I think this is one of the most liberating passages in the

New Testament, and I probably wouldn’t say that if I

hadn’t spent many a sleepless night grappling with it

many moons ago. In the city where I went to seminary,

there was a community called Open Door. It was just

down the street. Like monastic communities that

preceded it, the folks who made this community their

home had taken a vow of poverty. They lived together

and simply. They shared their time, talent, and treasure.

They were a mix. Some previously lived on the streets.

Some previously lived in gated communities. Some, like

a couple of my seminary classmates, had committed

to living in the community for one year to explore the

possibility of going all in for the rest of their lives.

These people were my friends. And they challenged me.

Did congregations like the ones I sought to serve as

a pastor have it all wrong? Congregations with big

steeples and million-dollar endowments. Congregations

with a penchant for running “on time” and not taking up

too much of our time. Congregations with budgets that

tended mostly to property and personnel.

What does an authentic Christian life even look like? It

was a question that kept me up at night.

My friends who had taken a vow of poverty on account

of the life of Jesus and passages like the ones I just read

had found their answer. Had I found mine?

In today’s scripture we are introduced to a man whose

archetype we know well. This man is more or less

convinced that he is on the right path. He has done well

for himself. As a child he probably followed all of the

rules. He listened to his mama. He became his teacher’s

pet. He ate all of his leafy greens. He cleaned his room.

He went to college and majored in business. Perhaps he

even minored in theology. He probably made the Dean’s

List. He went on to get married and had 2.5 kids and

built and managed his wealth—effectively storing up all

of the stuff that provides for a healthy and a secure future

for himself and for his family. I know this guy! And this is

the guy that asks Jesus, “Good Teacher, what must I do

to inherit eternal life?”

His question betrays something, but what is it? It betrays

something because Gentle Jesus responds swiftly as if

to say, “Don’t flatter me.” What was it behind the man’s

question that irked Jesus so? Would we not have the

same question if an itinerant preacher with mass appeal

and a reputation for healing walked on by? Would

Jesus not expect such inquiries? Eternal life? That’s the

business that he’s in, right?

The next exchange suggests that Jesus is sort of

playing along with this. Perhaps the man is looking for

a little assurance or affirmation that he’s doing the right

thing. Perhaps a little of both. “Well, surely you know

the commandments,” Jesus says as he rattles them

off. And the man, as if on cue, responds readily and as

anticipated: “Yes, yes, teacher; I’ve kept all of these, all of

them, every single one, since my youth!”

And then the gauntlet is thrown. We all know it:

There’s still one more thing: Sell all that you own and

give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in

heaven. Then come, follow me.

Considered wealthy by today’s standards or not, I’m

guessing that not many of us in this room today are

willing to sell all that we own, even if it is for a good

cause. The imperative posed a huge problem for that

man, and it poses a problem for most of us gathered in

this sanctuary today.

Jesus, you made this the ticket to eternal life?

You all know the grace is coming because it always

does. It is new every morning. Pastor Madison assured

us of it before we even opened the good book to this

story today, and today we come to the end of a summer

sermon series on the promises of scripture.

But dare we linger here for a moment, as if this is where

the story ends:

Sell all that you own and give the money to the poor.

In the ancient world—where the vast majority of people

lost their land if they had any to begin with, absorbed

by large estates that manipulated their indebtedness

and forced them into indentured, lifelong servitude—this

would have been good news indeed.

The rich man’s sale of his possessions and the gift of

proceeds to the poor would have been nothing less

than redistribution of wealth and restorative justice

enacted. The imperative is serious. So serious, in fact,

that Jesus does leave it there. In this Luke version of the

story, we aren’t sure how long the man sticks around

after he hears this challenge. But in Matthew’s version,

he leaves upon receiving it. He leaves grieving. And

Jesus lets him go.

There’s a reason that Jesus makes such a radical

demand of this rich man, and of all of us. Could it be that

the restoration of relationships—even to people whose

names we do not know—is at the very center, the very

center, of the Gospel? Could it be that eternal life is less

of a destination for the individual and more of a process

for the collective, in which estranged relationships are

restored and the worst of our exploitation—the worst of

what we do to each other—ceases?

The rich man wanted to know about this place, this

time, called eternal life, but Jesus spent most of his time

talking about the Kingdom of God in the here and now, a

kingdom that was much different from the ones that ruled

the day, the kingdoms that this rich man, this rich ruler,

was probably quite content with. Why wouldn’t he be?

The challenge posed to the rich man is actually an

invitation if he can receive it. It’s an invitation to seek the

Kingdom of God first.

It was certainly good news for the poor. Was it good

news for him? Is it good news for us?

This story reminds me of a mission trip that I took to

rural Nicaragua many years ago. In our group, there

was a young woman named Leah. She hadn’t done

much traveling, and what she had experienced was

the rather glamorous variety. Southeast Nicaragua was

different, and like many who are seeing extreme poverty

up close for the first time, Leah’s spirit broke, along

with her composure. This was not a world that she was

comfortable with anymore.

One day we sat down for lunch—really a feast that

our incredible hosts had prepared for us—and the

town leaders shared with us the problems that their

community was experiencing and how we might be

able to come alongside them as siblings in Christ.

While we ate, clearly malnourished children kicked a

deflated soccer ball up and down the dirt road beside us,

occasionally looking over to see if we’d finished our meal.

We had become accustomed to them swooping in after

we were done to eat was left off of our plates.

Like many of us, Leah moved the food around on her

plate, and then the floodgates opened again. She put

down her fork. She let out a big exhale, and she made

a declaration to us: she was going to make some

big, and I mean big, life changes upon returning to

the States. She would begin by selling most of her

possessions and writing a big old check to CEPAD, the

umbrella organization that our Presbytery worked with

in Nicaragua. When our well-meaning group leader

suggested that she simply join the Presbytery’s global

outreach committee instead, Leah was indignant with

a 20-year-old’s indignation. She challenged us all to do

something that “actually mattered.”

Well, as you can most likely surmise, Leah didn’t end up

selling most of her possessions or making any apparent

radical changes. Once back in the comfort of her own

home, she was surprised and sobered by the difficulty

of her intentions and the decisiveness that she had

exercised so earnestly when confronted with the depths

of human pain.

What she did have, however, was a change of

conscience. In order for Leah to receive the divine

invitation, her world had to be shaken up, and she had to

cease being the center of it. Grief came first, as it does

when we lose something precious. In Leah’s case, it was

a sense of general justice, of okay-ness in the world, of

the security that comes with it, of integrity.

But when I met with her for coffee and a chat just a few

months later, she expressed that the disappointment that

she had in herself had begun to dissipate. What I heard

is that this ensuing relief enabled her to make some

changes that brought her ideals and her reality into a

closer dance. Changes in how she managed her time

and what she spent her money on, what she committed

herself to, what she read, how she prayed. The biggest,

smallest things.

Jesus knows that the rich man seeking the recipe for

eternal life is anxious. Like most of us, he is missing

an inherent sense of his goodness, his worth, his

security. He compensates in all of the ways we tightly

wound folks compensate. He follows the rules—or

at least he tries really hard. He plays the game. He

doesn’t question too much. And despite it all, he is still

excessively worried. Am I really enough? Am I doing all

of this the right way? Am I safe in this world? Am I saved

in the next?” His question to Jesus is not “How do I serve

God and my neighbors more faithfully?” But “What do

I need to do to secure my own salvation? To punch my

ticket to heaven?”

Jesus encounters this man with grace, but not with

cheap grace. Jesus knows that the man’s anxiety over all

of these things is inherently self-centered. In this man’s

telling, he follows all of the commandments, but the

indwelling, inbreaking Kingdom of God has clearly not

taken root. He has accumulated wealth at the expense

of the poor without any apparent knowledge that this

is unjust, and his faith in his ability to gain eternal life

by and for himself has left him unable to recognize the

presence of God when it is standing close enough for

him to touch. Jesus knows that in order for this man to

live in, to taste, the eternal life that he is seeking, he, like

Leah, needs to cease being the center of his world. He

has to break free of the worry that binds him to his own

self-interest. He has to let go of the notion that he alone

can merit his own present and his own future because if

he continues in that way, his world is wholly consumed

by concern for himself, and that—as it turns out—is

exactly the opposite of the eternal life that he is seeking.

Rich man, you cannot do this! It is so hard, in fact, that it

is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle,

Jesus says. It makes sense that the disciples were

incredulous. And that we are. And that the Church was.

In the fifth century, the Church was convinced that the

metaphor of the camel going through the eye of the

needle just needed to be tweaked to make it possible.

They suggested that the Greek words for ‘camel’ and

‘heavy cable’—the kind that’s used as a ship anchor—

must have gotten mixed up. (They were very similar

words, after all, in Greek.) The ancient translator must

have dozed off, accidentally writing ‘camel’ instead of

‘heavy cable.’ Of course, this explanation didn’t last for

long—well, you know why! Because no ship cable can

be threaded through the eye of a needle any more than

I camel can. The explanation may have been short-lived,

but the effort to make the rich man’s quest for eternal life

possible is telling. My gosh, there had to be a way to get

that camel through the eye of that needle, to get that rich

man into heaven. Putting salvation in God’s hands alone

was not sufficient.

Is it sufficient for us? I sure hope so.

Church, this is a liberating story. If, for a handful of

folks, the words of Jesus spark convicted souls, and

a radical reorientation to one’s material wealth, and a

redistribution of the earth’s bounty, then thanks be to

God. That is good news. That is gospel.

And if, for most of us here today, this challenging call is a

reminder that the imperative of God is serious, but so is

the grace, then thanks be to God. What is impossible for

us is possible for God. Thanks be to God.

God—and only God—can release us from the agony of

self-worship and a meritocracy that is bound to leave

us despairing like that rich man. Rich and poor and

everything in-between: when we recognize that it is

God’s love, God’s grace, God’s gracious will at work in us

and in our world, then it is God that retains the rightful

place at the center—the very center—of our lives. And

when God, and not “me, myself, and I,” is the center of

my life, I am finally and actually free to think about the

interests of others, the needs, the dreams of others. I am

free to serve others with a courage I didn’t even know

that I had. I am free to imagine and work for a world that

centers others. I might not sell all of my possessions, or

whatever equivalent that would be for somebody in my

tax bracket and station in life, but because my salvation

does not depend on it, I am untethered—I am free to

follow Jesus with obedience and with joy. I can begin to

live that seemingly impossible lifestyle that Jesus pleads

with us all to live, resting in the Truth that God can

handle the rest.

Imagine if we all did that? Imagine if the rich man in our

story did that? Maybe he did.

This story can be discomforting, and it can be confusing

because it holds two seemingly opposite things in

tension: the call for radical discipleship on the one

hand, and the revelation that it is impossible for most

of us to heed that call on the other. But illuminating and

connecting that tension is the revelation that for our

God, it is possible. God can. And God has. And God will

not let us go until everyone is fed, and all is restored,

and life abundant is everyone’s birthright. It is a Godgiven promise; it is a God-given gift. Most of all, it is an

invitation to be so moved by our gratitude for it that we

begin to do the impossible.

Thanks be to God. Amen.