The rich young ruler in today’s Gospel has kept the major commandments of God. In the eyes of the world, this is a ‘good,’ upstanding man. He’s got all these things checked off his list; he’s not outwardly committed any of the ‘big sins.’ In the eyes of many, he would be considered a good, righteous, even a ‘moral’ man.
Now, before we delve into Christ’s answer to the ruler’s question, “what still do I lack?” we can acknowledge his outward keeping of the commandments, i.e., he’s not stolen, he’s not committed adultery, etc. This is what we’d like to see in other people, that is, to meet someone who is ‘moral’, ‘God-fearing,’ right? But this is not all that God desires for us. In fact, keeping the commandments outwardly, doing our ‘duty’ before God is only the start and not the finish line of our ‘race of faith,’ our relationship and communion with the living God.
So what’s the ruler’s problem? Why does he elicit from Christ such a response? Because this ruler, knowing he’s followed the tenets of the Law, comes confidently, even proudly, before Christ, as if to flatter Him but without acknowledging Who He is. He entrusts to Christ the ultimate question, that of eternal life, but without acknowledging His power to answer that question: “Good Teacher, What must I do to inherit eternal life?” The answer he gets startles him: he’s not told, “Oh, you’re already so good, you’re already set.” No, instead, Christ shakes him to the core, saying, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is God.”
Christ is not saying that He’s not God. Rather, He’s correcting the man’s first error, in which he addressed the God of all creation, God incarnate, as, simply, “Good teacher.” If Christ is merely a “good teacher,” then He cannot give you the answer you’re seeking, that is, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Only God can answer such a question of ultimate, eternal importance and judgment. Exactly! If you fail to recognize who Christ God is, if you fail to grasp the priority of following Him, of putting Him first, then you have nothing: no amount of civility or “goodness”, or self-improvement can save you, save God alone. Everything else is just “window dressing.”
Connected to Christ’s challenge here is His revelation, the fulfilling of the Gospel, the teaching of the truth of our new life in Christ: salvation isn’t a duty, it is not a ‘legal’ transaction, but a gift of grace, a gift of God’s goodness towards us and our cooperation with that grace. This is why the correct response and attitude toward God is: one of thanksgiving and gratitude, coupled with repentance, a hallmark of the virtue of humility working in us. We cannot save ourselves; we aren’t saved by our deeds, however ‘good.’ Rather, our following of the commandments is meant to be the fruit of a heart, a soul, submitted to God, thirsting for God, desiring life with God—even crying out for it when our heart is weak toward God and found wandering. As Christ points out to us, if goodness—doing one’s ‘duty’ toward God—were the criterion, no one would be saved because One alone is good and that One is God. This is the point of Christ’s response to the ruler, saying, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is God.”
In one fell swoop, Christ debunks a philosophy still prevalent in our own day: that is, that one is going to heaven if one is ‘good’ and has done one’s ‘duty’ toward God, as that person subjectively decides. This heresy continues to be one of the greatest to this day. This same philosophy is at work when one seeks to minimize his sins: justifying oneself, e.g., “Oh, it’s only a ‘white’ lie” or “I wasn’t really sinning in my impatience and anger because he had it coming.”
No, it isn’t a question of insufficient ‘goodness’ at stake as much as one of trying to put a square peg in a round hole—it just won’t work because it’s not what God has revealed to us as the fruit of life with God and responding to God’s love and calling; it’s not what’s necessary for us to inherit the Kingdom of Heaven; it’s the answer of the Pharisee and not that of the Publican.
We remember that King David, an adulterer and a murderer, one who did not keep the ‘outward’ commandments, who nevertheless found forgiveness and mercy from God and was said to be “a man after God’s own heart,” because, as King David relates to us in Psalm 50, “a contrite and humble heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise.” For this reason, the Church’s morning prayers prompt us to pray this Psalm every day, to remember this humble, repentant disposition of heart that you and I so desperately need to be with God, in His near presence, and inherit eternal life.
Without honest acknowledgement of sin, without a firm commitment to repentance and growth in Christ, without the accompanying contrition and humility of heart, one cannot draw close to God, which is salvation. Why? Because it’s this repentant, open and humble heart that is God-pleasing, that’s compatible with life and communion with holy God. Such a heart is truly hungering and thirsting after more of God, communion with Him, building up treasure in heaven.
The problem of the ruler, then, is not what he’s done or not done, but what he neglects: the conversion of his soul, a change of heart through repentance. He has another god: it’s not as is sometimes thought only his riches, but rather, also, his self-justification, his own erroneous thinking that he’s ‘good enough’ as he is, that he needs no change, or, perhaps, that he fears change more than he fears God. Christ God sees into his heart and for that reason, addresses the very thing that would keep this man from following Christ and being with Christ for eternity: his self-reliance. His riches are what feeds this self-reliance and self-righteousness. So, to enable the ruler to depend on God for His salvation, his needs, his very life-breath, Christ admonishes him to give away his possessions and, then, to follow Him. The Lord makes it clear to us, as He does in the first of the Ten Commandments, that we can have “no other gods” but Him. He alone is God; He is our Creator, “the only Lover of mankind.” In his heart, the young man has another god: himself and his riches. His heart is not converted or thirsting for more of God.
We cannot embrace the life in Christ, communion with Him, if our treasure is not in Him but is, rather, in our own self-reliance or self-righteousness. If we follow the ‘externals’ of God’s commandments and the Orthodox Faith, and stop at ‘doing our duty’ before God, if our treasure, our yearning, our focus, or reliance is elsewhere, then we have no room for Christ to be our God and Savior, we have no real desire to grow into His likeness and communion. Simply put, we too make of God incarnate, simply a “good teacher.” It’s in this context, that Christ affirms, “How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God.”
The Lord knows how much of a hold our sense of material well-being, our self-righteousness can have on us, and, how it can insulate us against the need to put our trust and our faith in Him, to possess that contrite and humble heart we need to be in Christ God’s near presence and to realize Who it is alone that can save us, heal us, and grant us eternal life with Him.
The young man goes away sorrowful from his encounter with Christ because he realizes that the very thing that grips him, that motivates him, is, in reality, his material well-being and self-reliance, it’s precisely that which he’s asked to give up to free his soul and inherit eternal life. And so, we too are cautioned and given the opportunity this Sunday to ask ourselves: Do I have anything in my life that I love more than God, that I rely on in my self-reliance and control instead of trusting in God? Have I put any other gods before Him: My time? My priorities? My work? My reliance on self? My earthly possessions? My passions? My pride or anxieties?
Whatever that something may be that seems impossible for us to relinquish because of the false sense of ‘control’ they have over us, we remember Christ’s other words today, “The things which are impossible for men are possible with God.” May we take this message of hope to heart and repent of all such prideful self-reliance. May we beseech the Savior of our souls, He who is eternal life, those attitudes of heart, vices, false controls, or indifference that may keep us from putting Him and His holy Church first in our lives, and learn to possess to a greater extent that “contrite and humble heart” so pleasing to God, so necessary for us to follow our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ into His eternal Heavenly Kingdom with all the Saints.
Fr. Robert Miclean
Holy Archangels Orthodox Church
Sunday, 15 January 2017
Epistle: Col. 3:12-16
Gospel: Luke 18:18-27
