What Seek Ye?

Matthew 19:23-24

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, 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.

I don’t know about you, but threading a needle for me has become an act of hope and prayer as I have gotten older. Some days I think I would be as likely to get a camel through the eye of a needle as a thread. But I exaggerate. All I really need is a bright light and glasses to correct my vision. I do wonder if the analogy offered in this parable is hyperbole though. I’m not one to read the Bible literally, but in a more direct reading, it does appear to say that it is impossible for a person with a lot of money to go to heaven. I am not certain that Jesus means to say it is impossible for an entire portion of humanity to be in heaven.

I suspect that I am not the only person that has found one of the most valued qualities of parables to be that over the decades we hear people interpret them and question their meaning over and over in different ways. Sometimes we are led to a completely new understanding by those among us that see with the most clarity.

So it is in this spirit that I look at this parable. Let us shine a bright light on it and sharpen our vision. What if the challenge is not in the camel and the needle but in what we think of being rich? What if the lesson is in what we consider wealth and what we seek rather than about coins and whether we have a lot?

Wealth of the financial kind has always seemed arbitrary and relative to me. Who has money and who does not rarely appears to be based on any one specific skill or trait. I have known people who have had what I would consider vast sums who were constantly voicing poverty and people who had less than I who seemed more satisfied and wealthy than most.

What if the reason it is hard to get through the eye of the needle is because we seek things that aren’t the path to heaven? What if the reason we don’t see the eye of the needle clearly is because we aren’t looking in the right direction?

What if the lesson is that we can’t be rich because everything we have is a gift, and we don’t really own anything at all? What if wealth has nothing to do with amount but how we view ownership and what we choose to do with what we have been given?

If one’s goal is earthly wealth, and one thinks they gain it by one’s own skill and hard work then life may or may not be filled with earthly delights and pleasures. These are not the lessons that Jesus came to teach us. His vision is focused elsewhere.

Be careful what you seek. What kind of satisfied do you want to be? Who are you trying to please? Be careful what you spend your time searching for because most likely it is exactly what you will find. 

Let us pray:

God, please help me not to aim for my own goals but for yours. Allow me the insight to understand how to see clearly what has value. Give me the strength to share what you have given me in the ways that you value and no other. Allow me to understand what poverty and wealth really are, Amen. 

Today's devotional was written by Jill Pope and read by Joey Smith.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

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First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.