A new type of flu has been identified.  Here are a few of the symptoms:

·         A feeling of being bloated, sluggish, and unfulfilled

·         A condition of stress, overwork, and financial debt

People studying this disease have named it Affluenza, and they have begun to identify its causes.  These include

·         A burning desire to keep up with the Joneses,

·         A dogged pursuit of what some have termed the American Dream, and

·         An unsustainable addiction to economic growth.

Here is a brief quiz:

1.  Which of the following is comparable to the size of a typical 3-car garage?

a. a basketball court
b. a McDonald’s restaurant
c. the average home in the 1950s.

Answer: C.  A typical 3-car garage occupies 900 square feet, just about the average size of an entire American home in the 1950s.

2.  Since 1950, residents of the United States have used more resources than:

a. everyone who ever lived before them
b. the combined population of all Third World nations
c. all of the above

Answer:  C, all of the above.  Since 1950, residents of the United States have used more resources than everyone who ever lived before us.

3.  Of the Americans who voluntarily cut back on their consumption, what percent report (in 1995) that they are happier as a result?

a. 29 percent
b. 42 percent
c. 67 percent
d. 86 percent

Answer: D.  86% of Americans who voluntarily cut back their consumption feel happier as a result.  Only 9% report becoming less happy.[i]

There are many implications we can derive from this information, and many directions we can go in discussing it.  But, for now it will serve as background as we examine our Second Lesson.  We are continuing our progress through the Gospel of Mark, addressing the provocative questions that Jesus posed to the people around him.  During our study, we have seen that it is important for our understanding to notice who is in Jesus’ audience when a particular incident or conversation takes place — whether he is talking with a crowd of people, with religious or political leaders, or if he is off alone with his disciples.  In today’s passage, we find Jesus on the move — setting out on a journey — and talking first to one, unidentified man and then to his disciples.

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.”

The devil was on the prowl one day out to get the Christian.  When he saw the Christian he shot one of his fiery darts and it struck the Christian in the chest.  The Christian had on the breastplate of righteousness, so he was not harmed.  The devil then shot at the Christian’s head, but that was protected by the helmet of salvation.  The devil thought a while and figured that everyone has an Achilles’ heel, and so he shot at the Christian’s feet.  But the Christian’s feet were shod with the gospel of peace, so no harm was done.  The Christian smirked and turned around to walk away.  The devil fired an arrow into the Christian’s wallet, and the Christian fell dead.[ii] 

This past Sunday we talked about marriage and said that marriage, for a Christian, is deeply personal, but it is not private.  For a Christian, marriage is a relationship not merely of two people, but of two people who are members with all of us in the community of faith.  In its ideal, the entire faith community unites in its effort to help the two partners become increasingly joined and to be an example of and witness to the nature of God’s love.  Some people balk at that idea.  Some people claim that their marriage and their family life is no one’s business but their own — not even the concern of the church.  But even among people who are willing to recognize that the church does have a concern for and a role in a Christian’s marriage and family, there are many who are unwilling to recognize that the church has a concern for and a role in what a Christian does with money.  Put some time into reading the gospels and you find that Jesus sharply disagreed.  This passage from the Gospel of Mark is one that makes this clear.

This incident follows close upon the one we examined this past week, in which Jesus talked about marriage as one relationship that God has given us to help us attain the fullness of life for which he has created us.  Before today’s passage begins, there is one more subject that Jesus addresses, and that is children.  Right after Jesus finishes talking about marriage, we read that

People were bringing little children to [Jesus] in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them.  But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me.  Do not stop them, for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.  Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.”  And he took [the children] up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.[iii]

We are tempted, when we hear about this incident, to begin waxing eloquent about all of the wonderful qualities of children that Jesus wants you and me to embody.  About how sweet and innocent and honest children are.  But that is not what folks would have understood about children back then.  What folks knew about children in Jesus’ time was that they had much the same status as slaves, that they could be bought and sold.  That a young child was completely dependent upon the good graces of the adults around him and could even be put out onto the street, abandoned and left to die without legal consequence. 

We talked about this a few weeks ago, when we saw that by interrupting his instruction of his disciples to take a child in his arms, Jesus indicated that a child, whom society considered worthless, had as much value as he did.  “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name,” Jesus said, “welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”  Now, Jesus adds that “whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child” — as one who is completely dependent upon the good grace of God — “will never enter it.”

Right after that, we hear a man ask Jesus, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  As the author of Mark tells this story, we know nothing about this man except that he is someone who wants to know what he can do to inherit eternal life.  What he can do.  Jesus’ response is something we have seen before:  Jesus responds to the man’s question by asking one of his own.  Jesus asks, “Why do you call me good?  No one is good but God alone.”  Does the man know who Jesus is?  Does he think he is talking with just one more teacher, one more rabbi?  Or does he believe that he is talking with the messiah, the Son of God?  Hard to say. 

Next, Jesus lists out for the man some of God’s commandments:  commandments against murder, adultery, theft, lying, and fraud and about honoring his father and mother.  When the man tells Jesus that he has kept all of these commandments since his youth, Jesus does not challenge him.  Instead, Jesus aims for the man’s Achilles’ heel:  his wallet.  “You lack one thing,” Jesus tells the man.  Please look with me at this passage and find that sentence:  “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.’”  Do you see within that sentence just what it is that the man lacks?  Jesus tells the man what to do with what he does have — tells him to go sell his possessions and give the money to the poor.  And, it is in that selling and giving that the man will gain what it is that he lacks.

At that point, Jesus takes his disciples aside and makes one of the most disturbing declarations of his life.  Jesus tells his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”  When the disciples are perplexed at this news, Jesus tells them again, and to make his point absolutely clear he tells them that it will be harder for the largest animal in the desert to go through the eye of a sewing needle than “for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”  Why?  What is it about being rich, about having “many possessions” that makes salvation — entrance into God’s kingdom — so hard to attain?  Is it the possessions, themselves?  The answer to that question lies back in what Jesus told his disciples about children:  “whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child” — as one who is completely dependent upon the good grace of God — “will never enter it.”

Whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child. . . .  When the man asked Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus told him the same thing.  Jesus told the man that whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child — as someone who has no power, as someone who has no status, as someone whose only true possessions are trust and need and a willingness to take whatever is given — whoever does not stand ready to receive the kingdom of God in the same way a little child receives the love of its parents, cannot receive it at all.  For this particular man, being able to that meant divesting himself of everything he had, then joining the band of disciples who traveled with Jesus.

“How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God.”  How hard it is for us humans — with all of our skills and talents and accumulated knowledge — how hard it is for us to recognize that we have no power or status apart from God.  How hard it is for us humans — with all of our fast computers and jet skis and home entertainment centers — to recognize that the only possessions of real value are trust and need and a willingness to take whatever God bestows.  According to Jesus, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for you and me to stop relying upon ourselves and rely fully upon God.  And, make no mistake:  Jesus was talking about a real needle for that camel to walk through, not some special gate that kept large animals from entering Jerusalem, as some would have it.  It will be easier for a camel.  That’s not very easy!  In fact, it is impossible.  When we understand that, then we are right there with the disciples in saying, “Then who can be saved?”

Who can be saved?  Only when we are ready to ask that question are we ready to hear the answer.  The answer?  For you and me, entry into the kingdom of God is impossible.  It is impossible for us to recognize that we have no power or status apart from God, to realize that the only possessions of real value are trust and need and a willingness to take whatever God bestows.  It is impossible for us to work or think or pray ourselves into making God the center of our lives, instead of whatever currently occupies that space.  “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God.  For God, all things are possible.” 

Salvation becomes possible for us only because, in the words of our First Lesson, we “have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens:  Jesus, the Son of God.”  He is not a “high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but . . . one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin.”  Jesus our high priest has made it possible for you and me to “approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace.”

You and I have a Heavenly Parent who hears our demands for love, who understands our need for someone to watch out for us, and who knows that there are times when no one else is on our side.  We have a Savior who has experienced separation and abandonment and has felt his own heart break from rejection.  We have the Holy Spirit, who sees into our hearts and knows the thoughts we hide from all others.  When we were infants, we not only knew how to demand the love and security we needed, we also knew how to accept it once it was offered.  Lord, help us regain that wisdom.  Help us learn anew that trust.  Help us focus our attention on the promises of God[iv] and “approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”  Amen.

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