Checkboxes and Challenges

Preached at Highlands Presbyterian Church in Long Valley, NJ.

Scripture

Mark 10:17-31

As [Jesus] was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. You shall not defraud. Honor your father and mother.’ ” He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! 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.” They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”

Peter began to say to him, “Look, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the good news who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”

Sermon

Sometimes, readers and hearers of today’s passage put a little bit of extra seasoning on it. One commentator said, “Today’s [passage] is a killer,” (Hinlicky Wilson 2018). Another said Jesus is making a “ridiculously extreme demand” of this rich man (Lose 2012). One prominent Baptist preacher took it to the next level, damning this rich young man to eternal torment in hell [1].

If I were to guess, this room is full of different reactions to this passage. We each hear Jesus with a different inflection in his voice, and we each perceive this man to be different levels of sympathetic.

It’s worth paying attention to what pricked your ears up, and what arrested your attention as today’s passage rang out. But no matter what you heard—no matter what this rich man and Jesus’ disciples heard—we all start on equal footing.

Before Jesus offers his command, the Gospel recounts this: “Jesus, looking [at the man], loved him.”

This is our preface for everything else that happens. It is the voice of love that speaks to this man and that lurches out of our Bibles and into our hearts. It’s the voice of Jesus who looks into the very depths of this person’s identity - who sees all of his heart and soul and mind. It’s the voice of our Creator, incarnate in Christ which reverberates throughout this Scripture.

This command of Jesus—regardless of what we pile onto it—is said in love, and intended to love. If we miss it, then we miss more than a command or box to check. If we try to rationalize our way out of it, we rationalize our way out of more than a checkbox. We miss and we rationalize our way out of what is behind the command — the voice of love: God’s invitation to life.

…

So… let’s unpack Jesus’ challenge to this man.

Jesus says, “Sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and then you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”

The last command is perhaps the most obvious. “Come, follow me.” This is the call to discipleship, the same one that Jesus extends to the Twelve. Christ’s earliest disciples were called “Followers of the Way,” and we see this language throughout the Gospel of Mark. To be a disciple was to walk the way of Christ, to accompany God on the journey.

But the first command, that’s where we start wiggling in the pews a bit.

This command might put a little nagging feeling in us; in part, because it’s so straightforward: “Sell what you own, and give the money to the poor.” But the nagging feeling of this command nags at the wealthy, not the poor. After all, this is an easy box to check off for those who are impoverished. For those who are wealthy, though, this checkbox presents a far greater problem. And boy, the rich man in today’s passage had a hard box to check. 

Our Bibles say that the man was “shocked,” or “appalled,” when he heard this. But the Greek text adds nuance: he goes away with stugnazō (στυγνάζω), being gloomy, downcast, carrying a heaviness that descends upon him. That heaviness, that gloominess that settles upon him, it’s easy to assume that it is a sign of his unwillingness to follow Jesus’ command. But there might be more behind his response.

The command Jesus gives this man is more than material. It’s not to merely divest from his possessions. Jesus says, “give the money to the poor.” Squarely in the center of this command that Jesus gives is an imperative that affects this man’s relationships. It seems that Jesus isn’t merely concerned with poverty as some sort of moral virtue; Jesus is concerned with this man identifying with the poor. This command is meant to change how this man sees others and sees the world; it changes who the rich man relates to, and changes this man’s attachments in this world.

That is what makes this command so powerful. That is where the love of Jesus becomes alive and grows hands and feet. If this man wants to really, truly check off this command, he won’t be able to merely sell his possessions. He won’t merely be able to “do the right thing.” He will become changed in his inmost being. Who he is, how he lives, who he identifies with—all of it will be uprooted by this command.

What we see is that this command has a deeper spirit, something far greater than a superficial box to check. It’s not really about perfection, or following the law perfectly on paper. Here, Jesus is preoccupied with love; wanting this man to walk a different path that is full of equity and compassion. Jesus is preoccupied with love that irrevocably alters this man’s relationships. It’s about finding the song of faith that comes to life within the command, the music and rhythms at the heart of discipleship.

Relationships seem to play a central role in this music and spirit of discipleship that Jesus urges. After the encounter, Jesus says this to his disciples: “there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for the sake of the good news.” When Jesus talks of eternal life and the Kingdom of Heaven and the first becoming the last and the last becoming the first, it’s situated in the context of new relationships. A new ordering of our lives and our connections and our communities.

In other words, the spirit and song of the law is love. And the spirit and song of love is new relationships in Christ.

…

We can use the rich man as a mirror of sorts.

Unfortunately… we know very little about him, all things considered. What do we know about the rich man? He’s rich and he’s a man! But we also know that he’s really good at something: checking boxes.

He’s never murdered. Check. He’s never committed adultery. Check. He’s never stolen. Check. He’s never borne false witness. Check. He’s never defrauded. Check. And he’s never dishonored his father or mother. Check.

But when Jesus gives him a command that challenges his way of living, that will turn his relationships upside down, this man hits a wall. This gloom descends upon him. Even though it is the voice of love calling to him, it’s not clear if this man will follow.

It turns out, this man might be good at “checking the box without checking the box.” He might think he’s checked the box, and others might think he’s checked the box, but has he? Deep down?

…

When I taught piano in college, most of my students were elementary-aged children. And there was a student of mine, Jonathan, who was very bright and very diligent with his studies. Jonathan wasn’t just a smart kid; he was a smart kid who really cared, and who really cared about getting things right. He achieved good grades, he always did his homework, and he was always looking for the right answer.

After spending time working with Jonathan on his music reading skills, and doing lots of flashcards, we were working on a piece for a recital. And unlike his method book, it had lots of notes. This was a piece to stretch Jonathan.

One day, we’re going through this piece. Jonathan starts, and go figure, he’s getting all the notes right. He’s reading the music really well. Unfortunately, you could see the tension in his arms, his knuckles locking up, and a facial expression that was warning that implosion was immanent. But… all the right notes.

We stop. “Jonathan, you’re doing great getting all these notes. What a huge accomplishment!”

”But now… it’s time to play music! Make these notes mean something, and make this piece come to life. What are they trying to say?”

And he did. We spent time playing music, not reading notes on the page. We worked on phrases and dynamics, making little adjustments in the tempo and articulation. Jonathan couldn’t rely on checking the boxes and doing things perfectly. Instead, he became comfortable with the subtleties and nuance, he learned to trust the voice behind the notes, the spirit within and around and behind the notes on the page. It required being changed by the music - following its arcs and themes and voice, rather than mechanically reading notes.

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This is what Jesus’ discipleship calls us to. It’s not to follow the script and check the right boxes that are found on the pages of our Bibles and Book of Confessions. It’s to become alive and participate in the music of the Gospel, to be changed and follow the voice of our Creator and Great Composer, to encounter the Spirit within and around and behind our vocations as baptized people.

Jesus invites this man—and every one of us—to new relationships and a new way of life. At the end of today’s passage Jesus says that we will receive new “houses,” in this age. Not brick-and-mortar houses, but “houses” in the ancient sense. New households of people and relationships and ways of life. Jesus became incarnate not to give us to-do lists and strategic plans and annual reports, but Jesus became incarnate so that we might live in newness of life. Jesus came to redeem more than our brains. Jesus came to redeem all of who we are, the very fabric of our DNA and the very glue that holds us together to one another.

Though there might be a checkbox—like giving of our material wealth, or making new disciples—that’s not the point. We can increase our volunteering, make more time for prayer, or serve on the Session. We can superficially forgive someone just so we can move on, or we can send a care card to check off our Deacon responsibilities. We can send a donation to the food bank to check off our Matthew 25 responsibilities.

But in checking those boxes without really checking those boxes, we miss out on the voice of love. We miss out on the gaze of Jesus, peering into our hearts and searching out the pain of our lives. We miss out on the love of our Creator, lovingly calling for us to remake and rebuild and reimagine our relationships. We miss out on the Spirit’s activity in our church community and our neighborhood, stirring us to action and to come home to God.

The volunteering we want to check off is a chance to meet God in the eyes of a stranger. The prayer we want to check off is a chance to be surrounded by the love and everlasting arms of God. The Deacon card we send in the mail is a chance to follow the way of Jesus into the trenches of someone’s life.

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This story ends, in part, with a cliffhanger. The man, who hasn’t done anything wrong at any point in this scene, remains under this gloom that descends upon him. He leaves, and we don’t get a tidy resolution with a bow on top.

Like this man, we’re left on a cliffhanger this morning. Will we follow?

I don’t know. But there’s a promise in this text, too. One that I think will be a balm to our fears or uncertainty. Oddly enough, it’s these words of Jesus: “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… For mortals, it is impossible, but not for God. For God, all things are possible.”

The kingdom of God isn’t for those with the means to get there. The rich man of today’s passage had the agency and power and wealth and means to fulfill the rest of the law. But Jesus asks him to give up all that agency and power and wealth and means. Jesus asks this man, who is first in every way, to become the last.

But we might read Jesus’ words about the camel and the “eye of a needle” as words of promise rather than damnation.

We are really good about checking the boxes of the Christian life. But we really stink about getting it right at the end of the day. After all, we’ve mismanaged the church for two millennium. 

Jesus assures us that the Kingdom of God is in good hands; God’s hands. Our capacity and ability to be healthy, wealthy and wise isn’t what protects the Church or God’s work on earth. Our strength and strategic planning and political influence won’t protect us or move the needle, ultimately, because the Kingdom of God is for the helpless. For those who are trying to push a camel through the head of a needle.

The Kingdom of God is for the “last” on earth: the vulnerable, the poor, the weak, the hurting, the struggling. It’s for those who want to be sober but never seem to be able to. It’s for the youth who are trying to live up to everyone’s expectations but seem to meet no one’s. It’s for those whose health is always failing and whose mobility is always shrinking. 

The Kingdom of God is for those who hear the music of discipleship and who join in song, even if it means missing a few checkboxes, even if it means missing a few notes on the sheet music.

For those of us who are like Jonathan, feverishly trying to play all the right notes of our faith, this is a passage for us all. Like this rich man, we might miss the music of discipleship if we think it’s simply about “doing something” or getting things perfect. And like this rich man, the voice of love is calling to us—you and me—not to give us another checkbox, but to invite the fullness of our lives into the bigger, broader song.

So unclutch your knuckles. Forget the spiritual timesheet. And listen to the deepest reaches of God’s commands, that ask us to identify with strangers, sit with enemies, and relate to each other in new ways. The song of community and new relationships in Christ is beating. The refrain of God’s promises and faithfulness is circling back again and again. The rhythms of love are pulsating through even the most difficult commands of Jesus.

Discipleship isn’t for people who check every box and who get every note correct. It’s for you and I: imperfect people, doing our best to join God in a song of hope. And with God’s help, we might find ourselves—and who we identify with, and who we serve—changed forever. Amen.

Sources

[1] Piper writes: “The rich young ruler committed suicide. That’s what he did. He prospered his whole life long with material wealth and left Jesus and perished. So remember the rich young man and don’t desire to be rich.” From John Piper, “Remember the Rich Young Man: A Message to Graduates,” Desiring God, 7 June 2009, https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/remember-the-rich-young-man

Mark Skinner, “Commentary on Mark 10:17-31,” WorkingPreacher.org, 11 October 2009, https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-28-2/commentary-on-mark-1017-31-4

Vincent Taylor, The Gospel According to St. Mark: The Greek Text with Introduction, Notes, and Indexes (Grand Rapids: Baker 1981) 

Clifton Black, Abingdon New Testament Commentaries: Mark, (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press 2011).