Traveling Light

(Scriptures:  Amos 5:6-15; Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:5-12; 4:12-16; Mark 10:17-31)

If you’re of a certain age – well, namely, my age – you may have watched the TV show Gilligan’s Island when you were growing up.  Perhaps you remember the not-entirely-plausible premise of the show – seven people – Gilligan, the Skipper, the fabulously wealthy Thurston Howell III and his wife Lovey, actress Ginger Grant, Mary Ann and the Professor, embark on an ill-fated three hour tour on a small boat appropriately called the Minnow, and end up stranded somehow on a remote island with no way off.  Among the recurring – and the more implausible – premises of the show is all the stuff that everybody brought along for a three hour tour – Mrs. Howell and Mary Ann each brought several changes of clothing, and Ginger brought her whole wardrobe; the Professor somehow squeezed the contents of an entire science laboratory on board, and the Skipper brought along enough tools and supplies to outfit an entire shipyard – though apparently not the ones needed to repair the damage to the boat.  With all that stuff on board, it’s no wonder that, when the weather started getting rough and the tiny ship was tossed, despite the courage of the fearless crew, the Minnow was almost lost.

OK, so nobody here would take their entire wardrobe, the contents of a college science lab, and the inventory of a shipyard along for a three hour boat ride.  But even among the few of us here, we probably vary in how we pack when we go on a trip, be it an afternoon trip down the shore or a longer trip.  Some of us bring along everything but the kitchen sink, and are prepared for every contingency.  I admire those who make careful preparations and anticipate every possible contingency. Others of us – I count myself as one – are more spur-of-the-moment travelers, tend to travel light - and always manage to forget something – a toothbrush, a change of clothes, suntan lotion, bug repellant, whatever.  One result from my absent-minded propensity to forget stuff, is to find out that, well, maybe I really didn’t need it all that much anyway.  Maybe had I packed it, it just would have gotten in the way, would just have slowed me down.

Our Gospel reading contains one of the very difficult teachings of Jesus.  As Jesus prepares to set out on a journey, a young man runs up to Jesus and kneels in front of him. We’re later told this man is very wealthy – he’s the proverbial man who has everything – and yet his behavior tells us that he must feel that despite all his possessions, something is missing.  He’s feeling uneasy, anxious, enough for him to sacrifice all dignity by running up and kneeling at the feet of Jesus. For the disciples it must have been quite a scene, this wealthy young man huffing and puffing up to Jesus and throwing himself at the feet of Jesus, who was penniless and homeless, with no place to lay his head, and probably more than just a little sweaty and smelly to boot.  “Good Teacher”, the man asks, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  Jesus gets the man to slow down and think his words through:  “Why do you call me ‘good’ – none but God alone is good.”   Hey, rich young man, do you understand what you’re saying when you call me good?  So Jesus has the man’s attention, and he goes on – “You know the commandments,” Jesus says, and then goes on to list some of them – notably all commandments about how human beings should treat other human beings.  The man says that he has kept all them from his youth.  Jesus looks at the man – we’re told Jesus loved him – and said, “You lack one thing: go, sell what you have, and give it to the poor, and you’ll have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”  The man is shocked and sadly walks away.

Let’s think about what Jesus did not say.  Some unscrupulous religious leaders would say to themselves, “Hey, I think I just found my next meal ticket.” Many religious leaders, even very scrupulous religious leaders, would welcome the man with open arms, no questions asked, and find themselves forever thereafter tiptoeing around the man and treating him with kid gloves, avoiding any challenge or confrontation of the man’s behavior, lest he be offended and stomp off, taking his money with him.  But that’s not how Jesus responded to the man’s question. Mark’s gospel tells us that Jesus loved the man, and so Jesus loved him enough not to let the man off the hook with his statement that he had obeyed all the commandments from his youth.  He also did not tell the man to come up front and pray the sinner’s prayer, or ask him to memorize a creed.  Jesus accurately diagnosed the cause of the man’s unease – his attachment to his wealth – and instructed the man to break this attachment by selling all he had and giving the proceeds to the poor.  And this the man could not do.  The man’s wealth was more than just a lot of stuff he happened to have lying around the house – it had become part of the man, part of the man’s identity, so much so that parting with it would be like amputating a limb.  The man walked away, knowing that Jesus loved him and understood him completely and indeed that Jesus had asked the man to do exactly the thing that would give him peace – and also that what Jesus asked was precisely the one thing the man would not do – indeed, could not bring himself to do.

Jesus, knowing a teaching moment when he sees one, says to his disciples, “Children, how difficult it is for those with riches to enter the kingdom of God.”  In response to the disciples’ astonishment – after all, in the experience of the disciples, the rich are always the first in line – Jesus repeats himself – How difficult it is to enter the kingdom of  God.  Or, as an alternative translation, on which the King James Version is based, reads, “How difficult it is for those who trust in riches to enter the kingdom of  God.  It’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”  And aside from the literal picture of a big ole smelly camel trying to fit through an opening so small the camel can hardly see it, let along squeeze through it, perhaps another image may come to mind – a small, narrow doorway leading to a place of boundless joy and untold delight, with someone loaded down with possessions standing outside – the many possessions won’t fit through the door, and the man won’t let go of them in order to enter.  So he stays on the outside, with his possessions, looking in longingly – and indeed those on the inside are coaxing him to leave the baggage behind and walk on in – but the man is unable to do what’s necessary to enter.

At this point Peter breaks in with the words, “Look, we’ve left everything to follow you.”  And for a change, Jesus does not rebuke Peter, but responds with assuring words: “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or mother or father or sister or brother or children or fields, for my sake and the sake of the good news, who will not receive in this age – in this age - a hundred times as much – houses, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, children, fields – with persecutions – and in the age to come, eternal life.  But many who are now first will be last, and the last will be first.”

Jesus promised his followers that for whatever they gave up for the sake of Jesus and the good news would receive in this age a hundred times as much.  What could Jesus mean by such a seemingly outrageous claim? Well, he was likely using strong language to make his point – but even so, there was a point to be made.  Some preachers of the prosperity gospel would likely instruct you to give them as much as you can, and wait for the heavens to literally rain down wealth a hundredfold.  But Jesus doesn’t ask us to take his words as cynical guidelines for investing our worldly wealth in the church, only in order to expect more worldly wealth in return.  Rather, Jesus was creating a society in which his followers held onto their possessions loosely, so that they were willing to share what they had, so that indeed, among the community of the followers of Jesus, many houses and fields were available to all, and all acted as mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers to one another.  Indeed, we’re told in the Book of Acts that members of the early church did exactly what Jesus invited the rich young man to do – sell all they had and lay the proceeds at the feet of the disciples, to be distributed among the poor.  Most of all, Jesus was telling us that eternal life is not just pie in the sky by and by when we die – but rather, that for believers, eternal life has already begun in our present life, that our former self-centered lives are dead, and our new lives as followers of the Risen Christ have begun – that there’s not only a direct connection, but indeed even a direct continuity between our lives on earth as Christians and our lives in the world to come.

The challenge of many of Jesus’ teachings, especially in the parables, is that they invite us to locate ourselves in the story.  For example, in the parable of the Prodigal Son, we may find ourselves in the story as the prodigal who has made many mistakes and is begging for a second chance, or as the self-righteous elder brother seeking to disown the prodigal, or as the father having to deal with both sons.  And where we find ourselves may vary as our life circumstances change.  So although today’s Gospel reading was not a parable, I’d still like to ask - where do we find ourselves in today’s Gospel reading?  Probably not as Jesus – there’s only one of him.  But as we look at our own lives, where do we find ourselves – as the rich young ruler, wanting what Jesus offers but unwilling to make a break with the past, unwilling to leave our comfort level?  As the disciples, very conscious of having made considerable sacrifices to be faithful to Jesus?  Or somewhere else?  Or perhaps we don’t find ourselves in the story at all.  And if we don’t, what might that be telling us?

In the 1950’s – during the Red Scare – the words “In God We Trust” were adopted as our national motto – likely in order to distinguish God-fearing Americans from the godless Communists who were our nemesis.  These words had already appeared on coinage since the 1860’s, but now our paper money likewise proclaimed, “In God We Trust”.  But for many in American society, I wonder whether these words speak the truth.  Is it true that, for all Americans, “In God We Trust”.  There are many whose Sunday religious professions uphold these words, but whose lives on the other six days of the week speak of a slightly different commitment – “In gold we trust”.  One little letter.  So much difference.  Because, indeed, trust is the issue.  Do we trust in the care of a loving God?

I’m reminded of these words of Paul from Philippians:  “I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.  For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him.”  And, indeed, Paul himself was only emulating example of our Lord Jesus Christ.  As Paul writes, “Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others.  Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.  And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to death, even death on a cross.”  If Christ was willing not to grasp and hold tight to his glory, but rather to empty himself for our salvation, we can act in a Christlike manner by letting loose of the death grip on our possessions.  In trusting God, not gold, we show that we are not possessed by our possessions.  May we at Emanuel Church not be like those who know the price of everything and the value of nothing, but rather may we, like Paul, affirm the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus as our Lord, in our gracious words and our generous acts.   Amen.