Monday 9 October 2017

What Do We Have To Do To Be Saved?

In this article I will unashamedly be paraphrasing the sermon our Vicar gave this Sunday. It was just really well done and I had to use it.

The sermon was on 'Mark 10:13-31' which I will put below.

Let the Children Come to Me

13 And they were bringing children to him that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them. 14 But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. 15 Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” 16 And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them.

The Rich Young Man

17 And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 18 And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. 19 You know the commandments: ‘Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honour your father and mother.’” 20 And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth.” 21 And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” 22 Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
23 And Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” 24 And the disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how difficult it is[a] to enter the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” 26 And they were exceedingly astonished, and said to him,[b] “Then who can be saved?” 27 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.” 28 Peter began to say to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you.” 29 Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, 30 who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. 31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
Footnotes:
a- Mark 10:24 Some manuscripts add for those who trust in riches
b- Mark 10:26 Some manuscripts to one another
There are a few parts that need to be focused in on to understand the message of salvation in this text.

In Verses 13-16, we see Jesus tell us that we should receive the kingdom of God like a child. Many take this to mean we should have blind faith and not think too much about what our Christian beliefs are. This is not how it is meant to be taken, as the idea of blind faith is demonstrably non-Christian.


test everything. Hold on to what is good -- 1 Thessalonians 5:21
Rather what Jesus really meant is exemplified in the following story about the rich man, which is probably why Mark put it here in this order.

The rich man approaches Jesus and asks him "What must I do to inherit eternal life?". Jesus' response highlights that the man had asked the wrong question.
Jesus says to him "You know the commandments" and lists a few. The rich man replies that he has kept all of the commandments, and Jesus tells him that he is missing something important. So his advice is to give away all his wealth and follow him. The rich man walks away distraught.

On closer inspection of the passage we can see exactly what is going on here. At first it might seem harsh that Jesus tells the man to give away all of his possessions, and possibly even contradictory when we think about the other wealthy people he knows who help to fund his mission, such as Joanna, the wife of Chuza. But Jesus' point here is not that his followers should all be poor. This is a point that is directly relevant to the particular rich man, although the lesson applies to everyone. Notice that he says “How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” and not "how impossible".

We notice that the laws that Jesus lists are mostly from Moses' Ten Commandments, with one extra one.
'Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honour your father and mother.’
The rich man rightfully says that he has not broken any of these laws. Then Jesus tells him that he is missing something. Looking at this list it becomes quite clear what it is that the man was missing. If we look at the Commandments that were left off of Jesus' list, we find:
  • You shall have no other gods before me.
  • You shall not make for yourself an idol.
  • You shall not take the Lord's name in vain. 
  • Keep the Sabbath Day Holy.
  • You shall not covet. 
The list of commandments that Jesus mentions are rules about how people should treat each other. The rich man has kept these perfectly. However, the commandments that were left out were about man's relationship to God.
The mistake the rich man made was to have another god. That god was his money, wealth, and possessions. Wealth was his idol. He probably skipped duties to God in favour of his work. He probably coveted a lot of items and this drove him to seek more material wealth. The rich man was focused on his own false god, and had let his duties to the real God slide.

So Jesus told the man that in order to inherit eternal life, he would have to give up on his false god completely and follow him instead. Essentially, Jesus told him that to earn eternal life, he would have to perfectly obey all of the commandments and not just a select few that suited him.
This message left the man disheartened, because he knew he could not give up his riches.

The point that Jesus made was in response to the rich man's question "What must I do to inherit eternal life?".
He answered him accurately by telling him to be perfect in every way.

However, the good news of Jesus is that we do not have to inherit or earn eternal life. Jesus knows that we have faults and weaknesses. Notice that even though the rich man had disobeyed some of the most important and well known commandments, he still loved him.
Jesus knows that nobody can achieve perfection on their own.

“Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.”
Eternal life is a gift from God, not something we can earn.

Jesus said "Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.". This was a subtle wink telling those who understood his message that he was God in the flesh. Only Jesus was a sinless and perfect man who rightfully earned eternal life by perfectly keeping the law.
So when he told the rich man to "
go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me." he was really saying "give up your false god and follow the real God".

Jesus knew that this was impossible, and that many people have their own false idols, whether it is wealth, fame, popularity, intelligence, beauty, or any other number of things. He also knew that there were others who broke other commandments.
This was not the point. He said to inherit eternal life you have to be perfect. But his entire mission on earth was to make eternal life a free gift for anyone who repented of their ways and followed him.

So the rich man should not have asked "What must I do to inherit eternal life?"
Instead, he should have said "Jesus. I have lived my life gathering wealth and property and I have neglected my duty to you. I am not perfect, and I know I will carry on making mistakes. Please forgive me, and let me follow you as best I can."
If he had done that, Jesus would have welcomed him with open arms.

So this ties back to the section on accepting the kingdom like a child. Children depend on their parents for all their needs. They are unable to provide for themselves no matter how hard they might try. They need things to just be given to them without any thought to whether or not they have earned it or deserve it.
So just like a child who can not earn the roof over their head, the clothes on their backs, or the food in their mouths, none of us can earn the eternal life that Jesus promises us.