“First Last, Last First" Mark 10: 17-31

Have you ever asked a question expecting one answer, but getting a completely different one? Especially if you were expecting an affirmation, but got handed a rebuke or more work - you may recognize some of the feelings in the story of the rich man in today’s scripture from the Gospel of Mark. 

As we heard from last weeks scripture, Jesus has his eyes and feet set towards Jerusalem. While the first nine chapters of the Gospel of Mark take place over a longer period of time in Jesus’s ministry, this section starts the point that slowly works through his last days and weeks. He intends to be heading to Jerusalem, knowing all that he is to face there, when a man came and interrupted him. 

In fact, the man didn’t just interrupt him with his words, but literally came and knelt before him, and asked this question, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Now, we don’t know exactly what the man was expecting as an answer, but we can assume that he is looking for some sort of check-list. If you to 1,2,3,a,b,c you are good to go. Only that isn’t the answer he finds at all. 

First, Jesus starts out with a correction, asking why he was calling Jesus good, for only God is good. From hindsight this can give us a bit of pause, because we know that Jesus and God are in relationship with one another, part of the Trinity, so of course Jesus is good. But we have to remember that the man didn’t know that. He simply said Jesus was a teacher. Not the Messiah. And certainly not God’s Son. 

So Jesus takes this moment to dig deeper into the man’s introduction to his question and point out that God alone is good. Another way to say this is that good is the source of all goodness. Something can only be called truly good if it is part of God, if it comes from God. 

Jesus had to take this opportunity to correct the man, because the underlying intent of what he was saying, what he was asking, would soon be revealed. 

Second, Jesus goes on to tell him that this man knows the commandments and starts to list them off. 

The man is estatic and quickly replies the he has kept all these since his youth. This may have been a good moment for more correction from Jesus. But he doesn’t address the fact that there is no way that this man has kept all of the commandments all the time since he was young. That would make him sinless and perfect, which we are not as human beings. Instead, Jesus looked at him and told him that he only lacked one thing - to sell all that he had, give the money to the poor, and come and follow Jesus. 

Ouch. 

This is not what the man thought was coming at all! He was looking for an affirmation that he was well on his way to inheriting eternal life, only to be told do something that he felt was impossible.

In the man’s question and Jesus’s response we see that there was more undergirding his question then what it looks like at first glance. See, when the man was calling Jesus “Good teacher” only to have Jesus point out that which is good is of God, Jesus saw in the man’s heart that he was more worried about goods than what is good. Let me say that again, the man was more concerned with goods than what is good. 

A good is something that can be consumed. Something we can have possession over. In asking this question it is almost as if he is making eternal life something he could consume. Something he could possess. Something that he could make happen through his actions. Completely missing the point that it wasn’t found in the category of goods, but instead was a gift from our good God. 

He equally got confused when it came to inheritance. On one hand, inheritances aren’t something that we can earn. It is something that we are given because of the relationship we have to a person. It is something that we wait for, something that we receive. But the way that the man was using it in this interaction with Jesus didn’t seem to take those things into account. Instead, he acts more like the Prodigal Son found in the Gospel of Luke, acting as if it was something that he earned, something that he could demand as payment for his good actions. 

The man didn’t understand what he was asking. Didn’t understand the ramifications. So of course he wasn’t expecting Jesus’s reply. 

But we are also told that Jesus’s reply was said in love. Because he loved this man, he had to tell him some hard truths. Things that he wouldn’t want to hear. And if we are honest, things that he had to walk away from because it was too much for him. But Jesus answered him openly and honestly anyway, even if it wasn’t what the man wanted to hear, because he loved this man so so much. 

Jesus also loved his disciples and took this interruption as an opportunity to teach them as well. He said these oft quoted lines about “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” And “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.” Jesus wasn’t discounting anyone, including the wealthy, from the Kingdom of God. Instead, he is saying these things to ask his disciples as they enter into Jerusalem and us, here and now, where our heart truly is. What is our priority? What is our treasure? What may prevent us from coming to be a part of the Kingdom of God?

See, Jesus couldn’t force that man to sell his possessions. Just like he doesn’t force us today to follow him. It is our choice because of free will. But Jesus loves us enough to invite us to be a part. To tell us how it is. And to remind us, ultimately that the Kingdom of God is not about us. We can’t inherit it on our own. We can’t be saved on our own. That is only possible with God. 

Jesus is talking about a complete reversal of the way of the world. The Kingdom of God is about a new way of being. For the Rich Man, he thought keeping the commandments would be the easy solution - but it wasn’t just about the commandments. For us, we may think the Kingdom of God is about getting into Heaven, but it is about so much more than getting into Heaven. Its about following Jesus no matter what the cost. Even if it will make you look like the lowly and the last on this earth. Because the first will be last and the last will be first. 

Friends, we cannot make God do anything. This is not about a formula or a check-list. It’s about your heart. Where is your heart this morning? Are you looking at yourself through the standards of the world or the standards of the Kingdom of Heaven? Because Jesus is calling us to so much more than what this world has to offer. Amen.