Thursday, January 27, 2005
Translation ~ Relics of John Chrysostom of Constantinople
2nd Vespers Relics St. John: Wisdom 7:30-8:9 Epistle: Hebrew 7:26-8:2 Gospel: St. Mark 10:17-27
St. Mark 10:17-27 RSV, especially vs. 17: "Now as He was setting out on His journey, a man ran up and
knelt before Him and asked Him, 'Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?'" How far apart this earnest man
was from the Lord Jesus and the journey upon which the Lord was embarked - toward Jerusalem, the Passion, and the
Cross. So intent was the Lord upon this task that His disciples were "amazed" as He pressed ahead (Mk. 10:32-34). The
earnestness of the unnamed man - to find how to inherit eternal life - is demonstrated in his unusual behavior: he ran rather
than walked up to the Lord Jesus. He knelt before One he considered to be a Rabbi (That was not customary with Rabbis.).
He addressed the Lord in an unusual way, one not practiced by either Jews or Greeks - when he called Him "Good."
As the account unfolds, the gap between the Lord Jesus and the man becomes more and more evident: to overcome the
man's obsession with "inheriting" eternal life, the Lord confronts him with an extreme demand - to renounce all and follow
Him to death (vs. 21). That demand reduces the man to grief, and he walks away (vs. 22).
The man believed that a human being could rationally understand how to inherit eternal life. The Lord knew better. The
man was deluded. He believed that God expects more than is revealed in the Law for men to inherit eternal life (Deut.
30:19). The Lord Who gave the Law reminded him that the Divine standard does not change (Mk. 10:19). The man
assumed that sinners, by their own effort, could win eternal life. The Lord knew that only God makes eternal life possible
(vs. 10:27). They were worlds apart.
The Lord's response when he was called "Good," reveals a basic error in the man - that he could set the terms by which a
person inherits eternal life. The man believed that the human being he saw before him, the famous Rabbi, Jesus of
Nazareth, as man knew the answer. The Lord's question and assertion, "Why do you call Me good?" rejected the
assumption that any human can be "good," for only God is good (vs. 18). St. Hilary of Poitiers points out that the Lord
"would not have rejected the attribute of goodness if it had been attributed to Him as God." The idea that human beings
have the capacity to discover the path to eternal life is inherent in many of the world's religions, but it is utterly foreign
with the true God. From the very first Divinely stated requirement for life (Gen. 2:17), to the Apostolic declaration that
"eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us...is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ" (1 Jn.
1:2, 3), God alone reveals the mystery of eternal life.
There is no esoteric knowledge for the earnest who desire eternal life. Through His Holy People - Israel and the Church -
God has revealed to mankind "what is good; or what...the Lord requires of thee...to do justice, and love mercy, and be
ready to walk with the Lord thy God" (Micah 6:8). Still, the man who came to the Lord wrongfully sought a human
answer. This the Lord exposed by quoting the Law (Mk. 10:19). As St. John adds: "I write no new commandment to you,
but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning" (1 Jn. 2:7).
The distance between the deluded man and the Lord Jesus was fully revealed when Christ exposed his sin to him. Still,
what the Lord requires is for all (Mk. 8:34). Knowing the state of the man's heart, the Lord placed this demand before him
in unavoidable terms which he could not rationalize. The man chose to turn away, for he knew he was incapable of doing
what God required to obtain eternal life. Sadly, he did not wait to hear the Gospel caveat: "With men it is impossible; but
not with God; for all things are possible with God" (Mk. 10:27 NRSV)!
O Master, by the precepts that Thou teachest, save me Thine undeserving servant.
