All but one thing!

Mark 10:17-27

As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him. He fell on his knees before Jesus. "Good teacher," he said, "what must I do to receive eternal life?"  "Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good except God. You know what the commandments say. 'Do not commit murder. Do not commit adultery. Do not steal. Do not give false witness. Do not cheat. Honor your father and mother.' "—(Exodus 20:12-16; Deuteronomy 5:16-20). "Teacher," he said, "I have obeyed all those commandments since I was a boy." Jesus looked at him and loved him. "You are missing one thing," he said. "Go and sell everything you have. Give the money to those who are poor. You will have treasure in heaven. Then come and follow me." The man's face fell. He went away sad, because he was very rich. Jesus looked around. He said to his disciples, "How hard it is for rich people to enter God's kingdom!" The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter God's kingdom! Is it hard for a camel to go through the eye of a needle? It is even harder for the rich to enter God's kingdom!" The disciples were even more amazed. They said to each other, "Then who can be saved?" Jesus looked at them and said, "With man, that is impossible. But not with God. All things are possible with God."

Food for thought!

Today's gospel is about eternal life. What is eternal life? When and how can we achieve it? These were some of the questions on the man's mind, as he ran up to Jesus, as he fell on his knees before Jesus, as he opened his mouth, as he said, Good teacher, what must I do to receive eternal life?

From his own words, this man was on the road to eternal life. "Teacher," he said, "I have obeyed all those commandments since I was a boy." As far as the commandments were concerned, this man was good. This man is like many of us who think of ourselves as good just because we we do not commit murder; do not commit adultery; do not steal; do not give false witness; do not cheat; we honor our father and mother. Yes, many of as are good as long as we do not look at our goodness through the eyes of Jesus. Without Jesus we really don't know who we were.

Many of as are like this man: life has been good to us; we have a little money; maybe we have climbed up the social ladder a little ways; maybe our name is well known and we are well thought of in the community, in the neighbourhood; maybe we are a good person, who have lived a clean, moral life; maybe we are a church member, a leader, a teacher, and everyone thinks our life is complete. That is before we take ourselves to Jesus. Seen through the eyes of Jesus, we all stand wanting; we all have sinned. This is the bad news. The good news is that Jesus can re-allign us. He does it in two ways: he will show us that what we have been and done up to now is not enough, and he willl show us what to be and do from on onwards. He did this in today's gospel.

Jesus quoted the commandments which were the basis of the decent life. Without hesitation the man said he had kept them all. Note one thing, with one exception they were all negative commandments, and that one exception operated only in the family circle. In effect the man was saying, «I never in my life did anyone any harm.» That was perfectly true. But the real question is, «What good have you done?» And the question to this man was even more pointed, «With all your possessions, with your wealth, with all that you could give away, what positive good have you done to others? How much have you gone out of your way to help and comfort and strengthen others as you might have done?» Goodness does not consists in not doing bad things; goodness consists in doing good things; we are not good because we do not do evil things; we are good because we do good things. That was precisely where this man, like so many of us, fell short.

Jesus confronted him with a challenge. In effect he said, «Stop looking at goodness as consisting in not doing things. True, he had never stolen, and he had never defrauded anyone, but neither had he ever been, nor could he compel himself to be, positively generous. In other words, all we have is given us to give to others; all we have (our talents, our skills, our riches, our money) is given us to use to make a difference in the lives of the other people. This is the ONE thing the man in today's gospel was still missing. Are you missing it too?