WEEKLY SERMON

Pentecost 21
Mark 10:17-27 – Invest in Something Reliable!
October 24-26, 2009 by: Pastor Wessel

 Mark 10:17-27 – “¹⁷As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him.”Good teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"

 ¹⁸"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone. ¹⁹You know the commandments: 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.' "

 ²⁰"Teacher," he declared, "all these I have kept since I was a boy."

 ²¹Jesus looked at him and loved him. "One thing you lack," he said. "Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."

 ²²At this the man's face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.

 ²³Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!"

 ²⁴The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! ²⁵It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

 ²⁶The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, "Who then can be saved?"

 ²⁷Jesus looked at them and said, "With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God."

 Introduction – How is your piggy bank feeling these days? A little sick? I’m not talking about swine flu, of course. I’m talking about setting money aside for a rainy day. I’m talking about investing for the future. Many of you have been hit with the hard reality that not every investment in the future is as stable as you would like it to be. With the passing of days and months and years comes the rise and fall of markets, the increase and decrease in the value of your hard earned money.

Decisions have to be made! Can you afford to be patient and just wait and see while the value of your money goes down, while resources become fewer and fewer? Or do you have to make more drastic decisions, just so you can have enough to get through the next week? Do you find yourself not quite as independent as you would like to be, needing help, but not finding it easy to ask for help, even from those you know love you very much and are very eager to do all they can to help?

Investing your money in something valuable can be very frustrating. Investing your time and energy can be frustrating, too. Do you ever have a week or a day or a year where it seems like you are spending a lot of time on something but not getting anything done? We have heard today about a man who was very concerned about his investments. He was planning for the future and we certainly can commend him for thinking ahead. There is nothing especially noble about winging every day, not knowing where you are going to be or what you are going to be doing from day to day. On the other hand, you can be so concerned about the future that you miss many of the opportunities that there are in the present.

This man seemed to be pretty well set for his future in this life. Unless some horrible disaster came upon him, he had his riches. His life as a rich man was probably pretty comfortable compared with the average person living at the time of Jesus. But he had a long term investment that he was concerned about. He wasn’t sure if he had his funds in all the right places, so he posed to Jesus a very important question, not trying to trick Jesus, but apparently because he had a sincere desire to learn something very important: “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Jesus’ first response seems to be exactly the answer this man wanted and his hopes are high, you can almost picture the sense of joy and relief on his face. But the second response of Jesus presented him with a Himalayan challenge that crushed his eager spirit. In effect, Jesus told this man that his investments for the future were all in the wrong places. Instead, Jesus told him to:

Invest in something reliable!
I. Invest in Christ’s goodness, not your own
II. Invest in godly wealth, not earthly wealth

 I. Invest in Christ’s goodness, not your own
            Do you know this man who came to Jesus? He looks awfully familiar, doesn’t he? His face shows the characteristics of many people from many different nations, people from different times throughout history. He is a man who is eager for a challenge and looking for something to fuel his pride and keep it burning bright, not necessarily to show off to everyone else, but so he can feel like he’s made it, that he’s done enough and all is right with him and the big guy upstairs.

     Jesus loves this man, so it may seem strange the way Jesus responds at first. He presents the man with the measuring line that the man has been using for his life, trying to determine whether he’s been good enough: The 10 Commandments. ¹⁹You know the commandments: 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.'“ As Jesus lists the commandments, can’t you see this man mentally checking off the list: “Nope, haven’t done that. Nope, haven’t done that or that or that or that, but I did that one, just like God says I should.”

            He had spent a lot of time and energy investing in himself. He was doing all he could to live right and do good to his neighbor. But he should have listened to what Jesus said, “No one is good – except God alone.” Jesus wasn’t refusing to acknowledge that he himself was the Son of God. But he was pointing out something important to the man. Look at the man’s whole posture. He runs up to Jesus, eager for a quick answer; he kneels before Jesus, a sign of humility; he calls Jesus “good”.

            It is hard to get a handle on the motives of this man. Was he sincere? Was he sucking up to Jesus? Was he desperate for an answer because he had not been able to find peace in all his good deeds and all his wealth? What we do know was that he had the wrong view of the 10 commandments. He was clearly tricking himself into thinking that he had done everything that God had expected of him.

            Jesus said that he lacked the one thing: selling his possessions, giving them to the poor and then following Jesus (kind of three rolled together as one). If he had carried out that task, would that really have been it? Would he have saved himself by his own good deeds?  Don’t you just want to shout out to him? “Go ahead and do it! Eternal life is the most important! Isn’t that what you’re looking for? Even with your riches, isn’t that a small price to pay for heaven instead of going to hell?”

            Well, it is pretty clear that Jesus wasn’t too impressed with the efforts of this man to get to heaven on his own power, but because he loved him, he called out for him to repent and see clearly that achieving eternal life isn’t about checking off a “TO DO” list. It’s about seeing how far we are off track from God’s will, even with our best efforts. When the investment is in us, it will last from cradle to the grave. But it will be as shaky as any other investment we make in this world that God created, this world which lost its value when people decided they were worth more than the ONE who made us.

            Jesus’ call to repentance led the man into sadness and he went away and we don’t know what happened. Jesus, in effect, has said the same thing to you and me and repeats it every day. “Take all you have and all you are and let go of it and follow me. Stop looking at yourself in the mirror and trying to find something about you to give you joy and contentment. You will be frustrated to no end.”

            If we want to invest in ourselves, we have to know that it is a losing investment, with no hope of ever gaining interest. Before we take our first steps, we have failed: anger and frustration with our parents, a rebellious heart, lust filled eyes that want more and more pleasure, from spending money, from sexuality, from having carefree irresponsible fun

            In Christ alone, who is God and who is good, our investment is forever safe. Let go of everything to have treasure in heaven? Without question! Come, follow Jesus? Plagiarizing Peter, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life!”

            It is a solid investment that pays the dividends of eternal life. The fund has been established with innocent blood, the contract signed by God himself in the presence of your living Christ, at the empty tomb where Jesus was buried. Come; invest without money, without anything. As the hymn goes, “Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to thy cross, I cling.’ No one is excluded from investing in this fund. Every person has access by God’s free grace, through faith in the Son of God.

 II. Invest in godly wealth, not earthly wealth
What is real wealth? What are the most valuable riches? In the world, we often define wealth in terms of how much you have. It may be money, it may be possessions: home, cars, electronic equipment, traveling where you want when you want. Some people inherit wealth; others work hard to gain wealth.

Jesus told the man, “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.” Is this command that Jesus gave to the command the same command for us? Does Jesus ask us to sell all of our possessions and give the money we get to those in need?

Yes, if you understand it correctly. Jesus calls us to view everything we possess as not really belonging to us. He calls us to acknowledge God as the giver, even when we earn our paycheck; even when we receive an inheritance from our relatives.

 God says that wealth is what he gives and just as easily as he is able to give, he is able to take away. The earthly wealth that we enjoy as Americans is good for us to enjoy during our time on earth. It has its time and place. But it is not for us to abuse. It is not for us to worship as the factor in our lives that will make us happy. It is not that without which we are hopeless and fearful. That honor belongs to God alone. Without him we are hopeless and fearful.

The disciples of Jesus seemed shocked that the rich would have a hard time getting to heaven. Using the eyes of the world, riches are so often equated with success, with “making it.” If you have been blessed with riches, surely you must be right with God.

Jesus turns that idea around and emphasizes the danger of wealth, its deceit, seeming to offer happiness in and of itself, but never delivering true lasting happiness, because it is based on something so unstable, as we have clearly seen over the last year.

But, as Jesus said, all things are possible with God. The possibility of being saved does not rest in our strength and our will power, our ability to become wealthy or our ability to get rid of our wealth. The possibility of being saved rests solely on the one we follow as we do these things. That is the key phrase: “Come, follow me.” Without following Jesus, the rich man would have just become a poor man, with no more hope than anyone. But turn his trust away from his own goodness, his own riches (in other words, to repent of his idol worship of himself and his possessions) and follow Jesus, that was the answer to his question. Jesus was the answer. But he couldn’t see past his sinful nature that loved himself and his wealth. He couldn’t see that what Jesus was offering him was much more valuable than anything he already possessed.

Sometimes our ability to see the true value of something is stunted. We are not always good appraisers. We turn away from something better because we are comfortable with what we have always known. We drive an old car until it is dangerous because we are afraid to adjust to a new car that in reality might be much easier to handle. We are afraid to change a habit that we’ve gotten used to, even if it is not the best or may be even harmful, because we are afraid of the unknown, what a change might mean. Our sinful nature convinces us that we shouldn’t leave sin behind, because we’ve gotten so used to using the Lord’s name in vain or thinking dirty thoughts about men or women or we’ve gotten so used to having a rebellious stance against anyone in authority.

            Jesus says, “Store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy and thieves do not break in and steal.” Jesus says, “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.” Your money and your possessions are valuable, but nothing is more valuable than your place in the kingdom of God. God has brought you to faith in Christ as the one who erases the guilt of your sin. God has promised to be with you forever and that you will be with him forever. Nothing we have or possess can compare to the joy of knowing our God and Savior.

 Conclusion – So what is the value of our possessions? We use them for God, to draw attention to his wonderful works. We use them for the benefit of those whom God has put into our lives to serve. You and I are rich beyond our imagination. And yes, we have been blessed with money and possessions as well. May God help us always to see clearly and help us to be wise managers of all the good things he gives us. Amen.