Sermon Seeds: Eye of the Needle

Sunday, October13, 2024
Twenty-First Sunday after Pentecost | Year B
(Liturgical Color: Green)

Lectionary Citations
Job 23:1-9, 16-17 and Psalm 22:1-15 OR Amos 5:6-7, 10-15 and Psalm 90:12-17 • Hebrews 4:12-16 • Mark 10:17-31
https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts/?z=p&d=79&y=382

Focus Scripture: Mark 10:17-31
Focus Theme: Eye of the Needle
Series: Here I Am…Testing and Tested (Click here for the series overview.)

Reflection
By Cheryl A. Lindsay

Does anyone enjoy being tested? There may be satisfaction in doing well in a test, but is there enjoyment? Tests can cause stress and anxiety even when one has a strong grasp of the subject matter or has demonstrated aptitude and ability in non-test taking situations. Those who experience real anxiety while test-taking often present physical symptoms, such as shortness of breath, racing heartbeat, and sweating profusely. While some institutions recognize that administering tests may not necessarily capture one’s knowledge and skill, still others double down and increase the frequency and conditions associated with tests in hope of being objective using quantitative data.

Of course, tests can also measure qualitative qualities. These require subjective evaluation, but that does not mean that they lack definitive criteria or desired outcomes. An algebra test will be formatted differently than an English one. One will probably offer a series of equations to solve and the other may seek an exposition of the themes found in the works of Alice Walker, Isabel Allende, or D. H. Lawrence. Tests may take many forms and access different ways of thinking, processing information, and communicating knowledge.

Jesus both faced tests and administered them. He was tested in the wilderness and on the cross. In encounters with the religious leaders as well as in conversations with his disciples, he stretched their understanding of the Law and the Prophets in response to their quizzing him out of malice or curiosity. The gospel passage is located within a series of encounters in which Jesus focuses on those occupying the margins in society at the time: children, women, and the poor. Through each passage, Jesus reframes the status and theologically reverses the fortunes of these marginalized groups. The focus text is the final lesson, and it is no wonder that it incorporates an exam.

The last episode deals with wealth. The underlying issue is the treatment of another group considered least in Mark’s social world, the poor. When a rich man approaches Jesus wanting to know how to gain eternal life (10:17), Jesus tells him to sell all he has, give the money to the poor, and then follow him (10:21). His command to give the money from the sold possessions is an attempt to restore to the poor what was unfairly taken from them. These instructions seek to remediate economic practices that consign the majority of the people to poverty. Discipleship that forbids the oppression of the poor protects these who are also among the least. Jesus’ teaching about wealth runs counter to the prevailing notions of wealth in Mark’s day. Wealth gave people access. Yet Jesus claims it is a hindrance to those who desire to enter the kingdom of God (10:23). Even for those who have little to no wealth, Jesus’ declaration is so shocking that the disciples question the possibility of anyone being saved (10:26).
Racquel S. Lettsome

I learned how to sew as a teenager. The worst part is threading a needle. Every condition has to be virtually perfect. Hand-eye coordination is key. This is not the time to set your contacts or glasses aside. The end of the thread cannot be frayed or it works against the needle. There are even products that have been developed to assist with threading the needle, and you can purchase already threaded needles, even if that is only a single use solution.

Still, thread is designed to go through the eye of the needle. Its shape and width is optimized to make that passage, and it’s still incredibly difficult to do. Threading a needle with the material made for that purpose feels like a test. Now, imagine trying to go through that needle yourself. It’s impossible. They don’t manufacture needles large enough for even the smallest baby to pass through. So, what is Jesus saying?

The harshness of the camel proverb is often ameliorated with reference to the notion that there was a narrow gate called the Needle’s Eye in Jerusalem, through which a camel could navigate only with difficulty; however, this is a Christian explanation popularized in the nineteenth century (France 2002, 405). To underplay the extravagance of the image, some ancient manuscripts substitute kamilos (“rope”) for kamēlos (“camel”). However, the saying is similar to a Jewish one about the impossibility of an elephant passing through the eye of a needle (b. Ber. 55b) and is meant to emphasize the difficulty of the feat. The disciples’ confusion over Jesus’s words is a typical misunderstanding scene that reflects the traditional attitude that God favors the righteous with wealth: And they were exceedingly amazed, saying to each other, “Who then can be saved?” (10:26). Jesus’s answer escalates from difficulty to impossibility: “With human beings it is not possible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God” (10:27). This is a sentiment that is expressed elsewhere in Mark, in Jesus’s words to the father of the possessed boy (“all things are possible to the one who believes”; 9:23; cf. 11:22–23). In Mark’s worldview, the expulsion of an intractable demon, a rich man’s leaving behind his wealth to enter the realm of God, the moving of a mountain by a word—all are humanly impossible but divinely achievable.
Mary Ann Beavis

When I was in college, I had a class where the tests were so rigorous that the professor allowed you to bring in a limited number of notes as an aid on what they called a “cheat sheet.” It was not open-book or open-notes; we were allowed essentially a large index card sized paper. Part of the challenge of passing that test successfully was discerning what would be helpful to include on your “cheat sheet.” Some of us compared strategies, but no two cheat sheets were exactly the same. The professor or the graduate assistant could have created a universal version of this tool, but my vulnerabilities and gaps in proficiencies, as an example, would not be the same as another one of my peers. Frankly, creating your individual cheat sheet was the first step in taking the test.

The rich man did not recognize that his cheat sheet was the one asking him the questions. The testing we encounter on the journey with Jesus is rigorous. We lack sufficient knowledge and skill to navigate the questions, challenges, and obstacles alone. The rich man does not fail the test simply because he’s so tied to his wealth, although that is certainly a contributing factor, he fails because he refuses to do the hard thing.

The rich man has kept the commandments, in his own words, since his youth. The inference is that they have not challenged him. The fact that the passage begins with the rich man quizzing Jesus about inheriting eternal life also suggests that this man knows his faith journey remains lacking. God expects more than the bare minimum, he acknowledges. When Jesus gives him a challenge beyond his capabilities or willingness, the rich man walks away, and that is when he fails.

He fails the test because he believes that he should be sufficient within himself to pass any test. Even when a teacher does not offer a cheat sheet or allows open books as an option, they prepare you by imparting knowledge and skill to meet the requirements necessary to demonstrate competency. Contrast this response to the man who responds to Jesus’ question about his faith by saying, “I believe…help my unbelief!”

Perhaps the rich man suspected that Jesus could help him on a journey that, like Peter and the other disciples, would lead him to abandon all the things that matter so much to him in the moment. Perhaps, he was just an ungenerous person tied inextricably to his wealth. Maybe, he had convinced himself, as so many do today, that the poor deserve their lot, and we are not obligated to extend compassion and share our abundance.

Whatever the case for him, the test remains for us: will we trust the Holy One to lead us through a journey to the unimaginable?

Reflection from Voices of People of African Descent
The 33rd General Synod adopted a Resolution to Recognize the United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024). As part of its implementation, Sermon and Weekly Seeds offers Reflection from Voices of People of African Descent related to the season or overall theme for additional consideration in sermon preparation and for individual and congregational study.
If Martin Luther King, Jr. was an apostle of love, he was no less an apostle of action. “The fierce urgency of now” stood as his cardinal impetus for social change. His friends and coworkers in the civil rights movement still joke about Martin’s seeming impatience at their extended, all-night discussions, which could bog down action itself. Then, Martin would tease about “the paralysis of analysis.” At heart, though, Martin was deadly serious. In The Trumpet of Conscience, he wrote:

In a world facing the revolt of ragged and hungry masses of God’s children, in a world torn between the tensions of East and West, white and colored, individualists and collectivists; in a world whose cultural and spiritual power lags so far behind her technological capabilities that we live each day on the verge of nuclear co-annihilation; in this world, nonviolence is no longer an option for intellectual analysis, it is an imperative for action.

And so we come full circle. The struggle to eliminate the world’s evils—evils so flagrant and self-evident that they glare at us from every ghetto street and rural hovel—can only occur through a profound internal struggle. By reaching into and beyond ourselves and tapping the transcendent moral ethic of love, we shall overcome these evils. Love, truth, and the courage to do what is right should be our own guideposts on this lifelong journey. Martin Luther King, Jr., showed us the way; he showed us the Dream—and we responded with full hearts. Martin was an optimist. I am too. I do believe that one day our strength to love shall bring the Dream to fruition and the Beloved Community to earth.
—Coretta Scott King

For Further Reflection
“For it would seem – her case proved it – that we write, not with the fingers, but with the whole person. The nerve which controls the pen winds itself about every fibre of our being, threads the heart, pierces the liver.” ― Virginia Woolf
“Separation
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.” ― W.S. Merwin
“I spent my life folded between the pages of books.
In the absence of human relationships I formed bonds with paper characters. I lived love and loss through stories threaded in history; I experienced adolescence by association. My world is one interwoven web of words, stringing limb to limb, bone to sinew, thoughts and images all together. I am a being comprised of letters, a character created by sentences, a figment of imagination formed through fiction.” ― Tahereh Mafi

Works Cited
Beavis, Mary Ann. Mark (Paideia: Commentaries on the New Testament). Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011.
Lettsome, Raquel S. “Mark.” Gale A. Yee, Ed. Fortress Commentary on the Bible: Two Volume Set. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014.

Suggested Congregational Response to the Reflection
This sermon series invites us to explore the call to Christian discipleship and to examine our response. Consider the “hard thing” that challenges full commitment to following Jesus.

Worship Ways Liturgical Resources
https://www.ucc.org/worship-way/after-pentecost-21b-october-13/

The Rev. Dr. Cheryl A. Lindsay, Minister for Worship and Theology (lindsayc@ucc.org), also serves a local church pastor, public theologian, and worship scholar-practitioner with a particular interest in the proclamation of the word in gathered communities. You’re invited to share your reflections on this text in the comments on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/SermonSeeds.

A Bible study version of this reflection is at Weekly Seeds.