Richard Davenport

October 13, 2024 – Proper 23

Mark 10:17-22

            The Gospel reading today is one that might be hard for us to relate to for a number of reasons.  We don’t know a whole lot about the man Jesus encounters other than he’s a young man and has a lot of money.  Most likely he’s inherited some family business that is quite prosperous. If that’s true, then he’s been used to having wealth all his life.  For most of us, that’s not the case.  If you’re doing well now it’s probably because you’ve spent your early years building up that fortune by working hard and saving well. 

            I can kind of imagine what that would be like, but I have a hard time thinking of what sort of person I’d be if I’d grown up having money around all the time.  Luxury hasn’t ever been a huge draw for me, but maybe that would be different if I had enough money to really become a connoisseur of luxury in some form or another, food, cars, art, or whatever. 

I didn’t grow up with that kind of money, so I don’t have a great sense of what that sort of life is like.            However, this would be the kind of life a man born into wealth would be used to. I’ve seen it, but I’ve never lived it myself.  That makes him a little difficult to relate to.  I’ve never had that kind of opportunity.  That’s not a good thing or a bad thing, since God blesses us all in different ways, but it does mean this man’s life is not one I’m really familiar with. 

            More than that though, his insistence that he has kept the commandments since his youth is interesting.  I’m not crazy enough to think I’ve done anything of the sort.  I fail at the commandments all the time, every day.  It’s pretty presumptuous for him to think he’s done even a reasonable job of keeping God’s commands, though, just like in our own day, many don’t realize how broad God’s commandments really are.  Even if you just stick to what the commandments specifically say, it’s pretty hard not to trip over them from time to time.  Murdering people?  Well, yeah I can say I haven’t done that.  I think I’d know if I’d been sleeping around, so that’s not too hard.  I can probably tell when I haven’t been respecting the Sabbath, though I could miss something there if I’m not careful.  Same with stealing.  You ever pick up and walk off with someone’s pen?  Might not have been intentional, but stealing is stealing. Coveting?  Well….I don’t think I can say I’ve avoided that entirely.  I don’t think there’s a kid alive who can conclusively say they’ve kept the 4th commandment every moment of every day. So, even there the infractions start to add up.

            Whether he knows it or not, the young man is suffering from a bit of pride.  He sounds like he’s on the right track though.  He wants to have eternal life and he’s asking Jesus how that happens. That’s the kind of question that should get him off on the right foot.  Who better to ask about eternal life than God himself?

            Jesus’ question follows naturally.  “How are you doing with the Law?” he asks.  If you’ve never run into trouble with the law, then you have nothing to worry about.  Only sinners have to worry about eternal life because they’re the ones who don’t have it. The young man’s response would suggest he’s just fine.  He’s kept the law, so what does he have to worry about?  Death is only for sinners and someone who has kept the law has never sinned.

            But, something prompted the man to ask Jesus his question.  Something told him this is what he needed to do.  Something told him his life wasn’t right, that maybe he was going to die after all and eternal life is something he really needed to be worried about.  If he really was perfect then this shouldn’t even be an issue.  But it is. He knows he isn’t going to live forever and he isn’t sure what to do about it. 

            Even that isn’t something I can’t really relate to. I have no illusions about how long I’m going to live.  If God allows me to, I may live to 80, 90, or even 100, but whatever that number ends up being, I’m definitely going to die at some point.  It isn’t something I wonder about.  I just know it’s going to happen at some point and I’m not really going to be surprised when it happens.  I know I’m a sinner and I know that’s what awaits all sinners. 

            Looking at all of that, it might sound like this passage is kind of a waste of time.  You could sum it up as:  “young, naïve, rich man who is a little too confident in his abilities wants to follow Jesus and Jesus tells him to leave his stuff behind and start walking. Young man is sad.”  We don’t really even know if the man does or not, though the text sort of implies he doesn’t.  You shake your head at the poor man who missed the boat and you go on with life.  Not much more to get out of this.

            But, on second glance, perhaps there is something here after all.  The young man is looking for eternal life, true, but he’s also looking for his inheritance.  He has a good life.  He has all of this wealth and yet he still feels cut off, dispossessed, unconnected. He has all of this stuff and yet he’s still missing something, something none of his stuff can provide him.  He’s missing a place to belong. 

            That’s something I can relate to.  I understand being disconnected, dispossessed, unattached. I understand working for something that I can never quite achieve.  I want a little peace and security.  Laurie and I work to provide that for our family.  I’m sure we’re doing better than if we just sat around doing nothing, but we’re a long way from having a future completely secure.  We’re a long way from being perfectly at peace with ourselves and the world.  There are always things popping up that continue to cause us some grief. 

            We have moments of joy and happiness too, but for every happy moment there’s another full of stress.  As much as I’d like to coast through life at peace with everything and savoring happiness and joy, it just doesn’t happen.  I can’t make it work.  I can’t keep it running for very long.  That also says nothing of sin.  I feel like if I could even avoid sin for a single day, my life would improve quite a bit.  If I could keep away from sin for even longer, then peace, joy, and all of those other things would follow.  But I can’t even do that. 

            I go through life, day after day, with the sense I’m missing something.  It’s not just that life is unfair, it’s that something’s wrong.  Life just shouldn’t be this way.  Out there somewhere is the life I should have, the life where things go the way they’re supposed to and where I don’t need to worry or be afraid anymore.  But I don’t have that, not right here.  Someone probably has it.  Jesus seems pretty unconcerned about his future.  Not just in a Timon and Pumbaa, “Hakuna Matata/no worries” kind of way. Not just because he’s been smoking a lot of pot and is completely oblivious to the world around him.  But rather because he genuinely knows there is nothing to worry about, even when he also knows he is voluntarily walking into torture, suffering, betrayal, and death.  That’s what I want.  I want that kind of peace.  I want that kind of freedom. 

            In ancient days, a prominent philosopher or religious teacher would have many followers who would flock to him to listen to him and learn to emulate him.  Jesus had that.  So did other notables like Socrates.  Those followers, those disciples would follow because their master and teacher seemed to have his life together.  He seemed to make sense of the world and why things worked the way they did.  Some disciples did manage to become like their master.  Plato eventually became like Socrates, and Plato’s disciple, Aristotle, eventually became like him.           While the philosophers and religious teachers may have been doing a little better than the average person, none of them had what Jesus had.  Peace? Yes.  A life without worry? That too.  But even more, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.”  That’s what Jesus has.  That’s what I want, because I don’t have it and I can’t seem to get it for myself. Or perhaps I should say that’s what I need and it’s the only thing that will fix what’s wrong with my life.  Like the young man, I need to know what I need to do and where I need to be to inherit what Jesus has.  How can I come to be a part of that?  How can I get the one thing that will make the rest of my empty life make sense?  That’s what the young man wants to know.

            Jesus gives an answer that isn’t what the man wanted. Perhaps he thought he could buy his way in or perhaps he thought it should just be given to him because of what he’d done.  Jesus saw a deeper problem.  He’d never be willing to receive what Jesus had to offer if he were too comfortable in his own life.  He had to learn that nothing he had would get him what he truly needed.

            I can relate to that too.  There are days when it’s abundantly clear I can’t do anything on my own and there are days I get myself to thinking maybe I can manage my own life just fine.  Jesus knows the solution though.  It isn’t really about me at all.  No one earns their inheritance.  No one can force another to give them their inheritance.  Either it is given to you or it isn’t. 

            In Israelite days, receiving your inheritance meant having a place to call home.  It meant having a place that welcomed you because you belong there. Jesus receives everything his Father offers as an inheritance, eternal life in his perfect creation, a place to call home, a place where we belong and are welcomed.  Jesus shares that inheritance with those he calls brothers and sisters, co-heirs with him of eternal life.  Jesus tells the young man to sell his possessions so he doesn’t get so caught up trying to earn what he’s after that he misses Jesus’ outstretched hand simply offering it to him. 

            Like a jigsaw puzzle missing a couple of pieces, our lives look ok most of the time, but you always kind of know something isn’t right.  Jesus wants to make our lives right by making us right.  He fills in the holes in our lives with his own life.  He makes us complete.

            Jesus wants to give you a place where you belong, a place to call home.  He welcomes you to his table and calls you a brother or sister.  He calls you family.  Father gives his Son his inheritance and Jesus passes that inheritance along to us as well through his own death.  Eternal life is yours now, an eternal inheritance passed from Father to children, given on account of Christ, our brother.  A loving family where we are welcomed and a place we can always call home.