Mark 10:17-31, Amos 5:6,7,10-15
The tale of the monkey with the clenched fist
The story is told of a monkey who was out one day looking for food and came across a dried up riverbed. As he walked along he saw there was a deep pit. He jumped down into it to investigate. In the side of the pit he spotted a small hole. He peered inside and could see something that looked good to eat. Perhaps they were nuts!
He slid his hand into the hole and grabbed hold of what he had seen. It was nuts. Mmm! These were going to taste good. He held onto them tightly in his fist. Just then he heard the sound of rain and running water.
Oh dear! the monkey thought. The river is starting to fill up again. I’d better be off! But he had just got time to eat those nuts. He tried to pull his hand out, but it was stuck. That’s strange – he’d put it inside easily enough! But now that the nuts were tightly grasped in his tight little fist he couldn’t get his hand out.
Oh no! The water started to trickle down beside him into the deep pit! Well, he’d just pull his hand out and eat up those nuts and he’d be gone. He pulled and he pulled and he pulled. He even had his feet up on the wall pulling as hard as he could. The water was rising in the pit. Soon it would be up to his waist. What was he going to do?
The only safe option was to leave the nuts in the hole, release his hand and escape from the rising water. But would he do it?
Jesus’ story of the rich man with the clenched fist
The story of the monkey sheds light on the Bible reading, Mark 10:17-31. The rich man found it hard to give up his great wealth to gain eternal life. Jesus said it was terribly hard to get into God’s kingdom; in fact he said it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into God’s kingdom.
Jesus instructed the rich man to: ‘Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.’ (Mark 10:21b) This man clearly had his money in his fist and he wasn’t about to open his hand to free himself to follow Jesus. Many times Jesus said you can’t love God and money together; you have to choose one or the other.
In the Bible reading from Amos 5:6,7,10-15, the people of Judah were challenged to live as God’s holy people by being honest and fair, choosing good not evil; God not money. That was the way to really live. It was the same sort of challenge!
Jesus can sound quite harsh in his judgment of the wealthy and their entrance into the realm of God, but Christians are called to be countercultural and share what they have. For comfortable, middle-class Christians, Jesus’ discussion of wealth and of giving up possessions is hard to hear. We can be like the disciples – ‘who then can be saved?’ This even though we know no one can buy their way into heaven.
Although we are wealthy on a worldwide scale, there are people who are considerably wealthier than we are. They tell us that money can be a burden that is hard to bear.
Andrew Carnegie: “Millionaires seldom smile.”
John Jacob: “I am the most miserable man on earth.”
John Rockefeller: “I have made many millions but they have brought me no happiness.”
W.H. Vanderbilt: “The care of $200 million is too great a load to bear. There is no pleasure in it.”
Unclenching our fists for God
There is no middle ground. Money is either a tool that will help you serve God and achieve His purpose OR a trap that will destroy you! The most important thing you can do when it comes to money is free your heart! (Matthew 6:24)
How can we respond to this in our lives? Jesus said to give it away – share it with others who need to it just as much as we do. Release your grip on it – recognize that God gave us everything we have and we’re responsible to him for what we do with it. Open your hand, free your heart, pour it out. Be generous as God is generous.
How is your attitude to money and things? Do you tend to be a hoarder, a spender or an avoider? What are some of the things you have practiced that have helped you free your heart?
Our topic today is the cost-benefit ratio in the Christian life. Jesus said that those who gave things up for him would be thoroughly recompensed in this life and in the life to come. How does that look in your experience? How do we share our wealth? What do we receive when we share? How are we changed in this life?
Now, remember the rest of what Jesus asked the rich man to do – ‘Then come with me’ – to walk with God, to follow Jesus. We can do that when our hearts are free.
There are some hard things in this passage. Jesus’ words are encouraging when he says, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.” What do we think is impossible? What does God make possible through us? What has God made possible in your life that at one time you considered impossible?