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Before we hear our passages of scripture I’d like to remind you that we are a spiritual journey together. A journey into Becoming a Generous People. A journey where we become “candidates for growth in grace.” Isn’t that a great phrase?

It comes from Westmont College scholar Trempor Longman III. This is what the book of Ecclesiastes is about. Opening our eyes to the reality of life so that we can become candidates for growth in grace. A teacher is on spiritual journey to find the meaning of life. In his search for the answer, he smashes into pieces every object in which we place our trust: money sex, power, position, human wisdom, even our attempts to become righteous.
Nothing satisfies. Nothing delivers the goods. Nothing fulfills. Nothing. It is only when we have genuinely given up everything, that we can become – here’s the phrase again – ‘candidates of grace.’ A generous people. The teacher in Ecclesiastes wants us to completely hear Solomon, the richest, wisest man in the world in the ancient Near East at that time – finding no meaning in wealth, power or even wisdom itself.

Old Testament Reading: Ecclesiastes 5:10-15
10The lover of money will not be satisfied with money; nor the lover of wealth, with gain. This also is vanity. 11When goods increase, those who eat them increase; and what gain has their owner but to see them with his eyes? 12Sweet is the sleep of laborers, whether they eat little or much; but the surfeit of the rich will not let them sleep. 13There is a grievous ill that I have seen under the sun: riches were kept by their owners to their hurt, 14and those riches were lost in a bad venture; though they are parents of children, they have nothing in their hands. 15As they came from their mother’s womb, so they shall go again, naked as they came; they shall take nothing for their toil, which they may carry away with their hands.

The author of Timothy meanwhile is on a different kind of journey. Struggling with the early church his quest is to determine what does it mean to live fully into the grace of Jesus? There is false teaching in the church that godliness (or righteousness) will bring both a special kind of spiritual wisdom and financial gain. This also may have been a time when some in the early church started charging fees for services like pastoral counseling.

New Testament Reading: I Timothy 6:9-10
9But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains.

Now we come to our gospel story. If you are able would you please stand for the reading of God’ word. Our story of a rich young ruler’s encounter with Jesus begins in verse 17 in Mark chapter 10.

Mark 10:17-27
17As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 18Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. 19You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; You shall not defraud; Honor your father and mother.’” 20He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.”
21Jesus, looking at him, 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.” 22When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.
23Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” 24And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them 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 someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” 26They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” 27Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”

SERMON: Rev. Paul Seebeck
An exasperated mother, whose son was always getting into mischief, finally asked him, "How do you expect to get into Heaven?"

The boy thought it over and said, "Well, I'll just run in and out and in and out and keep slamming the door until St. Peter says 'For Heaven's sake, Jimmy, come in or stay out!'

It’s a great child-like response to the questions of life that sometimes overwhelm us, isn’t it? Questions that have been with us throughout the history of humankind. Who can I trust? How should I live? What is the meaning of life?

These questions that come to us on our journey into life – our journey away from death; which is what becoming a generous person is ultimately about – usually come to the forefront during a crisis.

1. The teacher in Ecclesiastes has seen people keep their riches to themselves, only to lose those riches in a bad investment. Now they have nothing to give their children,

2. The writer in Timothy is in a church that is fighting for its life because of a disconnect between what they say they believe and how they are living,

3. The young man that kneels before Jesus has it all – rich and religiously good – yet in some deep internal sense he knows it isn’t enough to satisfy.

Sounds eerily familiar to some of our present circumstances, doesn’t it?

When I began working on this series of messages this summer this is what I wrote in the margins next to these texts that I had chosen for Sunday – becoming a generous people: dangerous accumulation, wealth is fleeting. My plan was to preach on one key verse from each of these scripture passages:

1. The lover of money will not be satisfied with money; nor the lover of wealth, with gain.

2. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil

3. How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!
But as I listened to these scripture passages this week, and to the unfolding events of the financial crisis, my thinking of how this message would play out began to change. I do think it’s helpful to notice that in each question, and each crisis, the authors of scripture state clear that money matters – how much we love it, how much we trust it, how much we live for it, how much we ultimately attach the meaning of our life to it, to our possession, our worth. But I’m most interested in how these questions that come to us during times of crisis are a sign of God’s grace. Just listen for a moment to a snippet of an editorial piece written in the New York Times this week by Judith Miller.

“A couple of years ago,” she writes, ”at the height of the economic boom, a friend in New York publishing described to me the indignities of being a five-figure employee commuting daily from suburban New Jersey on trains packed with traders, stock brokers and hedge-fund types.
“These were the guys who, in college, I used to step over on Sunday mornings when they were laying in a pool of their own vomit,” he said. “And now they’re earning millions and millions – in bonuses alone.”

The image, as you might imagine, stuck in my mind. For it summed up so well a certain kind of resentment and sense of injustice that a particular class of non-monied professionals in the New York area came to feel sometime in the late 1990s. The feeling of injustice wasn’t just about money. It was, rather, about a sense that the wrong people had inherited the earth. They had taken over everything. Their salaries (and bonuses in particular) had pushed real estate costs and living expenses sky-high. Their values had permeated every aspect of life. And their choices seemed to have become the only acceptable — even viable — ones possible. ”

Can you hear the questions – Who do I trust? (The guys who used lay in their own vomit?) How should I live? (Is there really only one choice?) What is the meaning of life? (Is it really all about cost-cutting and efficiency, self interest, maximizing profit?)

The first Jesus does when this rich young man comes to him is to remind him that no one is good, but God alone. Then after reminding of some of the commandments – how obedience to them might open the door to eternal life – he sees the young man’s sincerity… and he loves him.

Interestingly one of the commandments Jesus reminds the rich man of is “Do not defraud” which he substituted for do not covet… both terms could be related to how this young man felt about money, what he might do to acquire it. To covert means to desire what belongs to another and to wish for it earnestly, to defraud means to deprive someone else of something by deception or fraud. Do see the distinction? Both responses could be wrapped up in deadly combinations in love for money couldn’t they?

But Jesus becomes aware that this young man sincerely wants life, not death. Because he loves him he tells him some of the most difficult language any human can hear regarding his/her money: there’s just one thing you’re lacking so go, and sell all of your possessions, give it to the poor, and then come and follow. Everybody is stunned. Shocked. The man goes away sad, in darkness, grieving at the hold that his money and possessions has on him.

Then Jesus turns to his disciples – (paraphrase Lamar Williamson Jr. – Union Theological Seminary.

How hard it is for anyone to enter the kingdom, but for rich people it is quite impossible. In fact, humanly speaking it is impossible for anyone to be saved rich or not: but with God all things are possible.

I love the language Jesus uses because it holds out for the possibility of hope. Who knows what will come in the time of darkness and grieving when a human being recognizes what is preventing them from truly living? The rich young man did go away sad, but what happened to him after that?”

There’s just one more thing that is so remarkable graceful in this passage of scripture that I don’t want us to miss. It comes in verse 24 - after Jesus told his disciples how hard it would be for those of wealth to enter God’s kingdom they anxious, full of uncertainly with these difficult… So Jesus says it again, “Children.” Did you catch that? “Children, how hard it is to enter the Kingdom of God.” In the preceding paragraph in Mark 10:13-16 Jesus had established that one must receive the Kingdom of God like a child. It reads this way:

13People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. 14But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. 15Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” 16And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.’

Isn’t this a remarkable contrast? On the one hand Jesus is saying receive the gift of the Kingdom of God, or eternal life, like a child. On the other hand he is saying entrance to the Kingdom of God demands all – whatever it is that possesses you, whatever it is where you have placed your trust.

Yet we can’t do enough to achieve the life we seek. It is only possible with God – we can only receive it as a gift. The contrast of the gift and the demand a paradox that is astonishing… and true!

The crisis becomes the gift where the questions in our journey come to the forefront. Who do I trust? How should I live? What is the meaning of life? It is a way that a loving God moves with us candidates for growth in grace, as we become a generous people.