Pentecost 20 Year B

Mark 10:35-45

I think one of the downfalls of having a background in psychology is that you become a watcher of people.  Whether you like it or not, it just becomes something you do.  And you don’t just watch people, you pay attention to what they are doing and try to figure out just exactly why they are doing what they are doing. 

Take kids for instance.  I used to direct an after school program.  No matter what we were doing, if it involved a line, all the kids would try to get to the front of the line.  If we were going outside, there would be a push to be the first one by the door.  It we were going to have a snack, there would be a push to be the first one by the window.  It didn’t matter what, there was always the push to be the first one in line.

This behavior confused me.  If we were all going to be going outside, then why was there such a rush to be the first one?  We always had enough snacks for everyone.  Why would there be such a rush to be sure to be the first to get one?  What was so important about being the first person to get something?

Well, I was thinking about this while swerving in and out of traffic while trying to get to the Meridian Mall.  And while I was driving, I started thinking: Why was I rushing?  Why did I need to get ahead of everyone else?  It was not like the mall was going to disappear at a certain time; it would still be there.  So why was I rushing?  It really struck me as weird.  Why was I putting so much effort into rushing, pushing, and trying to get there first?

Now, not to be so hard on myself and on the kids, but trying to be first does make some sense.  When things are limited, trying to get there first makes real sense.  If you are not one of the first, you may not get what you want.  I don’t know if you remember, now what is many years ago, the whole big uproar over Cabbage Patch Kid dolls.  I remember people getting into fights just to get one of these things.  People would wait in line for hours and then push and fight just to one of the few dolls that were available.  If you wanted one, you had to be first.

I guess we want to be first because we want our own part of the limited supplies that there are.  And not only do we want a part, we want the best of it all.  We want to be first so we can have the best seat in the house, the best gaming system, or the best new gadgets there are.  We want to be first so we can get the best.  And really, wanting what is best is quite natural.  If you have the best, you tend to live better; you tend to live longer.  Having the best is not a bad thing.

So when we look at James and John in today’s gospel reading, we can understand what they are trying to do.  They really are not doing anything that is all that unnatural.  They wanted to be assured that they would have the best places, the places next to Jesus.  I guess it would be like having front row seats at a concert.  To sit at someone’s right and left would be to have your status publicly acknowledged.  To sit at someone’s right and left would be to say that these people are “second in command.”  By sitting on someone’s right and left, you get to bask in the light of the person who is sitting at the head.

John and James wanted these positions.  They wanted to be seen as those who were in power.  They wanted to bask in Jesus’ light.  They were like the people waiting to the Cabbage Patch Kids, they wanted to be there first so they could get the best.  Although they wanted to be in positions of power, they really didn’t seem to understand the whole message of Jesus.

But not too surprisingly, the other disciples didn’t seem to understand the message either.  The others become angry with James and John.  I am guessing the reason the others were angry was because they had not thought of asking first!  When they heard James and John’s request, their thought was probably, “Why didn’t I think of that!”  The other disciples didn’t want James and John to get the best positions, so they got angry with the two.  But, you know, the other disciples didn’t understand Jesus’ message either.

Our reading for today follows the stories of bringing the children to Jesus and the rich young man.  In these past stories, Jesus was showing them, and showing us, that in the reign of God, things are not always as they seem.  The young children are the ones Jesus tells should be brought to him, and all the wealth in the world cannot buy our salvation.  What we see is not what is real. 

The reign of God that Jesus has been trying to show is the reign of abundance.  In the reign of God, the blind see and the deaf hear.  The ill are made well and the poor hear the good news.  The reign of God is not filled with Cabbage Patch dolls or other things that will parish.  The reign of God is unlimited!

The request of James and John, and the other disciples’ response to this request, shows us just how much they believe in a limited God.  The disciples were constantly with Jesus.  They saw how Jesus healed, how Jesus taught.  They heard Jesus tell that the reign of God is at hand.  But even with all of that “proof,” the disciples still didn’t get it.  Even with all they had seen with their own eyes, they still believed that the world of limitations that they saw around them was the world of reality.  Even though they saw the abundance poured out through Jesus, they persisted to believe in the world of scarcity.

Our whole economy is powered by our belief in scarcity.  Our prices are set, based on how scarce an item is; whether this scarcity is real or perceived.  Because this belief in scarcity surrounds us, it is hard for us to think in any other manner.  However, Jesus presents us with a different worldview, a radically different worldview. 

So often we say that Jesus presents a radically different view of the world, but have we really considered how different this is?  Jesus does not view the world from a viewpoint of scarcity.  Jesus does not see the limits that we impose on the world.  Jesus functions within a worldview of abundance and tries to pass this view on to his followers.  He tells them that whoever wishes to be great must become a servant and whoever wishes to be first must become a slave to all.  We have been given a choice:  if we wish to be first, we must become a slave, if we wish to be great, we must become a servant.

Have you ever been someplace with a caterer?  Often the staff is allowed to eat.  But when do the servants eat?  (Or maybe I should call them “waitstaff.”)  Do they eat first?  Do they eat before the people at the party?  No, they would eat after the party is over and all of the people left.  It is then that they can eat.  But lets think of something else.  What would happen if the servers knew that the way they were serving the food would result in there being no food left for them to eat?  What would happen then?  Would the servers truly serve?  Would they give all they were supposed to give or would they hold some back some food for themselves?  To truly serve, there needs to be the assurance that there will be enough for all.  After the guest have eaten their fill, the servers need to be the assurance that there will also be enough left for them.  If there is not the assurance of abundance, the servants will hold back food for themselves and not truly serve as they should.  Because we are human, we can only truly serve when we have the assurance that there will be enough.  When we are assured that there is an abundance, it is then that we humans can serve with a loving heart.

Jesus calls us to be servants.  He wants us to go out and serve with a happy heart.  When he calls us to drink the cup that he drinks and to be baptized with his baptism, Jesus is calling us to God’s reign of abundance.  In these words, Jesus is calling us to give our lives in the service of others.  If we believe that God is limited, like Cabbage Patch dolls, we will have trouble giving our life, but Jesus shows us that we have life in abundance.  In the reign of God, there is so much life that death does not even have the final say.  Although Jesus was killed on the cross, death did not have the final word.  In the reign of God, abundance of life will always have the final word.

What is interesting is that Jesus does not say who will sit at his right and left.  Jesus says that is for God to decide.  So who does God choose to sit in these coveted positions?  Well, when Jesus is crucified, who flanks him on the cross?  Is it his disciples?  No, when Christ is undergoing the ultimate humiliation, the two who are on his right and left are two criminals.  Two recognized sinners are placed in the positions of power!  God’s love for us is so abundant that even the criminals are included!  In God’s reign, even the sinners are given positions of honor!

We can be servants because we know there is an abundance.  We can be generous because Christ shows us that scarcity is an illusion.  The world of God is not a Cabbage Patch kind of world!  It is a world where leaders are servants.  It is a world where the powerful are lowered and the lowly are raised up.  It is a world where the killed becomes the savior who brings eternal life.  The world of God is the world where the place of honor is reserved for you and for me.  The world of God is where all are wanted, all are cared for, all are loved.  We don’t need to rush, we don’t need to be first, we don’t need to grasp for whatever we can get.  The God love has placed a world of abundant love right in our midst!  We just need to look with the eyes of faith.

Obama Derangement Syndrome

Pentecost 19 Year B

Mark 10:17-31



“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.’”

Ok, there has GOT to be a mistake here! Someone, somewhere, must have made a translation error. I am sure the verse went something like this, “Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, ‘You’ve worked so very hard to get all of your money. You deserve to give yourself a treat. Go out on a shopping spree so you can show the world how much you have been blessed. And then, when you are comfortable, you can come and follow me.” That HAS to be the translation. The Bible says that Jesus loved the guy! When we love people, we don’t want them to be poor, do we? But there it is, “go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor...” That is what Jesus says to those whom He loves.

I find it interesting that even people who claim to interpret the Bible literally will drive expensive cars and live in expensive homes. They seem ever ready to jump on the “literal” meaning of the Bible, except where it becomes difficult. And I should not be so quick to lay judgment upon others; aren’t we all like that? (I say this at the risk of tarnishing my liberal reputation) I heard Dr. Laura once say that we would all like to have OTHERS have a Biblical morality. We think it would be great if others followed all the rules in the Bible and followed all the Ten Commandments. But when it comes to us, we would like to have a little wiggle room. Ok, we would like to have A LOT of wiggle room! Living life is not easy. And trying to follow all the injunctions of the Bible is not easy. So it just seems cruel to lay all of these injunctions on top of a difficult life! If Jesus really loved the guy, Jesus would have been willing to let the young man spend all of his money, and Jesus would have made all of the man’s water into wine just to help ease the burden!

But that is not what we are told happened. Jesus loved the man, and in loving him, Jesus told the man to sell everything and give it to the poor. Then, after he sold everything and had nothing left, then, and only then, should the man come and follow Jesus. These are very uncomfortable words. And as I said before, words that even the most staunch Biblical literalist finds ways to avoid.

The effect these words of Jesus have should be very similar to the effect of last week’s gospel reading. We should be jarred by them. They are not what we would expect to hear and they should cause us to sit up and take notice.

Does Jesus really want the man to become poor? This seems kind of silly. He sells all he has and in the process becomes poor. It seems to kind of defeat the purpose. And yes, you would be right. But, Jesus, being the great psychologist that he is, knew how to make a point.

See, when talking to people, if you want to make a point and don’t want to offend people, you use a HUGE example. This allows people to get involved in the story and does not make them feel like the example is directed specifically at them. So in this case, Jesus is using the example of selling EVERYTHING to make a point.

So what is the point that Jesus is making? Well, once the man sells everything and gives it to the poor, it is then that Jesus tells the man to come and follow. Does that mean that Jesus wants us all to be poor? No. But it does mean that Jesus wants us to be in a state where we are ready to learn.

Have you ever tried to teach something to a “Know-It-All?” It is really difficult! Nick tells me stories about a guy where he works who will ask a question. Then, when Nick tries to answer it, the man says, “No, that is not right!” Nick wants to scream and say if the guy already knew the answer, why was he asking questions! Whether we want to admit it or not, we quite often approach our faith in this manner. We will go to God in prayer about something, but we already have the answer in mind. So when the answer comes to us, we are very ready to say, “No, that is not right!” We want God to answer our prayers, but we want them answered in the way that we already figured out!

I am sure the man in the gospel reading had some idea in mind when he asked Jesus what he needed to do to inherit eternal life. I am sure he had some kind of “To Do” list and was looking for Jesus to verify his ideas. I am sure he was not so much searching for truth as he was looking to have his ideas verified. But that is not what happened! In bringing his question before Jesus, the man had his world rocked! After his encounter with Jesus, I am sure the man would not look at the world in the same way again.

What Jesus told the man, in effect, was, “Everything that you consider to be important, is not!” Think about this! How would you feel if Jesus told you that the sacrifices you made raising your family were not important? How would you feel if Jesus told you that the money you contributed to charity was not important? How would you feel if Jesus told you that the time you donated to the homeless was not important? In all of these things, what you did was a good start, but was not enough? What YOU did was not important! How would that make you feel? I would guess it would probably make most of us feel pretty bad. And in the gospel reading, we see this very response; the young man went away grieving.

Now this seems cruel, and would be except for one thing: We are told that Jesus loved the young man. Jesus was not doing this to the man to be cruel to him, he was telling this to the young man because Jesus loved the man!

So, there has got to be some clues here to help us. If we look, we see that Jesus does have a plan for the young man. The young man, after removing all those things that he, the young man, thinks are important, can finally open himself up to those things that are truly important. It is only when the false idols, or maybe we could call them “False Securities” are gone that the man is finally able to follow Christ!

We are pretty self-reliant people. We want to be in control even if that control is an illusion. We want the lists and we want the ironclad contracts. We want to know exactly what we have to do to get into God’s good graces. We want to know just how many sins we can commit, or what type of sins to avoid, so we can be issued a heavenly harp upon our death. We want to be sure we have it all sewn up before we die. We don’t want to leave it up to chance! This was the mindset of the young man: How could he use his money to assure his place in Heaven?

And Jesus jarring response is the loving truth: You can’t use your money to assure a place in Heaven. Money can buy you a seat on the Heavenly Bus just as easily as it will allow a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. Our money, our possessions, our talents will NOT assure us a place in the Eternal Kingdom.

So, what is our assurance? Well, for God, all things are possible. We have been given money, and gifts, and talents to use for the promotion of God’s reign on earth, but these are not what assures us of Eternal life. It is our faith in Christ in all things. It is our faith that if we release these things that we hold so dear and allow God to work through our lives, that we will find the life we have been looking for. It is in our faith that God will provide for our needs that we find the truth.

How is our wealth holding us back? I am not just talking about money here! We may have a wealth of insight. We may have a wealth of strength. We may have a wealth of caring. How are we holding onto these things as a means of ensuring that we will receive Eternal Life? How do we trust that God will not abandon us and just go out and give it away? That is not an easy question, is it? But that is the ideal Christ places before us. Christ wants us to be as extravagant with our gifts has God has been in giving us gifts! Our gifts are to be used and shared!

We have been assured eternal life through our Savior. We do not need to be searching for ways to save ourselves. Christ saves us through faith, which opens us for a whole realm of possibilities!! Do we wish to hang on to those things that we feel are important or do we want to follow our faith and find the true treasure?

This is the challenge placed before the man in today’s gospel, and this is the challenge placed before us. But we have one advantage! We know that Christ is raised from the dead and has saved us by his blood! This is the good news of the Gospel! This is the true treasure we can hang onto, even while we share it!

Pentecost 18 Year B

Mark 10:2-16

Isn’t it fun to watch little kids?  They are so interesting, and in many ways, so predictable.  I have a little thought experiment for you.  There is a plate of candy sitting on a table.  Now, there is a little kid in the room and you tell the kid to not touch the candy.  To make it even more interesting, you say, “Now, don’t touch any of that really yummy candy!”  Then, after saying that, you walk out of the room.  I am sure all of us would agree that the kid will go about doing whatever the kid was doing previously and will not, no matter how long the kid is left alone, touch the candy.

Who am I kidding!  We know that the kid, no matter how good, will eventually go over and take a piece of the “really yummy candy!”  That is just the way kids are.  The moment you tell them “no,” it is then that they want to do exactly what you told them not to do.

And even though we are adults, I think we are still guilty of this behavior.  I have seen people in stores handle things while standing in front of a sign that says, “Please Do Not Touch.”  I have seen people graze their way through a grocery store knowing that they will never pay of the things they have eaten.  We are told, “No, we should not do this,” but we still knowingly break the rules.

Does this behavior make us horrible people?  Does it make us terrible people?  Does it make us “BAD?”  No, nothing of the sort!  So what does this behavior make us?  Well, it makes us human.  Part of being human is to see how far we can push the rules.  Don’t believe me?  It this weren’t so, we wouldn’t need police; we would all know that rules and not break them.  But because we are human, we always push the rules.

And if anyone would understand this, it would be God.  God knows we are going to push the rules.  Heck, more than that, we will knowingly break the laws God has given us.  God has given us freewill and in the use of freewill, we WILL go against wishes of God.  That is just a simple statement of life.

So, because kids, and adults, are going to break the rules, does this mean that we totally abandon all laws?  Because just about everyone ignores speed limits, does this mean that we never have speed limits?  Well, of course not.  We have rules and laws in place because it is a good thing to do.  Rules and laws keep us safe.  Rules and laws make life easier to live.  Rules and laws are a good thing.  Rules and laws make our lives better. 

But we still have the problem of breaking the rule.  Well, there are the possible consequences such as getting an upset stomach from eating too much candy or burnt fingers from touching the hot pan on the stove.  There are also other consequences such as the anger and disapproval of the parents or possible fines.  But even with all the consequences, I think we would all agree the world would be a better place if we would all just follow the laws and the rules.  But, alas, being human, we just aren’t going to always follow the rules.

Is God going to abandon us if we don’t follow God’s laws?  Or should God just stop making rules and laws and allow us to do whatever we want?  Of course the answer to both of those questions is, “No.”  God will not abandon us if we don’t follow God’s laws.  God wants us to follow God’s laws and rules, these make life more enjoyable, but God will not abandon us.  And God is not going to stop expecting the best of us.  Just as we expect the best for our children, God expects the best from us.  But God is not going to abandon us if we fall short of the goal.  Just like we would not abandon our own children if they fall short, God will not abandon us.

This is the lesson we are to learn from today’s scripture readings.  God has great plans for us, but when we fall short of these plans, we are not abandoned.  God wants what is best for us, but when we don’t live up to these plans, God does not leave us dangling.  Although God wants what is best for all of God’s children, God loves us enough to have some contingency plans.

Jesus tells us that divorce was not part of God’s plans for us.  God does not want our relationships to fall apart.  I am sure we have all seen some pretty messy divorces and I am sure we can agree that a world where divorce was not necessary would be a pretty wonderful thing.  But I think we would also agree that in some situations, divorce can be quite a blessing.  Although we may not want to see marriages end, in some cases, the best thing that can happen is for a marriage to end and for the people to continue their lives apart.  Divorce is not what God wants for us, but because we are human and we have freewill, divorce is given to us.  Divorce, even though it is not the ideal, is still a gift.

God knows that we are not perfect.  God knows that we are going to wander away and try to do things our own way.  God knows that even though we are given an ideal, because of freewill, we will fall short of that ideal.  And in God’s goodness, we have that out.  But Jesus also reminds us that this is not what God had wanted for us.  Just like we do not want our kids to get into trouble, and we would like for our children to listen to us, God wants us to pay attention and to learn.  But when we fall short, we are not abandoned.

Now lets do a quick jump to the end of the gospel reading.  At the beginning of the reading we have all this talk about divorce and adultery, all this really deep stuff.  But suddenly, at the end of the reading, we are talking about children.  "Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.”  The shift is almost jarring.  However, it is this jarring shift that should make us think.

The children are brought into the picture to help us to gain perspective.  How do we love and care for our children?  We set up rules, we set up laws.  We provide expectations and we send them on their way.  We know that our children will make mistakes, but we also know that our children will learn from their mistakes.  We would hope that our children would listen and learn, but we also know that our children will have to experience life in their own way.  We would hope that we could pass our knowledge on to our children, but we know that our kids will go out and find the truth themselves.

And as jarring and disjointed as this shift may seem, it does make sense.  God has a vision for our lives.  God has a dream for our lives.  But God also knows that we, just like we know our children will do, will go out and experience life.  We will run over God’s law and we will experience the pain of our mistakes.  But in the midst of our experiencing of life, we are given the assurance that because we are the beloved children of God, we can still come to Christ, and we will still be accepted with open, loving, arms.  "Let the little children come to me; do not stop them…”  That is what Jesus is saying to us.  God would prefer we follow God’s plan for our lives, but when we take the candy from the candy dish, we can rest assured that we are still loved and accepted.

We are the children of God and we are all accepted.  Even if we fall short, God is there for us.  Even when we flaunt God’s law, God still calls us to the table.  God is the ultimate parent; we are loved more than we can ever know.  We are called to the table in love, and we are called to spread that love to the world.