Fleecing the Rich;  Fleecing the Poor

Mark 10:16-31

By

Reverend Litton Logan

Scriptures:

Mark 10:16--31 (NRSV)

¹⁶And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.

The Rich Man

¹⁷ As he 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?” ¹⁸ Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. ¹⁹ 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.’” ²⁰ He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” ²¹ 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.” ²² When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

²³ 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!” ²⁴ 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! ²⁵ 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.” ²⁶ They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” ²⁷ Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”

²⁸ Peter began to say to him, “Look, we have left everything and followed you.” ²⁹ 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, ³⁰ 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. ³¹ But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”

Sermon:

            In the preceding chapter and in the opening verses of this 10^th chapter of Mark’s gospel, Mark has been recalling and interpreting Jesus’ teachings concerning discipleship to an anxious and struggling church. We continue Jesus’ teachings on discipleship today.

            Jesus has told us that those disciples, by Mark’s inference Jewish or Gentile disciples, who are new to the faith, are to be treated with the same care and concern as if the disciple’s were receiving Jesus himself. The faith of the little ones is not to be tampered with by convoluted interpretations of Jewish oral traditions.  The person who does such a thing does so at the risk of their exclusion from the Kingdom of God.   In addition, the true disciple is the person who is willing to become as a child-- stripped of their traditional understandings of power, prestige, and prominence--and become totally dependent upon Jesus’ teachings.

            In today’s scriptures, Jesus takes his teachings to another level.  A level, which would upset the understandings of many people of his day concerning wealth, prosperity, and a person’s relationship to God.

            In Mark 10:17, a man runs up to Jesus just as Jesus is about to move on in his journey to Jerusalem.  In Matthew, this man is called a rich young ruler—a person of wealth and social prominence--in Mark, he is just a rich man.  The man runs to Jesus and shows great respect because he believes that Jesus is a great teacher and may hold some essential teachings important to his spiritual life. The man is eager to question Jesus before he departs. The man addresses Jesus as “Good Teacher,” for which Jesus soundly rebukes him.

            Jesus tells the man that no human being is truly good, only God can rightly be called good.  Therefore, to call Jesus good is to imply that he is equal to God. Jesus throughout Mark’s gospel never sets himself up to be co-equal with God or declares that his teachings are to replace the Mosaic Law. Jesus, however, does take exception to certain Pharisaical interpretations of the Mosaic Law.

We shall see in Jesus’ interaction with this rich man and the rich man’s genuine godliness that God’s will for humankind has been revealed in the Ten Commandments.  Jesus, in Mark, is the anointed, prophetic voice of the Son of God whose teachings and mighty deeds are a call to kingdom living in the present. Those who will be included in the kingdom will be those who are living according to Jesus’ teachings without reservations.

            Let’s look at the rich man’s words closer.  “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?  First, the word “inherit”.  This man evidently believed like many Jewish people that he was entitled to inherit eternal life for no other reason than he was a Law abiding Jew. 

Eternal life for Judaism at this time was more nationalistic than individualistic. Many rabbis believed that the resurrection of the dead would be for Jews only. However, other rabbis that maintained that all people would be resurrected, but the Jews would be the blessed and dominate nation in the new heaven and new earth.

Let me give a generalized summary of the Pharisee’s idea of eternal life and resurrection. I think it will help to put this man and his concerns in a proper context. During Jesus’ day, there seems to have been a consensus among the Pharisees that after a Jewish person died their souls separated from their body and either went to heaven (Gan Eden) or made a stop in hell (Gehinnom) to be purge of sins.  In the End of Days, the Messiah will gather the Jewish exiles to Israel and the Temple will be rebuilt.[i]  Some time later the dead will be resurrected and reunited with their souls. This is a sort of universalistic salvation for all Jews and possibly for all people. This new, perfected universe is known as the World to Come. The Sadducees, the aristocratic, priestly class associated with the Temple, rejected the idea of bodily resurrection but there is strong evidence to support that they believed in the immortality of the soul in some metaphysical way. [ii]

            Therefore, I believe, our rich man not only wishes to affirm his inherited status as a Jew but to learn if there is anything else that he must do to be one of those souls that would either go straight to heaven or at lease reduce his stay in Gehinnom.  I don’t see any other reason for the question for a good Jew. Unless, the story is a parable of Mark’s in which he employs Jesus’ kingdom teachings to make a point for his audience.  These interpretations are up for argument.

I have known people like this man.  They have had meaningful, personal experiences of God in their lives, they have been baptized, they are moral, descent, and charitable people, yet they doubt, they are never secure in their faith.  The anxiety of their doubt compels them to do more religion; pray harder and longer; read this book, read that book; give more money even to their detriment and their families detriment; go hear this preacher or that spiritual guru, and hope that in their works or associations with great, religious personalities they will find the assurance and certainty that is missing from their lives.  These folks as good as they are, are nonetheless victims of their humble pride and unwillingness to accept God’s grace as a gift of God’s love.

However, some other religious people feel guilt for their prosperity and blessings in life to the point they make a crusade of the poor and less fortunate to exorcise their guilt over having so much.  I am not talking about those whom God has truly called to the ministry of caring for the poor, down trodden, and oppressed.  People that have a genuine call to these ministries don’t seem to exhibit a histrionic intensity to their calling that betrays ulterior motives.  They seemed centered, focused, and steadily committed. Both eccentric groups as far as I am concerned are sad, sad people. Beneficial in the whole, but sad.

            Jesus sized up this rich fellow before he tells him what he must do to perfect his understanding of eternal life. Jesus says that he is aware that the man knows the commandments of God.  Yet, Jesus feels a need to detail the Ten Commandments, consolidating the 9^th and 10^th commandment.  Jesus makes the point that the Ten Commandments are themselves a summation of God’s will and ways for human spiritual and moral behaviors. In keeping these commandments, a Jew would have been assured of eternal life.

            The man responds that he has kept these commandments since his youth.  Jesus looks into this man’s eyes, sees his sincerity, his decency, his faithfulness, and feels a deep affection for him and for all he represents.

            Next, Jesus tells this man he lacks one thing.  Here it comes, here it comes, the final and absolute thing that he needs in the perfecting of his faith and gaining absolute assurance.  Please note that Jesus issues this man a call to become a disciple, a follower of Jesus. The call to discipleship and the response to the call is the major point of this story not the poor or Christian affluence, although many would make these scriptures about the poor.  At point, I wished to touch on later.

The requirement of this call, this man’s absolute assurances of his eternal life, is to sell all that he has, give it to the poor, and come follow Jesus.  It seems that disciples of Jesus at this time must divest themselves of all encumbrances of wealth and social responsibility. The disciple that receives the call of God in Jesus Christ must be self-sacrificing and have nothing in his or her life greater than responding to God’s claim on their lives. Matthew in 22:14 gives us a hint that there are many called to be Christians but few who are called to be disciples as the extreme level we see here today.

I have often wondered if the man said, “Okay, wait, I’ll do it and be right back,” what would Jesus have said.

            The man is shocked at this requirement and he goes away mournfully sad—grieving--for he had much wealth and was a prominent person.  What would have been shocking to this man and Mark’s audience is that they, like so many of his day including Jesus’ disciples, believed that wealth, prosperity, social, and political prominence were signs of God’s blessings and part of a wealthy person’s divine obligations to others.  Wealthy, responsible people gave alms to support the poor, donated money to build synagogues, influenced society for the good, etc.  God blessed the righteous few as a systematic and charitable means of blessing the less fortunate.  Here Jesus again repudiates in the extreme what people believe about God’s will and ways so that he may teach them to embrace the new thing that God is doing in the Gospel.

            Let me get a little political here and touch on the poor and these scriptures because these scriptures have frequently been used erroneously to manipulate Christians. These passages of scriptures make many of us uncomfortable, especially if we are well invested and financially comfortable. These scriptures have been used to justify religious extortion or to discount peoples’ commitment to God—if you really loved God then you would do what the rich man didn’t. These passages have been used to fleece the rich and the poor by unscrupulous people as well as by well-intended and sincere people. I also think that these scriptures have been used to fleece the poor of not only their money but of achieving some degree of dignified self-reliance. Many guilt ridden and prosperous Christians think these scriptures imply the poor have a divine right to other folk’s wealth and charity if we are really Christians.

            Growing up we were taught that if you worked hard, got a good education, lived by the Ten Commandments, helped those in need—loved your neighbor--then God would bless you and you would prosper.  Those teachings were right and many of us prospered.  Now we have folks running around, many using these scriptures and other scriptures, to tell us that we should feel guilty because we have so much and others have so little.  In short, the implication being if we are wealthy we couldn’t really be a Christian. 

We are lead to believe by the Chicken Littles of this country that it is the consumption of middle-class Americans and Europeans along with a few filthy rich in the world that are the cause of all the evils in the world.  We are lead to believe that we are part of the systemic and willful victimization of over 4/5^th of the world’s population.  I admit we are participants in the ills of this planet and its people, but we are not the sole cause.  Moreover, please don’t let us take from the poor their contributions to their plight under the guise of enlighten social responsibility...

            Those who would attempt to make us feel guilty, if I remember my fundraising demographics and statistics correctly, are themselves upper middle-class or wealthy Americans.  I believe many of these people are attempting to exorcise their guilt over their prosperity by trying to morally extort charitable contributions or pass legislation to do what they are unwilling to do personally. These folks distance themselves from the people and ills of society by hiding behind institutional or politically correct causes. These are not the people who volunteer to go to Africa and dig wells or to Mexico and get their hands bruised building houses for the poor.  Those same people give less per capita to charitable causes than the so-called conservative, greedy, Christian middle-class, who are often portrayed as being indifferent to the needs of the masses. Truth is, and I can support this statement with good data, most conservative Christians are far more apt to be concerned about, to volunteer to help, and to give to those less fortunate than any other single demographic group in this country.

Let me share another point.  When you look at the social welfare legislation enacted by the people of this nation over the years, most of whom were Christians, that benefits not only the sick, the underprivileged, the powerless, the morally irresponsible, and the lazy among our own citizens but even illegal aliens, we should never be made to feel guilty for not caring for the poor or down trodden.  Many folks neglect to take into account this nation’s charitable sentiment as expressed in our State and National welfare systems and our educational systems, not to mention, our nation’s foreign aid programs.  No, none of these systems is perfect. Yes, more could be done. Yes, there is waste, inefficiency, and corruption in the system.  However, let me tell you the people of this world would be far worse off without our national and state welfare systems and our foreign aid programs funded with our money imprinted with the national sentiment of “In God We Trust.

            Couple this insight with the American people’s desire to improve the material, social, and spiritual welfare of humanity, which is an integral part of the American conscious, we should never be made to feel guilty by histrionic do-gooders. The only thing we should do is look at our personal resources and give as the Lord has prospered us to that which God lays on our heart to support, but not because of moral extortion.

Look at the average American’s response to the natural disasters around the world if you need further proof. Did you know that individual Americans gave $187.92 billion dollars to charity in 2004 of which 35.5 percent went to religious organizations, 13.6 percent to educational institutions, and human service organizations received 7.7 percent of charitable contributions, which represents a steady three-year decline, yet the largest single budget item in the Federal Budget is Health and Human Services—approximates $650. Billion.[iii]. This budget item has increased steadily over the last four years. Charitable giving to religion and education in 2004 represents a 1.4% increase adjusted for inflation over 2003. [iv]  That boils down to $1,136 in 2004 per American income tax return in addition to the taxes we pay.  In New Mexico, ranked number 46th in charitable giving in the nation, we gave $597,754. [v]

            No, I will not remain silent while the “Chicken Littles” of this country exorcise their personal demons of prosperity or their failed or misguided ambitions at my expense, nor will I allow the religious charlatans, or even the well-meaning, misguided souls to use these scriptures to victimize, manipulate me or anyone else in my care and keep.

            I apologize for my diversion and diatribe, but I felt such things need to be said if nothing more than to open up a dialogue.

Back to our scriptures.  Please, remember that through out Mark’s gospel Jesus uses hyperbole and exaggeration to make his points. Remember, Jesus is the one who said cut off your hand, cut off your foot, or gouge out your eye if they cause you to sin.  Remember Jesus said that if you mislead a little one it would be better if you had a millstone placed around your neck and you were drown in the sea.

Mark’s is trying to teach his audience and I believe all Christians by hyperbole to open their minds and hearts to those Christians who are being victimized and persecuted, regardless of who they are or what their stage of faith development.  Mark wants his Christian community to understand that they are the new family of God, Jesus’ new brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers. Therefore, support and care for one another like family.

As a side note. Jesus’ disciples, for instance Peter, left wives, and family to travel around the countryside with Jesus.  Peter would not necessarily have been seen in a favorable light for doing this unless he made responsible provisions for his family. We are not given any insights into how the married disciples took care of their family responsibilities, but as good Jewish men, they would have done it.  This is so because they had prior, divine commitments to dependent people, who did not necessarily have their same level of calling. 

I contrast this with the case in California back some years ago where a man sold all that he had and gave the proceeds to some church based upon these scriptures.  He went bankrupt, and placed his family on welfare. The State of California however, and rightly so, sued the church, got back the man’s money, recouped what it had spent on this guy and his family, and I believe established some kind court monitored trust for the family’s with the recovered funds.

I also mention that this story would have been very affirming to Mark’s audience, who were poor, marginalized, and anxious.  They may be poor and persecuted here in this life but they were the new, poor, spiritually elite--the sure winners for the Kingdom in the next life, while the rich and powerful would have been in serious trouble with God.

            What are Mark and Jesus really talking about here and what could it possibly Christian an attitude and the prioritizing of the mean to us?  Jesus is teaching that we are to prioritize our Christian and stand ready to receive God’s call in the extreme or in the mundane.  Jesus is saying that if and when the call comes to give sacrificially for God’s work the true disciple will be ready and willing to do it.  I maintain that we shouldn’t throw common sense out the window in the process or before hand.  We must not neglect our families, our responsibilities to our neighbors, our bankers, or our government.  To break faith with family, friends, community, and state in our society as well as in the ancient society would mean serious injury to others.  However, all this being said, in the context of Mark’s gospel a true disciple must be ready to lay down their life in faithfulness to God in the face of persecutions or to share sacrificially with their fellow Christians. We are to be ready for the call, be ready for the call.

            Let me share a story that I found in a sermon illustration service I subscribed to twenty years ago.  There was a street person in New York named Molly.  Molly had a shopping cart she pushed around town with all her worldly possessions in it as she scrounged in trash bins, dumpsters, or abandoned buildings for bits of saleable refuse.

            One winter night Molly went to a homeless shelter for a meal and a bed. This shelter required people to attend a religious service prior to eating or sleeping.  Molly sat listening to a sermon on the Prodigal Son and God’s love. She had probably heard these words before.  However, that night something was different.  Either the preacher said something in a new way or Molly was just at a point in her life to hear the words of the Gospel clearly for the first time.  After the sermon, Molly approached the preacher and told him she wanted to talk to him about becoming a Christian.  The preacher asks Molly to sit and talk with him about what was going on with her.

            Molly sat for a few moments, her head bowed, picking at the debris embedded in her threadbare coat. Then she raised her face looking at the preacher with a look of defiance and said, “Well, if I become a Christian I guess it will mean I have to get a job and become a responsible person, won’t I?”  The minister smiled at her and said, “Molly, if that is what you feel God is laying on your heart; then you must be true to it.  It is not for me to say what God has in store for you only that God loves you and wants to be in your heart and life.”  Molly’s countenance darkened, she seemed to shrink inside herself, and then she rose and ambled toward the back of the meeting hall to recover her shopping cart and out into the cold night.  Molly was deeply saddened by her encounter with the Gospel and the preacher because she had much freedom from responsibility. 

There are the Mollies of this world who choose to be were they are for their own reasons—I am sorry. However, as a Christian, I want to and will do my part to make available to the Mollies of the world the opportunities and resources to sustain them against the chance they choose to improve their plights in life.  Having said that, I often wish some of these social do-gooders would be as hard on the poor and their contributions to their misery as they are on my fellow Christians, my country, and me.

            Christians, let there be no doubt, God’s ultimate claim on our lives is that we are to lay down our lives for God’s will and ways and for those whom God loves. We are to respond to God’s call just as Jesus did.  Jesus teaches us—rich or poor—that we are to stand ready to shed anything in the extreme or in the mundane that stands in the way or our responding to God’s call.  However, God will never call us to do the immoral or unethical nor to abandon our divine responsibilities to our families or others.

            I caution, let us make sure that when and if we receive a drastic call to serve God’s will that the call is from God not from our own guilty consciences, psychopathology, or the manipulations of others.  When the genuine call of God comes, it will be in context, we will know it, and we must respond commensurately. In addition, I trust when the rich or the poor attempt to defraud or exploit us with scripture we will listen to the voice within us and not be fleeced.

As the rich man in our scriptures, we are descent, moral, and law-abiding people.  We open our hearts and give of our time, talents, and money to God’s work and to those less fortunate.  We work for and vote for responsible social legislation.  However, like this man, we must also realize there is a divine option in the extreme on our lives that God may yet exercise.  Be ready, be ready, be ready for the call. Are you?