October 11, 2009
Text: Mark 10:17-31
Most of us can identify with the man in today’s Gospel reading who comes with his question for Jesus. He approaches with great respect and wants to know the way to eternal life. He isn’t just asking, “How can I get to heaven after I die?” but, “What kind of life is real life?” “How shall I live so that my life is full and complete?”
Jesus’ response is like a “good news, bad news” response. First, Jesus recites some of the commandments: do not kill; do not commit adultery; do not steal. This sounds like good news, because like the man we tell Jesus, “We have worked on these since our childhood.” So far the man in the story is just like us. He is our kind of guy. God is sure to like him – and us – as well. Mark even tells us, “Jesus looked upon the man and loved him.” But here comes the bad news. Jesus says, “You lack one thing: go, sell, what you own, and give to the poor.”
Uh, ho; now what? Sell what we have? “It has taken me these many years to accumulate what I have. Do not my possessions give me my real life? Look at all of us – we are successful; we have what we need, we are not dependent on others; what we have we acquired honestly; we worked hard and long for what we have; you can see how God has richly blessed us. Surely, this is real life.”
In response to our protest, Jesus could very well say, “If you believe that your possessions give you your real life, then why are you asking, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Listen again to what I said, “How hard it will be for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.”
Again we protest, “That is impossible. If receiving eternal life is as restrictive as a camel going through the eye of a needle, then how am I going to be saved? Can anyone be saved?”
The picture we have in our mind’s eye is one in which we are trying to squeeze all our bumps, lumps and humps, through the eye of a needle. We are frightened and frustrated at this impossibility. What do we need to get rid of? How to get on the other side of that needle?
Now Jesus focuses our attention away from ourselves and toward God. He says, “With human beings it is impossible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God.” You see, with God, a camel can go through the eye of a needle. If that is possible with God, then it is also possible with God that we can be saved.
We are back at the original question the rich man asked of Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” The blunt answer to the man’s question is, “Nothing.” We cannot do anything to inherit. It is God who has acted through Jesus Christ to graciously give us an inheritance, that as we read in First Peter, is “imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for us.” (1 Peter 1:4)
The death and resurrection of Jesus gives us another picture to view in our mind’s eye. This picture focuses our attention on the opposite side of the needle from where we are now. There we see God, with one foot on either side of the opening, pulling on the ears of the snorting, wide-eyed camel, straining mightily to pull through the awkward beast that is each of us.
Another picture that is familiar to us is the poem “Footprints in the Sand.” The poet asks, “Why is there only one set of footprints at times?” Jesus answers, “Those are the times I carried you.” A more accurate picture might show Jesus pulling us like mules, with heals dug into the sand leaving behind deep skid marks.
God is the one pulling us through the eye of the needle of salvation, and God never stops pulling. It is hard work for God – He loves us more than anything. It is painful for us – we must acknowledge that we have not loved God as much in return. Clinging to all our stuff, God still pulls and squeezes through the needle’s eye. Sooner or later, we finally recognize the needle’s eye as death. Death strips us of all that we are and all that we have. The opening of our grave is the eye of the needle.
It takes God our whole lifetime to get us through. As we live, we learn daily how much of our journey is a process of being stripped of things we thought were precious but are not. We are fearful, faced with having our security stripped away, but we can be confident. The good news is that we have already passed through the eye of the needle. In our baptism, God joined us to the death of the crucified one, Jesus, the Christ. Stripped of everything and thrown into the grave of the needle’s eye, he cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” There was God, one foot on either side of the opening, pulling Jesus through to resurrection and new life. God pulled Jesus through, and now Jesus has become God’s promise of pulling us through the needle’s eye of salvation.
The rich man could not see in Jesus the Son of God who would pull him through the eye of the needle. He went away shocked and grieving. Why we follow Jesus is because he is the Son of God. Christ living in each of us, He is the real owner of our lives, and not our possessions. His life is our real life. Through the gift of his Spirit, we learn to interpret our pains in light of God’s faithful, persistent struggle to pull us through the needle. If we lose our courage or our grip amidst the pain of all the stretching, squeezing and pulling, God will never let go. He is the only one possible to pull us through the eye of the needle.