It is Reformation Sunday. The phrase for today is that we are, “saved by grace through faith.” Those are fine churchy words, but what do they mean? The wealthy ruler that we read about in the gospel reading gives us a perfect example to learn from.
This ruler doesn’t just suddenly appear in front of Jesus out of the blue though. As Luke tells the story of Jesus he says that people were bringing infants to him that he might touch them. The disciples saw it. In what we might call an admirable attempt to protect their master from being bothered, they tell people to stop. But Jesus replies, “Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.” (Luke 18:16)
It's a sweet scene – Jesus welcoming children and being kind to them. But then Jesus says something that is difficult and confusing, “Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” (Luke 18:17) What are we to make of that? Does that mean you have to start your journey of Christian faith in childhood? Or is it more symbolic, like you need to have childish innocence and powerlessness in order to enter the kingdom of God? Jesus doesn’t give any answers directly, but when the rich ruler steps forward we find out what Jesus means.
It appears that the ruler was in the crowd as Jesus was blessing the children. So he steps forward and asks for clarification about his own situation. “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” That sounds to us like this ruler is complementing Jesus by calling him good. And he was, but what we may miss is that it was a compliment with strings attached. According to social rules of the day, one complement deserves another. In other words, the way this man compliments Jesus sort of puts Jesus under obligation to compliment him in return.
These days what you say and how you say it often indicates what political party you belong to and what your values are. We could call it moral posturing or virtue signaling. That’s along the lines of what this man is doing with Jesus. He’s showing his commitment to a particular set of social conventions, showing he is part of a particular social group, and how he expects life and relationships to work.
When Jesus replies, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.” Jesus is not denying his own goodness. He is signaling to the man that he is not going to play a game of moral posturing and virtue signaling. Jesus continues, “You know the commandments…” and he lists some of them. Thus, while Jesus isn’t playing along, he does start a different game of sorts. Listing the commandments like this is not meant to teach them. Jesus started off with, “You know the commandments…” What Jesus is doing is using a technique of using the Ten Commandments as a baseline to then teach something about how to apply them. So the ruler replies, “I have kept all these since my youth.” In other words, he is blameless. He is powerful, a leader, upright, and of high social standing. All of it has come about from his own efforts. By social conventions of the time you could say that he has it all, and that he merits it.
So now it is Jesus’ turn to teach something about how to apply the commandments. What things more should this ruler do? What should he do to merit a higher and more certain status before God?
You know Jesus’ reply. He does not reply about the commandments at all. If this man started off by complimenting Jesus so as to manipulate social conventions such that Jesus had to compliment him in return, Jesus now manipulates religious conventions in a way that corners this man. “There is still one thing lacking. Sell all that you own and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”
The ruler is now faced with the wholesale rejection of: his status in the world, his financial security, his social networks, and even his understanding of God. Everything, and Jesus means everything, that gives this man a position in the world has to go.
This scene was initiated by Jesus welcoming little children and saying that it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. A little child has: no developed social network, no financial portfolio to leverage, no possessions, and not even a morality that could lead to moral posturing or virtue signaling. A child is dependent upon its parents for everything. It is not even capable of meriting being loved. Now we know what Jesus meant. Receiving the kingdom as a child is not about innocence or immaturity. It is about dependence.
Faced with the wholesale rejection of everything that gave the ruler an identity he is saddened. He could have been angry. He could have lashed out at what Jesus taught. If social media were around at the time he could have lashed out against Jesus and tried to get him “cancelled”. But since he is saddened we realize that he probably was genuinely interested in what Jesus had to say. He did respect Jesus when he called him good and teacher. Jesus looks at him in his sadness and says, “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! Indeed, it is easier to for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” (18:24-25)
The rich man disappears from the story line. We are left to wonder what happened to him. Presumably he couldn’t do what Jesus said.
But he’s not the only one struggling with all of this. Those who heard Jesus said, “Then who can be saved?” Indeed, if being: respectable, hardworking, conscientious, and rule-abiding doesn’t make God love you, then what possibly could? What could God possibly want from us so that God loves us?
Here on Reformation Sunday we realize that that whole way of thinking is totally backwards. Yet that is exactly the way we are inclined to think. We live the way God wants – we are “good people” in other words – and God then takes us to heaven after we die.
I have been at a lot of death beds over the years and I’ve done plenty of funerals. I cannot count the number of times I’ve heard things like, “She was a good person.” Or, “He may have been a bit rough, but he was a good person at heart. I’m sure he’s in heaven with God right now.” My Lutheran theology wants to scream out and say: “Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!” But my pastoral sensibility keeps me quiet. I end up muttering something about we are all sinners in need of God’s grace, but the hearer thinks I’ve actually agreed with them.
“Then who can be saved?” they ask. Jesus replies with the truth. It is the simple, honest, straightforward truth: it is impossible.
That’s it. End of story. Do you want to be saved? Forget it. It’s not going to happen. You can’t do it. You’re lost, condemned, dead, damned. Too bad.
Except you aren’t saved by being: respectable, hardworking, conscientious, and rule-abiding. You are saved by God’s grace through faith; with faith itself being a gracious gift from God.
Jesus said, “What is impossible for mortals is possible for God.”
Now we’re at the core of what the rich ruler needed. We’re at the core of what we need too. It is the profound and absolute recognition of how helpless we are in our situation and how completely dependent we are upon God.
Salvation comes by God and God alone. It is not possible for us. No morality or merit of our own, regardless of the religious system, can get us there. If it could, then we could be smug and leveraging and manipulative; and do our virtue signaling and moral posturing, and have ‘correct’ political leanings, and all of that.
But when you are saved by God’s grace through faith all of that – all of it – is chucked out completely.
Inasmuch as we are moral, hard-working, conscientious, and all of that, it is the reasonable response to God’s grace. We say that if God does truly save us out of unmerited love, then we can live in love as well. We do so without strategy or scheme. We simply do it. Our lives of faith are not a strategy. They are a response.
God’s love and constant embrace of us gives us freedom. It gives us comfort. It gives us joy. We can live in true confidence. The Reformation renewed these truths 500 years ago. But of course they go back to Jesus himself. Despite their age they are as relevant to today as ever. They are what we build our lives upon.
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