Needle in a Haystack
Mark 10:17-31
by Rev. Randy Quinn

Some things seem impossible to us, like finding a needle in a haystack, or putting a camel through the eye of a needle, or, as Jesus suggests, for a rich person to enter into the Kingdom of God (Mk. 10:25).

And while some of us breathe a big sigh of relief thinking we are not rich people for whom Jesus says it will be difficult; the truth is, we are the richest people in the world. If all we were earning was half of minimum wage, we would be among the wealthiest 10% of the world’s population.

Not many of us – if any – worry about whether or not we will have food on our table tomorrow, for instance. When we pray, “Give us this day our daily bread,” we already know the prayer has been answered because there is food in our cupboards. We even have “disposable” income for entertainment. We may not have as much money as the ball players do, but we can afford to watch them play – and that makes us rich. You see, if you have enough money to pay to watch a ball game, you are rich.

We are people who have money. So when we hear this story, we are more like the rich man than any of the other people. And if we don’t place ourselves in his position as we’re listening, then we probably haven’t heard the story.

Like that man, most of us would profess to be good people. We can list the Ten Commandments – at least most of them – and we say with some humility, and with a certain amount of honesty, that we have kept them from our youth (Mk. 10:20).

And like the man in the story, we find it hard to believe Jesus would ask us to sell all that we own and give that money to the poor. We might even get defensive about it. We don’t want to part with our furniture set. We have collected too many little knick-knacks to part with them. We have made too many plans based on our income or our savings to simply let it all go. And what about those family heirlooms? What would we do without a car?

In a society where mini-storage units are among the most successful businesses, it’s hard not to realize that we have and keep more than we need; but few of us want to part with the “stuff” stored in them, either.

We might try to justify our need to keep some things by saying we can’t go to work without the right tools or the right clothes. But Jesus doesn’t make any exceptions. He tells the man to sell it all (Mk. 10:21).

We might justify not giving the money “to the poor” because we think they are so unreliable. It would be a waste of our money. We can cite examples of wastefulness that we believe led to their poverty.

But Jesus says, “sell what you own and give the money to the poor” (v. 21).

It’s no wonder the man is shocked by the answer Jesus gives him – so are we! And the Disciples are as stunned as we are. But when they ask if it counts that they have given up home and family and income, Jesus assures them that they will receive their reward (Mk. 10:27-30). (He doesn’t say what the reward is, by the way.)

But where does that leave us?
It’s OK to feel a little squeamish right now.
I don’t like it any better than you do.

We don’t like to talk about money, at least not our own money. We can talk about taxes and we can talk about the high price of gas – or the low price of corn. But it’s another thing to talk about our own bank accounts.

The truth is Jesus spoke about money more often than he spoke about any other topic. He knows what we pretend isn’t true. Jesus knows that money can become an obsession; money can become our god. And it doesn’t matter how much or how little we have, money can become the focus of our lives. The only way to make sure money doesn’t become our god is to become the master of our money. As Dave Ramsey says it, we need to “tell our money where to go,” rather than letting money determine where we go.

We have tried very hard in our family to make sure that money doesn’t make our decisions. That’s because I know that when money makes our decisions, money has become our god – and that’s not the god I want to worship.

But in our culture, that’s not easy to do. We are constantly bombarded by marketing folks who want us to believe we need their particular product. We may indeed be the recipients of the most powerful marketing pressures that have ever been experienced. There is an all-out war for our attention. Money wants to become the god of our lives.

Jesus, looking at [the man], loved him and said, "You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me." When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.
Mark 10:21-22

“You lack one thing,” Jesus says (Mk. 10:21). I think the one thing the man lacks is trust in God. He trusts his money more than he trusts his maker. He doesn’t want Jesus to make decisions in his life.

I want to show you a short video clip. It doesn’t speak about money, per se. But it does address the issue of who will make decisions in our lives. It asks us to look carefully to determine if we are willing to let God make our choices or if we are allowing others to influence us.

Video Clip:

This clip, called “the Stool” features a woman who asks Jesus to sit on the stool – a stool that fairly quickly becomes evident is symbolic of the decision-making seat of her life. But when Jesus tries to make some decisions, she starts to sit on the stool with him. He insists – and it is obvious by watching – that only one person can sit on the stool. It’s either him or someone else.
http://www.sermonspice.com/product/21240/the-stool


I don’t know about you, but I see myself in that video. Like the woman, I find it all-too-easy to ask Jesus into my heart, but then betray that decision by ignoring him when something else lures me away.

In that sense, we are like the man who comes to Jesus and asks what we need to do in order to inherit eternal life (Mk. 10:17). We have been searching for an answer to that question, sorting through the various options like people looking for a needle in a haystack. Nothing seems to satisfy us, in part because we don’t want to live with the decisions of someone else.

The answer is rather simple, really; but it isn’t easy. The answer is to trust God. And while the test of that trust may vary from person to person, it does reveal our true allegiance.

If money makes our decisions, we cannot enter the Kingdom of God.
If family makes our decisions, we cannot enter the Kingdom of God.
If our employer makes our decisions, we cannot enter the Kingdom of God.
If our peers make our decisions, we cannot enter the Kingdom of God.
If advertisers make our decisions, we cannot enter the Kingdom of God.

If God isn’t the one sitting on the stool, we cannot enter the Kingdom of God.

It may seem impossible for us to live that way, to let God sit in the driver’s seat of our lives, to let God make our decisions for us. But the truth remains that the only way to enter the Kingdom of God is to trust God to provide for our needs and to direct our lives.

It may be that God will lead us to a life filled with wealth. It may be that God will lead us to a life filled with fine linens and fancy cars. It may also be that God will lead us to a life of poverty. It may be that God will lead us to a life filled with friendships and not finances.

No matter what God desires for us, our prayer could become the one found in our hymnal, # 607. It’s based on a prayer of John Wesley. You can turn there if you’d like and pray it with me:

I am no longer my own, but thine.
Put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt.
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
Let me be employed by thee or laid aside for thee,
exalted for thee or brought low by thee.
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
I freely and heartily yield all things
to thy pleasure and disposal.
And now, O Glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
thou art mine, and I am thine. So be it.
And the covenant which I have made on earth,
let it be ratified in heaven. Amen.