above the man’s room, and one of them got the bright idea to shout back in a deep, God-like voice: “Go to Switzerland!”
“What’s that Lord? You want me to go to Switzerland?”
“Yes. Go to Switzerland!”
The man went to Switzerland as a missionary and was very successful in his ministry, for he was committed to following the Holy Spirit, Who spoke through some godly friends.
But it is difficult to truly follow Jesus. Even Jesus recognized this and said as much:
“Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! 25 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.”
Now, there are some people who argue that the eye of the needle is a Jerusalem gate that was a bit of a tight fit for camels, but I don’t buy this. Jesus was not in Jerusalem, and He wanted to make a point about how God needed to act – and how wealth makes something which is difficult even more difficult.
26 The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, “Who then can be saved?”
In the ancient world, the general understanding was that those who are wealthy are those who have been blessed by God because of their goodness. Those who are poor have been somehow cursed by God because of something they have done. And though we intellectually think today that the poor are preferred by God over the wealthy, our hearts and our actions toward each group of people do not agree. Although we may believe in our hearts that the most wealthy people must be evil, we still believe that the well-off, the upper middle class, if you were, are doing the "right" things in front of God, and the homeless, the poor, the poverty-stricken are doing something wrong and that God has punished them for their actions. The crime which keeps people out of our living rooms is the crime of being poor, for in our hearts, we "know" that they have sinned.
When He talked about the camel and the eye of the needle, Jesus was saying that God needs to act for anyone to make it into God’s kingdom. We need the Holy Spirit to draw us into the kingdom before we are even interested. That’s why it’s so hard to talk people into coming to church – most of them aren’t Christians, they don’t have the Holy Spirit, and they don’t understand why they need to be here. And so you look at me the same way the disciples looked at their leader and you say, “Who then can be saved?” "How can anyone be saved?"
27 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”
And thus I tell you to pray for help with the dozen or so people you are trying to lead to Christ. Pray for God to melt their hearts. Pray for God to give you the words that need saying. Speak to them of the Gospel, but pray for God to save your friends, neighbors and family.
You know, in every crowd, there is always someone who wants a pat on the back. You may feel like you’ve done a lot for God. You may feel like you are well on your way to being God’s pet, like a good student is the teacher’s pet. I may feel like I’ve been working hard and following Jesus very well. And we want to say so, like Peter did:
28 Then Peter spoke up, “We have left everything to follow you!”
Once again, Peter has confirmed that Jesus is God. Jesus called each of the Twelve disciples. God, in the form of Jesus Christ, has saved them. The Holy Spirit has called me to be a pastor and writer. Christ has saved me. And God is calling you to minister to people also, perhaps full-time, perhaps part-time, perhaps in the church, perhaps outside the church, perhaps in a ministry of works such as Food pantry, perhaps in a ministry of caring such as being the listening friend who leads people to Christ, perhaps being the prayer warrior who goes onto your knees every morning and every evening and prays wonderful prayers that God listens to as a music lover listens to a symphony. Whatever it is, you can be sure that you are called, for God does not waste a willing heart. If you want to serve God, God will find a calling for you.
And what is the reward for turning over your life completely to your God, to following Jesus wherever He leads you, to leaving behind all your possessions, your family, your fields, your jobs, your homes?
29 “Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel 30 will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. 31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
The rewards will be there – a hundred times – and persecutions – and also eternal life in the age to come. Jesus Himself, God who is good, walking upon this earth has promised this.
And it does not matter whether you are the poorest, least educated, most miserable, most ignored, most hated human being in the world – or whether you are a billionaire politician who owns entire cities and has a hundred personal servants – God will reward all those who follow Jesus, for as Jesus said:
31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
So what is important?
How strongly do you follow Jesus? Is Jesus the center, the core, the everyday purpose of your life? Or is Jesus just on the outer edge of your life, a boundary which keeps you from stepping over the cliff edge of despair and evil-doing?
Keep your eyes upon Jesus. Look to further God’s purposes every day. Be clear for Whom you work – is it yourself, your family, or Your Lord?
27 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”
And thus I tell you to pray for help with the dozen or so people you are trying to lead to Christ. Pray for God to melt their hearts. Pray for God to give you the words that need saying. Speak to them of the Gospel, but pray for God to save your friends, neighbors and family.
You know, in every crowd, there is always someone who wants a pat on the back. You may feel like you’ve done a lot for God. You may feel like you are well on your way to being God’s pet, like a good student is the teacher’s pet. I may feel like I’ve been working hard and following Jesus very well. And we want to say so, like Peter did:
28 Then Peter spoke up, “We have left everything to follow you!”
Once again, Peter has confirmed that Jesus is God. Jesus called each of the Twelve disciples. God, in the form of Jesus Christ, has saved them. The Holy Spirit has called me to be a pastor and writer. Christ has saved me. And God is calling you to minister to people also, perhaps full-time, perhaps part-time, perhaps in the church, perhaps outside the church, perhaps in a ministry of works such as Food pantry, perhaps in a ministry of caring such as being the listening friend who leads people to Christ, perhaps being the prayer warrior who goes onto your knees every morning and every evening and prays wonderful prayers that God listens to as a music lover listens to a symphony. Whatever it is, you can be sure that you are called, for God does not waste a willing heart. If you want to serve God, God will find a calling for you.
And what is the reward for turning over your life completely to your God, to following Jesus wherever He leads you, to leaving behind all your possessions, your family, your fields, your jobs, your homes?
29 “Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel 30 will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. 31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
The rewards will be there – a hundred times – and persecutions – and also eternal life in the age to come. Jesus Himself, God who is good, walking upon this earth has promised this.
And it does not matter whether you are the poorest, least educated, most miserable, most ignored, most hated human being in the world – or whether you are a billionaire politician who owns entire cities and has a hundred personal servants – God will reward all those who follow Jesus, for as Jesus said:
31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
So what is important?
How strongly do you follow Jesus? Is Jesus the center, the core, the everyday purpose of your life? Or is Jesus just on the outer edge of your life, a boundary which keeps you from stepping over the cliff edge of despair and evil-doing?
Keep your eyes upon Jesus. Look to further God’s purposes every day. Be clear for Whom you work – is it yourself, your family, or Your Lord?
The answer to this question is important.
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