Has Money Become An Idol In Your Life? - Proper 23 - Year B

In the name of the living God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

I doubt that there is anyone listening to this sermon that hasn’t seen the film Titanic. If you haven’t seen it then I’m sorry if I spoil the end of the film for you because it sinks!

But wind back about 30 minutes before that there is an exchange between two of the characters, a businessman called Caledon Hockley and the first officer William Murdoch. Hockley says ‘Mr. Murdoch, I’m a businessman, as you know, and I have a business proposition for you… and then quietly slips a stack of dollars into his pocket.’

A little while later Hockley who is still on Titanic confronts Murdoch, who has just let another man get into the lifeboat, and says “We had a deal, damn you”, Murdoch looks at him and responds by flinging the bribe money in Hockley’s face and saying bitterly: “Your money can’t save you any more than it can save me.”

Hockley departs the scene with a look of horror on his face at the realisation that with all the money he had, it wasn’t going to help him to buy his way into a lifeboat.

‘It 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.’

There is much in our Gospel today which challenges us, because it speaks to the heart of something which if we are being honest, would like more of, money. This rich young man desperately wanted to know that he would be welcomed in the Kingdom, and as such he approaches Jesus to ask what he must do.

It began with Jesus recalling the six commandments which dealt with how we treat others, although you may have noticed that he said ‘You shall not defraud’ which the theologians point out that among other things means to deprive someone, which is another way of speaking about coveting that which is not theirs to take, and the young man confirms he has done all of this, but then Jesus hits him with what can only be described as the deal breaker, sell everything, give to the poor and follow me.

Just like Hockley the young man was bitterly disappointed, no doubt he saw the accumulation of his wealth as a symbol of power, how successful he had become, but whilst he was knowledgeable about the Talmud, the primary source of Jewish Religious law, its possible that his study of the Psalms, wasn’t as extensive. If it had been, then he would have known teachings such as this:

Do not be afraid when some become rich,

when the wealth of their houses increases.

For when they die they will carry nothing away;

their wealth will not go down after them.

Though in their lifetime they count themselves happy

—for you are praised when you do well for yourself—

they will go to the company of their ancestors,

who will never again see the light.

Or if he had listened more closely to the sermon on the mount, he would have heard this in the Gospel of Luke:

‘But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.’

There is a pattern, that while, the ancient Jews associated wealth with being in God’s favour, which was a worldly view, we see from scripture the kingdom view, that associated the poor with the pious and the rich with the ungodly.

Essentially whilst Jesus didn’t quote the first four commandments, the ones which focus our attention on obedience to God, in challenging the young man, Jesus shows that the young man has failed in following the first two, because he had made his wealth which he now worshipped, and money had become his idol.

The analogy of the Camel going through the eye of the needle wasn’t meant to be used as a parable, its meaning was as simple as it sounds. The Camel isn’t going through the needle, because its too big, just as someone who covets their wealth above everything else is going to struggle to enter heaven.

Now these are difficult words to hear because anyone who has wealth may be thinking where does that leave me?

It comes down to the second part of this scripture, because it brings God’s grace into the equation, and whilst it shouldn’t be seen as a get out of jail free card as it were, it does help up to think more deeply about what this means to us in the 21st century.

The disciples state quite rightly that they have left everything to follow, and as we read in Acts others will follow, but that was 2000 years ago in a place where wealth was only held by a few of the most powerful in the land.