Who is Good?

Scripture: Mark 10:17-31

¹⁷ As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” ¹⁸ Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. ¹⁹ You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. You shall not defraud. Honor your father and mother.’ ” ²⁰ He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” ²¹ Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” ²² When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

²³ Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” ²⁴ And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! ²⁵ 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.” ²⁶ They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” ²⁷ Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”

²⁸ Peter began to say to him, “Look, we have left everything and followed you.” ²⁹ Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the good news ³⁰ who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. ³¹ But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”

Questions

1. Is Jesus saying he is not good and if he is not good who can be good and why would goodness be a fruit of the Spirit?
2. Why does Jesus begin talking about being “good” and end talking about wealth, what is the relationship between the two?
3. How does the illustration about a camel going through a needle relate to being good?

Background

Related Scriptures: Micah 6:6-8; Romans 15:7-21; Galatians 5:22-26; 2 Thessalonians 1:5-12

Being good is about observing a general morality or being virtuous.

Jesus points the man to Scripture to help him understand that everyone has an idea of what is good but a true definition begins with God.

Ephrem the Syrian: “The rich man called Jesus “good,” as if he were offering him a favor, just as some favor others with honorary titles. [The Lord] fled from that by which people favored him, so that he might show that he had received this goodness from the Father through nature and generation, and not [merely] in name. “Only one is good,” [he said], and did not remain silent, but added, “the Father,” so that he might show that the Son is good in just the way that the Father is good.”^[1]

Reflection

I think one of the strangest comments in the entire Bible for me was Jesus saying, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone”. Why would Jesus say this, in what way is Jesus not “good”? To me it sounded odd. Similarly, Paul says, “There is no one who is righteous, not even one”. If being “good” or “righteous” is impossible as these texts seem to indicate at face value why would God expect us to be “good”. So what do these passages mean and how is it that we are good and righteous?

The story of being good in the Bible begins in Genesis 3 where humanity is offered a choice between listening to God and determining what is good for themselves. We know the choice that was made, it is the same one made throughout the Bible, “everyone did what was good in their own eyes”. It is the same today. Each person looks to do what they think is good. We all recognize this, each of us knows the temptation to make our own judgments. We recognize this pattern in others and when we are very self-aware we recognize it in ourselves. Jesus’ witty response to the rich man recognizes this, he is asking “on what grounds do you find me to be good”. Jesus is asking why this man places Jesus in a position of moral authority. Jesus was not denying that he himself does good can be good. Rather he is trying to get us to ask where we find our moral compass.

Jesus wanted the man to recognize that there is only source for knowing good from evil and it is outside of humanity. Jesus points the man back to scripture as the source of knowing God and ultimately what is good. Jesus wanted to start the rich man down a path that begins in Scripture. This is the path of becoming good. Reading Scripture is the beginning of teaching us to believe the right things. That means that we know what our moral north star should be. Studying scripture is good to give us right beliefs like murder and stealing are wrong. But the path does not stop there, Jesus does not simply ask the rich man what scripture says he wants him to do these good things. Even the rich man understands this, “I have kept all these since my youth.” The man had kept these commands his actions had lived out what he had read in scripture. His walk matched his head knowledge. What he said he believed and knew was right he lived out. This in many ways is commendable. There are a number of people today who have moral standards until… .There are so many that if you ask them what they believe to be good they will provide a list similar to the rich man, do not steal do not commit adultery, but these go by the wayside when they or their side wants to steal or commit adultery. These hypocrites will claim to know what is good but are only concerned with living out the good only when it is convenient. Jesus wants something different. He wants the morality of scripture to pervade us, he wants us to take deliberate steps to move from head knowledge to our lifestyle. Reading scripture becomes a type of exercise to reinforce what we know so that we can practice it in daily life. For Jesus this is aligning the moral compass so that we can walk on the path.

But Jesus does not want us to stop there, he does not simply want us to know what is good and do what is good. Jesus wanted the rich man to sell his possessions and follow, why? Because true goodness is not simply about knowing right from wrong, as Paul says, “For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.” And even doing what is good is not enough, we can do what is good for all the wrong reasons. Rather what Jesus wanted from the rich man was to show that he wanted the good. Selling his possessions was meant to show he wanted to be good, that is be like God. He was not simply trying to “get into heaven” but that he truly wanted life with God. Being good is not simply about believing the right things or doing the right things, rather it is about having the right concerns the right motives, everything else are steps to get to this point. Jesus was walking the rich man from understanding that God is the source of goodness to the point that God’s goodness comes to us not simply in our actions but in our attitudes toward others

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^[1] Thomas C. Oden and Christopher A. Hall, eds., Mark (Revised), ACCS 132.