The Feast of Bernard of Clairvaux – Mark Winward
Jesus said to them, “How hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! 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.”
– Mark 10:23, NRSV
As Mark Twain once remarked, “It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me; it is the parts that I do understand.” Many people have tried to dodge the force of this teaching. Some soothe their consciences by assuming that what Jesus says applies only to those who are truly rich. But who, exactly, are the rich? Often, the rich are simply defined as those who earn more than we do. The IRS sets the top 10% of income earners at around $149,000 or more per year, and while that varies by region, it is a good starting estimate for places like Pickens and Gilmer counties. Yet no matter the number, we somehow manage to draw the line just above ourselves, so that we can comfort ourselves with the thought that Jesus surely meant this lesson for someone else.
Over the centuries, there have been many attempts by preachers and teachers to enlarge or reduce the size of the “needle’s eye.” You may have heard sermons citing a tradition that the “Needle’s Eye” was the name of a small gate in Jerusalem, through which a camel could pass only if it shed its burden and knelt down. The lesson becomes: rich people need not worry if they are simply humble. It is a nice metaphor, but biblical scholars tell us it fails the Snopes test—there is no historical basis for such a claim. Another interpretation suggests that “camel” is a mistranslation of a similar Aramaic word for “rope” or “ship’s cable.” Yet this hardly helps, for ropes go through the eyes of needles no more than camels do. C. S. Lewis once captured the vivid extremity of Jesus’ image in a poem: “All things (e.g., a camel’s journey through a needle’s eye) are possible, it’s true; but picture how the camel feels, squeezed out, in one long bloody thread from tail to snout.”
No one ever saw the dangers of prosperity and possessions more clearly than Jesus did. What, then, is the harm in what we in the West would call success? Material possessions tend to fix our hearts to this world. If we have too much at stake in it, it becomes hard for us to think beyond it—and even harder to imagine leaving it behind. If our main interest is in material things, we begin to think of everything in terms of price rather than value. In the West, it is easy to measure life by what money can buy. Yet there are things beyond money’s reach, things of infinite value that cannot be bought or sold. It is spiritually dangerous when we lull ourselves into believing that everything worth having has a dollar amount attached to it.
It is also easy to overlook the figure at the heart of this story—the rich man himself. At the beginning of the passage, a wealthy man approaches Jesus to ask what he must do to inherit eternal life. To the people of Jesus’ time, he would have seemed the ideal candidate: rich, respected, and presumably blessed. Yet Jesus responds shockingly that he must give up everything. Does this mean that Jesus expects every disciple to sell every possession? Many dismiss the idea as ridiculous. In fact, some of Jesus’ earliest followers clearly did have possessions—after all, someone owned the houses where he and his disciples sought refuge. The issue is not strictly about money, but about what rules our lives.
That is the heart of Jesus’ point: what is the ruling force of our lives—God or money? Jesus loved the righteous as much as the sinner, the wealthy as much as the poor. He did not love the rich man for the advantages his wealth might bring to the movement, but for who he was. Out of love, he told him exactly what he needed to hear, even if it was not what he wanted to hear. True love always challenges for the sake of another’s good.
The point of the camel and the needle’s eye is that it is impossible. No one measures up to God’s standards, no matter how good we think we are or appear to be. God’s will requires more than rote obedience to rules. The rich man believed his obedience complete and wanted confirmation from a respected teacher. But the disciples learned that salvation is beyond human power. What Jesus offers does not depend on what individuals can do for themselves, but on what God does for them. No one enters the kingdom by their own strength. Who can truly deny themselves completely? Who can sell all they have? If salvation were that simple, Jesus would not have needed to die on a cross. The impossible becomes possible only when God’s strength infuses our lives—not through confidence in ourselves, but in the one who alone is able to save.
Whether rich or poor, fishermen or tax collectors, prosperous landowners or day laborers—God requires the same of all. Jesus calls every disciple to set aside whatever barriers stand in the way of total commitment to him.
In the end, whether it is wealth, career, or power, the question is not simply what we have but what we do with it. What is the center of gravity in our lives? If the answer is anything other than God, it is the very definition of an idol. The practical test comes down to two standards: how we gained what we have, and how we use it. Do we use what we have selfishly, or in service to God and others? The truth is that all of us fall short. And as I have said many times, it makes all the difference in the world whether we are aiming at the right target or simply shooting in any direction we please. Still, I cannot help but think of that poor camel…
As Mark Twain said, “It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me; it is the parts that I do understand.”