“Time to Let Go”
Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost
October 10, 2021
Amos 5:6-7, 10-15
Mark 10:17-31
This passage, at first glance, really hits us where it hurts today—our wallets. You’ll be happy to hear, however, that this passage has nothing to do with stewardship. It’s spiritual. It’s theological. It’s…dare I say it…political. And it hurts more than just our wallets.
In those days—not unlike today—there was skepticism about those who were wealthy. On the one hand, people had come to believe that wealth was a sign of God’s blessing and good fortune. Who hasn’t hoped for a get-rich-quick opportunity? Most Americans have bought at least one lottery ticket in their lives—or pulled the handle on a one-armed bandit at a casino, hoping for the best, expecting very little.
On the other hand, people also recognized that most wealth held by one person was accumulated through less-than-honest means. Consider the Pandora Papers—the research done exposing the many ways the wealthy of the world have secreted away evidence of their wealth in order to avoid paying the taxes the rest of us pay. Some of these were legal loopholes, but not all. And even legal loopholes are not necessarily ethical ones.
And before we get too comfortable on our own high horses, we must remember that wealth is simply defined by comparison to one’s neighbor. While billionaires are wealthy in comparison to most of us middle-class Americans, we are extremely wealthy compared to the majority of the world’s population.
So, let’s take a closer look at today’s text. There are some elements that are easy to pass over if we don’t know what we’re looking at. We begin with Jesus setting out on a journey. The Greek says that Jesus was ‘on the way.’ On the way, quite frankly, to Jerusalem. On the way to the cross. On the way to his death, when a wealthy man runs up to him and kneels before him.
“Good Teacher,” he says, “what more must I do to inherit eternal life?” My predecessor, Lowell Hennigs, has been writing weekly commentaries on the gospel passages, and I really appreciate the various approaches he takes to these texts. Here, he suggests that calling Jesus ‘good’ is a way in which the man is hoping to bring Jesus into his elevated confidence. Like saying, “Hey, we’re both above the rest of this riff-raff—me with my wealth, you with your status. Give me the low-down here. How can I get more than I have? I don’t quite feel satisfied.”
Jesus puts him in his place. “Why do you call me good?” Why do you assume we’re anything alike? Only God is good. Quit sucking up. You know the commandments. You know what you’re supposed to be doing. Interestingly, he adds a commandment. Along with murder, adultery, stealing, and lying, he include defrauding. It’s curious—because that’s not one of the commandments. What he leaves out, however, are the first ones—no other gods, no idols, no names above God’s name.
The man concludes that he’s done everything by the book. But it doesn’t feel like enough. He’s got everything, and yet he’s lacking something. And Jesus turns the tables on him. “You’ve got nothing that matters. Let it go. Get rid of it. Not only that, but give it to the very people upon whom you have built your wealth. And don’t stop there. Once you’ve divested yourself of everything in your way, then you will be free to follow me with your whole heart and mind and soul and strength—to love the Lord, your God—and to follow me to the cross.”
And as we all know, he can’t do it. As Jesus points out, to follow him means putting down your privilege and power so that you can pick up a cross. It means leaving behind your ideas of success and walking to Jerusalem. It means letting go of your way of life in order to die…and truly live in freedom. Like us, this man has become too dependent upon his life.
And I, for one, understand. I may make some sacrifices for the sake of the gospel, but I would never choose to leave my husband, my child, my home, my security. My security. Because I place my welfare in what I have more than in what God has done for me. I’ve often said that I won’t give these things up willingly—God would have to take them from me. And in doing so, I’m not so sure I’d be able to praise God like Job did.
More importantly, though, there’s an underlying element to this passage. It’s more than where we place our priorities and security—the defining of our gods over against our Creator. This is also about what we consider salvation—and for whom. Jesus never talked about personal or individual salvation. The man wasn’t looking for assurance of what happened after he died. These are recent ideas.
The eternal life—or ‘abundant life’—the man seeks was very much something in his lifetime. He wanted to experience a deeper quality of life. He was hoping to be part of a movement that would change the world—or at least change the reality for Israel. When Jesus talks about the Kingdom of God, he’s not talking about some heavenly afterlife but about a very real way of life, here and now. When the disciples ask, “Who can be saved?” they’re not asking about going to heaven someday. They want to know who will be part of the new order of things when Jesus reconciles the world to God—here and now.
All of this is to say that our ideas of a heavenly kingdom for individuals is a far cry from what Jesus taught. It is a decidedly western Christian way of looking at things. And it leaves us separating the spiritual life from the rest of our lives—keeping, as many would like, politics out of the pulpit. This individualistic way of looking at God’s Kingdom allows us to put blinders on and ignore our responsibilities toward our neighbors, both locally and globally. It allows us to see ourselves as morally superior, regardless what decisions we and our ancestors have made that may have destroyed the life of the other.
What Jesus encourages this man to do is to let go of his idea of individual success and his personal inheritance of eternal life. Let go of the ways in which he has made himself ‘better than’ his neighbor. Let go of his personal and private practices of faith and embrace what it means to be in community. Jesus suggests that being saved has nothing to do with individuals, and as long as we approach God in this way, we build a barrier between God’s love and our hearts.
The point I’m making—the point I believe Jesus is making—is that everything we are, everything we have, everything we do is a spiritual matter. Everything we support, everything we challenge—it’s a spiritual matter. It all stems from what we understand of the God who created us and all living things. It stems from where we put our trust, where we place our security, to whom we turn when all is lost. Who we know ourselves to be at our very core—what we deserve and what is demanded of us—has, at its root, what we believe about God’s love and grace, God’s mercy and justice.
When we say our hope is in the Lord, it is a declaration that denies our hope in anything else—money, nation, standing, reputation, position, authority, or citizenship. We make a claim that sets aside allegiance to anything but God. That’s what makes the gospel so scandalous. If you’re not scandalized, if you’re not at least a little uncomfortable, then you haven’t been listening. Because the gospel challenges our way of life, just like it challenged the rich man in today’s passage. It challenges every element of our way of life. And when we realize that we prefer to live under the demands of this world rather than in the mercy of God, we leave behind the way of Jesus, grieving and angry and often lashing out at others.
Jesus says that it is more difficult for those who have something to lose to experience God’s good kingdom in this world than it is for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. It is impossible. It is beyond imagination. And yet…and yet, God does not let the impossible define God’s love for us. And so, the divine continues to work and knead our hard hearts of stone, crumbling them piece by painful piece. Until God takes that messy pile of rubble and turns it into a heart of beating flesh. Vulnerable. Delicate. Fragile. A heart that is finally able to let go. A heart ready to be part of a body filled with good news.
Pastor Tobi White
Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church
Lincoln, NE
