Mark 10:17-31.  In yesterday’s post I mentioned that the Pharisees thought that their system of following the Old Testament was the way to be sure of spending eternity with God in Heaven.  I also mentioned that in today’s reading we would see that people were not entirely sure about what the Pharisees were telling them.

In today’s reading we see Jesus on the move again.  The scenery may be changing physically but I think it is not changing too much with respect to the disciple’s spiritual or learning journey.  As Jesus begins this journey he as approached by a man.  The man comes up quickly and bows down at Jesus feet.  He wants to know how he can be sure he has “eternal life”; that is a forever relationship with God in Heaven.  The man addresses Jesus as “good teacher”.  Jesus uses that greeting to get the man’s attention of God.  Bowing was a way of showing extreme respect for someone; even worship.  Although from other parts of the New Testament we know that Jesus is God and worthy of worship the man was probably looking at him as a great man rather than God.  Jesus responds in a way to get the man to clearly focus on God.  Jesus doesn’t say he isn’t God or isn’t good, he just points out that only God is good.  Then he goes on to answer the man’s question, sort of.  Jesus basically quotes part of the “Ten Commandments” from Exodus 20:3-17.  Those Ten Commandments were seen as the foundation or a summary of the requirement of the Old Testament Law.  The first four deal with our relationship to God and the last six deal with our relationship to each other. Jesus is referring to the first five of the last six, he leaves out the last commandment, “You shall not covet (strongly desire) your neighbor’s wife, house, servants, or stuff.”

The man responds to Jesus that he has done all of these things since he was a young man.   Jesus appreciated his response, the Bible says he felt “love” for the man.  In Greek (the language of the New Testament) there are four words for love.  This one speaks about a sacrificial dedicated love, the same kind of love described in 1 Corinthians 13.  Jesus love motivates Jesus to inform the man what he was lacking in his devotion to God, Jesus told him to sell all of his stuff and give it to poor people.  Through Christian history there have been groups of believers who though it was a mark of great devotion to God to be poor; take a vow of poverty.  Our relationship with God is more complicated than just making up a bunch of rules and following them, that is what the Pharisees were doing and it wasn’t working.  This man certainly had heard the Pharisees take on how to have eternal life and was not satisfied.  Jesus answer was personal and related to where this guy was spiritually.  The guy really wanted to live for God, he had kept all those rules since he was young, but he was missing one key thing he had at least one false God in his life, money.  He had a lot of money and wanted to hold on to it at all costs.  That is why Jesus was pointing him to the one true God.  Unfortunately the man left.  The Pharisees were busy holding on to their traditions for security and this man was busy holding onto his money for security.  Neither was like the little children who lived life by faith.

In verses 23-27 Jesus turns from the rich man’s spiritual journey (which had just taken a very serious wrong turn) to the spiritual journey of the disciples.  He told the disciples that it was hard for a rich person to go to Heaven, clearly he was implying that the rich man was going the wrong way, all the good that he had done was not enough.  His response to the rich man amazed his followers.  He took his answer even farther by telling them that it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven.  Bible scholars debate whether Jesus was being literal or was using a metaphor.  In those days cities often had walls around them with large gates in the walls to enter through.  At night the gates would be shut and not opened until the following morning.  If someone came after closing time they had to stay outside the city.  Some cities had a way around this by putting a smaller gate in the large one, a door really.  That door could be easily opened form the inside to allow a person in.  It waas small and easily defended.  Some scholars claim this small door was called “the eye of the needle”.  Although difficult it is possible that a camel could go through one of these doors (perhaps in pieces).  Jesus was probably talking about a real needle used for sewing though.  You can see this in the rest of the conversation.  The disciples responded by asking, “Who can be saved then?’”  Clearly they understood the answer to be, “No one.”  Jesus supports this answer by telling them that it is impossible for men to save themselves, but there is hope, salvation (spending eternity with God) is possible if God does it for us.  And that is exactly what Jesus’ journey to the cross was going to be about, a fact he was trying to get the disciples to understand.

Unfortunately they were still being held back by their traditional views of how to get to heaven a little.  Maybe they thought that the rich man hadn’t done enough but that they had.  Peter started talking, reminding Jesus how much they had already given up.  Jesus’ answer assures Peter that he knows they have made sacrifices, and God isn’t about them being in poverty; giving up stuff doesn’t make us better, it may be necessary sometimes, but it doesn’t make us better.  Remember the problem with the rich man was that he had other gods in his life, he was a spiritual cheater.  The disciples on the other had had given stuff up and were faithful to God, though confused.  God would take care of their needs now and would give them a place in Heaven.  Jesus ended the lesson by telling them Heaven doesn’t work on a whose done more basis, it’s about putting your faith in God to take you there.  That is what he is getting at when he tells them that the “first will be last and the last first”, he is turning their traditional ideas inside out and upside down.  Some of the first people in their society (like Pharisees and rich rulers) will have the hardest time getting into Heaven because they will need to abandon their adult pride and become like dependant children.  This lesson would have probably been very comforting to the believers in Rome, many of not all of whom were last in their society.  Most of whom had only been believers for a short time and not “kept the commandments from their youth up.”  To them and to us the message is, it’s all God’s doing and we just need to receive the Kingdom of God as a gift from Him.

God thank you for heaven.  Thank you that I don’t need to earn it.  Thank you Jesus for paying my way in.  Help me have no other gods in my life.  Help me trust you for now and for eternity.