As Jesus was setting out on a journey, a man ran up, knelt down before him, and asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus answered him, “Why do you call me good?” No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: You shall not kill; you shall not commit adultery; you shall not steal; you shall not bear false witness; you shall not defraud; honor your father and your mother.” He replied and said to him, “Teacher, all of these I have observed from my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said to him, “You are lacking in one thing. Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” At that statement his face fell, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions.” (Mark 10. 17-22)
Many things could be said of the passage that we hear today that tells the story of the rich man who can’t let go of his possessions. The story appears in all three synoptic gospels. However, the story varies from one to another, although it remains overall the same. Mark infers that the man is older when he has him say, “All of these I have observed from my youth.” Matthew says he is young. And Luke says he is a ruler. However, all three agree he has many possessions that he finds impossible to let go of in order to become a follower of Rabbi Jesus.
Interestingly, the story is the longest in Mark’s gospel in regard to an ethical issue. In fact, there are three parts to it, only the first part that I’ve provided in the introduction. The second part has Jesus turning to the disciples and telling them how difficult it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. The third part has Peter say to Jesus, “We have given up everything and followed you.” His statement allows Jesus to assure him that he and others like him who have given up everything for the sake of the gospel will receive a hundred times more “in the age to come.”
It’s easy to see that there is a mountain of spiritual topics contained in the story, each one worthy of serious examination. You can take your pick. Rather than stay on the beaten path, I’d like us to look at something that usually is ignored. I think it would benefit us to look at the emotions that are presented in the story and see what they might tell us. It is a story full of emotion, somewhat unusual for Mark.
We should begin with this phrase that is unique to Mark’s version. He writes, “Jesus, looking at him, loved him,” Love, as we know, is a strong emotion. One wonders why Mark says Jesus loved him, especially since there is no evidence that he had spoken to the man before. Since the phrase follows immediately after the man has told Jesus that he has observed all of the commandments that Jesus has told him are necessary to inherit eternal life, we can infer that Jesus finds goodness and genuineness in the man, pointing to his upright character. Jesus recognizes that he would make a good disciple. Little wonder then that he invites him to follow him.
With the invitation, we find another strong emotion, this time on the part of the man who says he wants to inherit eternal life. As Mark tells it, upon hearing Jesus tell him that he should sell everything he has, give the proceeds to the poor, and then follow him, the man’s “face fell and he went away sad.” Obviously, the man feels disappointment. But as I’ve said many times before, translators have a difficult job on their hands trying to find a comparable word in English for a word in Greek. And this is another prime example.
Truthfully, there is nothing wrong in the word choice that we find in our text, but as I see things the actual depth of emotion is missing in the words “his face fell.” I say that because the word that Mark uses here is the only time in his entire gospel that he uses it. Anytime there is a single instance of a word in a gospel, it’s like a flashing light. So, we need to look at it more carefully.
When we do, we find that the original text has a lot more emotion in it than we find in the words “his face fell.” Actually, the word is better translated as shocked, stunned, or appalled. Now, those words have the feels, to borrow a modern-day phrase. To say his face fell is to say he was disappointed. But to say that he was shocked or appalled, well that is a whole new level of being surprised. We might be disappointed if our amazon delivery doesn’t show up at our door as promised. But we would be shocked if a Publishers Clearing House van parked in front of our house. And we would be appalled that the guy who ran off with our wife is ringing our doorbell. You see, different words express different depths of feelings.
So, when we’re told that Jesus loved the man because he finds him to be a good and a genuine person we know Jesus is experiencing a deep feeling. Likewise, when Jesus asks the man to sell what he has and to give it to the poor so that he can follow him as a disciple, the man’s reaction also is a very deep one, gut-wrenching in fact. He’s stunned and as the words sink in he’s appalled.
The depth of his feelings is further illustrated by the fact that Mark tells us the man “went away sad, for he had many possessions.” Here the word for sad is trying to express someone who is in physical pain or who is experiencing grief. Of course, those feelings make sense in light of the fact that the man wants to inherit eternal life and he learns that in order to do so he has to give away everything he owns. Imagine if we lost everything we had. We’d be more than sad. We’d also be in pain and grieving our loss.
So, It’s fair to say that there are strong feelings on both sides of the equation. Jesus feels love for the would-be disciple who for his part feels both shock and great pain because in that moment of decision he knows in his heart he can’t let go of his possessions to follow Jesus. So, in the end, both Jesus and the rich man are heartbroken, Jesus because he’s lost someone who would have been a good disciple, and the rich man because Jesus’ prescription for gaining eternal life just isn’t something he can do.
Both men feel a sense of loss. It makes sense then that Jesus turns to the Twelve and says quietly to them, “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God.” Knowing the feeling of loss he has experienced, we can hear the pain in his words. It would be wrong for us to think that Jesus just shakes his head and says to himself, “Just another day in paradise.” He was never cavalier about his call to follow him.
So, what is Mark telling us here? Let’s go with the obvious first. The exchange between Jesus and the man with many possessions reminds us of the cost of discipleship. To follow Jesus takes from us. Jesus makes that crystal clear when he tells Peter shortly after that “anyone who has given up a house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake will receive a hundred times more in the age to come.” I just don’t think he pulled those examples out of a hat. I believe they were the lived experience of his disciples at that very moment.
Those are big items in anyone’s life and to have to give them up to become a follower of Jesus tells us the radical demands of discipleship. Really, it shouldn’t surprise us. Mark has already had Jesus say that we should amputate arms and legs and cut out our eyes if any one of these things causes us to stumble as we follow in the path of Jesus.
And, if memory serves us well, we may want to recall the radical nature of discipleship that has been staring us in the face since the call of the first disciples at the Sea of Galilee when Jesus asked the fishermen to follow him. Mark says that Peter and Andrew abandoned their nets and James and John answered the call decisively by leaving behind in the boat their aged father Zebedee.
In many ways, then, Jesus isn’t asking anything more of the man with the possessions than he’s asked of the fishermen. The difference, of course, is that the man kneeling in front of him had “many possessions,” as Mark says, meaning he had a lot more to let go of. Not that dropping their nets and leaving their father behind was any easier for the fishermen. But it certainly was more difficult for the man who had more disposable wealth.
We’re reminded, then, that when Jesus calls someone to follow him there can be no obstacle that gets in the way of answering that call. And obstacles, as we surely know, come in all shapes and sizes. The fishermen’s nets could have been an obstacle if they had allowed them to be. But they chose to drop their nets onto the ground.
The man with many possessions could not find the same will power to let go of all that he held in his hands. The call was the same, but he was loaded down with a lot more luggage. And that leads us to consider another essential part of following Jesus. We have to travel light. Earlier in Mark’s gospel, we heard Jesus send the Twelve out on their missionary journey, instructing them to “take nothing for the journey but a walking stick–no food, no sack, no money in their belts. They could have a pair of sandals, but not a second tunic.” In other words, he’s telling them to pack light. Very light.
That requires that we live simply, cultivating a lifestyle devoid of stuff, not being weighed down by things. The reason is easy to discern. In choosing a simple lifestyle, the disciple is not weighed down by stuff. As we know, stuff–whatever it is–has weight. And the more stuff we have the more preoccupied we are with it. That apparently was the rich man’s problem. His time and his energy were focused on his stuff.
It’s the same for us. If our attention is focused on all our stuff, then it isn’t focused on Jesus and his ways. If we’re preoccupied with getting and keeping our stuff, then we’re not preoccupied with getting and keeping our lives right with Jesus. Having less in our rooms means having more room for Jesus in our lives.
Of course, Jesus fully exemplified this way of living simply. He traveled light so he could stay focused on doing his Father’s will. He stayed on the road to Jerusalem, not weighed down by possessions. And so it comes as no surprise to us that when Jesus was nailed to the cross outside the walls of Jerusalem he had nothing to his name except the shirt on his back and even that was taken from him as the soldiers threw dice to see who walked away with it. He died on the cross stripped down to nothing, showing us one last time that he was willing to let go of everything to do his Father’s will.
Leaning into the story of the man with many possessions, we might want to ask ourselves just what it is in Jesus’ words and ways that evoke the strongest feelings in us. What is it that he asks of us that shocks us to our shoe soles? What is that one thing that he asks of us that we find particularly impossible and especially appalling?
Whatever it is that stuns and shocks and dismays us in the words of Jesus, in all likelihood it’s the one thing that is lacking in us that keeps us from fully and faithfully answering the call to follow him.
So, maybe we should allow our emotional reaction to be the clue as to what Jesus is asking us to let go of. For some, it might be a fisherman’s net. For others, it might be a million dollars.
When he looks at us with love and tells us what he wants us to do, and it causes our faces to fall, we have our answer because it feels like he’s asking the impossible of us. In that moment, we stand alongside the man with many possessions. There is no room for us to condemn him if we also decide to walk away from Jesus and from his call to follow him, sad for sure, but simply not able to pay the price.
–Jeremy Myers
Sunday Brunch 