October 9, 2009
Sunday Scripture
Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time
BY FATHER DONALD DILGER
At the beginning Mark reminds us once more that Jesus, with his disciples, is on his journey to Jerusalem. The disciples represent the Christians for whom Mark is writing. Jerusalem as a goal will lead not only to triumph but to bitterness and a tortuous death. Therefore the teachings that Mark presents “on the journey” will include bitterness and death to oneself. Today’s instruction is cast in the story of wealthy man. We will not know about his wealth until the end of the story. He has deep emotions — running up to Jesus and kneeling before him. The subject for instruction: Christians and wealth.
The man asks Jesus, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus may have been put off by the man’s overdone emotional approach and the unusually flattering address, “Good Teacher.” Thus Jesus’ prickly answer, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone?” This is not the only time in Mark’s gospel when Jesus responds with unexpected, even shocking irritation. Another interpretation of Jesus’ answer to the man: it is Mark’s way of indicating that the man is unknowingly right about Jesus’ identity as “good,” for God alone is absolute good, and Mark has repeatedly taught his readers Jesus’ identity as God. Jesus then extends his answer to an enumeration of five of the ten commandments that express duties toward others rather than those that directly express duties toward God. To these five Jesus adds, “You shall not defraud.”
The over-confident man replies that he has kept these commandments, “from my youth.” Jesus moves from irritation to love, as teachers often do with aggressive but sincere students. Mark writes, “Jesus looked at the man and loved him.” There was something the man could do beyond the commandments, “Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come follow me.” The man’s emotions once more come into play. “At that statement his face fell, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions.” Recall that Jesus gave counsel here, not a commandment but something beyond the commandments. The man was not condemned. He was loved by Jesus. His perfection would have to come in another way — by the use of his wealth to make friends of the poor. We borrow from Luke 16:9, “Make friends for yourselves with worldly mammon (Semitic word meaning riches) so that when it fails (at one’s death) they (the poor) may receive you into the everlasting dwellings.”
Jesus looks at his disciples for a reaction, and says, “How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God.” The disciples looked incredulous. That was not what they had learned from the Scriptures (our Old Testament). Their Scriptures for the most part considered wealth a great blessing. Only two men, Moses who was a prince of the royal family in Egypt, and Abraham, both of them powerful and rich, are given the title “friend of God” in the Old Testament Jesus insists, “It is easier for a camel to pass thru the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” This blew their minds, and they reply, “So who can be saved?” Jesus’ answer is easily understood from other New Testament teachings. “Humanly speaking this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Meaning: no one can buy the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is God’s free gift, both to the poor and to the rich.The gospels do see wealth as a possible hindrance to gaining the kingdom, but as noted in the above quote from Luke, wealth can be used as a ticket to the door of the kingdom. But entrance to the kingdom is God’s free gift. Simon Peter, the practical businessman from Bethsaida, notes that the disciples left everything to follow Jesus. He is concerned about the return on such a high-risk investment. Jesus assures them that those who have left all for the gospel, will have one hundred percent return in this life, “plus persecution,” and eternal life hereafter. “Plus persecution” calls for an explanation by a homilist.
This first century B.C. Jewish wisdom teacher authors a prayer which he attributes to King Solomon who did not pray for wealth but for wisdom to govern God’s people. The author compares wisdom to gold and silver. They are like a little sand and mud compared to wisdom. God answered Solomon’s selfless prayer not only with wisdom but also with “countless riches thru the mediation of wisdom.” The author does not define wisdom, but Sirach, another Wisdom book, defines wisdom as the Torah, the revelation that Moses gave Israel. For us Jesus is the final Torah or revelation that God gave to us. Got Jesus?
As Jesus is God’s Torah, so is the revelation of the Old Testament and the revelation Jesus brought us, the word of God contained in the New Testament. The author of Hebrews describes the Scriptures, the word of God, as “sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating even between soul and spirit, joints and marrow, able to discern reflections and thoughts of the heart.” Got Scripture?