One Thing

In today’s familiar scripture passage from Mark, a rich young ruler comes to ask Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life, and, first, Jesus cites a number of the commandments, all of which have to do with relationships. The young man says that he has kept all the commandments. Then “Jesus, looking at him, loved him” and told him he must sell everything he owns and give to the poor, which was disturbing to the young man because he had a lot of possessions. The disciples, led by Peter, pursue the same question – who can be saved? Jesus says it is extremely difficult (the analogy of the impossibility of a camel moving through the eye of the needle) for those who have many possessions, but the lesson is that God’s gift is community rather than possessions. In our lives we often need to remember that to move out of the isolation of possession and consumption and into the life of community is the foundation of love.