Mark 12:28-34
“Almost a Saint”
November 4, 2012 - All Saints Sunday

         In 1982 Kenneth Blanchard published a guide for business people called The One Minute Manager. It was a basic, memorable management strategy which could be implemented in one minute bites of time. No long meetings or training sessions. Manage your staff with training and direction offered in minute-long increments.

         Through the rest of the eighties, there was “One Minute” mania. Blanchard wrote The One Minute Golfer. Others wrote The One Minute Coin Expert, The One Minute Teacher, and One Minute Stress Management. For families there was The One Minute Father or The One Minute Mother. All you need is a minute. Just in 2008 someone wrote The One Minute Cure: The Secret to Healing Virtually All Diseases.

         I’m told that Blanchard’s One Minute Manager is not a bad book. Lots of wisdom can be packed into a short time. Our own Terry Glaspey has written an excellent One Minute Bible Guide which we will study together at the beginning of the year. But I still haven’t found The One Minute Pastor… or The One Minute Sermon, for that matter.

         First century rabbis were fond of a similar strategy in regard to Scripture, in particular to all the laws they found there. The traditional understanding saw 613 separate commandments in the Hebrew Bible. So teachers and students of those laws liked to come up with simple, memorable summaries. Hillel was challenged by a Gentile to “teach me the whole Torah while I stand on one foot,” and he came up with “What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor: that is the whole Torah. The rest is commentary.” Not bad, in considerably less than a minute.

         You can even see “one-minute” summaries in Scripture itself. Micah 6:8 says, “what does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” Isaiah 56:1 boils it down to, “Thus says the Lord: ‘Maintain justice and do what is right.’”

         The teacher of the law in verse 28 came looking for one of these brilliant “one-minute” answers. Notice that we’ve skipped from chapter 10 to this point where Jesus has come to Jerusalem for the last time, headed for the Cross. We read the beginning of chapter 11 on Palm Sunday. But now Jesus is engaged in His last debates with the Jewish leaders, like the final presidential debates, but with lots more at stake. The scribe noticed that Jesus had done well in these disputes and so came more sincerely with his own question, “Which commandment is the first of all?”

         Rabbis then also engaged in weighing the relative strength and importance of the commandments, and they had a point. Some things in the Law pretty clearly matter more than others. Jesus pointed that out Himself several times. Helping those in need matters more than strict observance of the Sabbath. Not hurting others with your words matters more than washing your hands before you eat. So the question now is, “What in the law matters most of all? Which is the first and greatest commandment?”

         Jesus was better than Ken Blanchard. He offered a summary of the Law of God in sig­nificantly less than a minute. Verses 29 begins, “The first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one;’” and verse 30 concludes “you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.”

         But like any good debater, Jesus isn’t going to let a simple summary go unqualified and unclear, so He immediately adds verse 31, “The second is this, “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no greater commandment than these.”

         There’s nothing new or particularly surprising in the pieces of Jesus’ one-minute version of the Law. What He said about loving God is a quote from what we heard in Deuteronomy 6 this morning and the second command about loving our neighbors is from Leviticus 19:18. What is new is the way Jesus brings them together and insists they belong together. Essentially, you cannot truly love God if you do not also love your neighbor, and you cannot fully love your neighbor if you do not first love God.

         Matthew also tells us the story of this question and Jesus’ one-minute answer, but Mark adds more about the man who asked. I think Mark had a soft spot in his heart for seekers of Jesus who were somewhat like himself, earnest young men who weren’t quite able to follow wholeheartedly when they began.

         Tradition tells us that the story in Mark 14:51 and 52, of a young man who followed Jesus, is about Mark himself. Those verses say that when Jesus was arrested they tried to grab the young man, but he left his garment in their hands and ran away naked. And we know from Acts 15:48 that years later Mark also deserted Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey. Mark wanted to love and follow Christ, but it wasn’t easy for him.

         I think that’s why Mark tells us a little extra about the rich young man we saw in chapter 10 and this scribe in chapter 12. They were like Mark himself. They wanted to be devoted to the Lord, but it was hard for them to fully commit. That’s why Mark takes time to show us they were sincere, and also shows us Jesus’ affection for them.

         The scribe wholeheartedly agreed with Jesus in verses 32 and 33. He repeats what Jesus said and then adds the thought found in the prophets, that God wants this kind of love for Himself and for our neighbors more than He wants “burnt offerings and sacrifices.” Love is more important than big donations.

         In one-minute terms and in terms of the day we are celebrating, Jesus gave the scribe the formula for being a “one-minute saint.” He told him how to be holy in a simple, short summary of all that God asks of us. Love God and love your neighbor. And when the young man agreed that the formula was exactly right, Jesus praised him in verse 34, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

         The scribe was almost there, almost a saint. He was not far from what he was seeking: a life that truly honored God and cared for those around him. He was almost a saint… but not quite.

         There’s the question for you and me today. Will we be almost saints, or go the whole way? The first and greatest commandment demands our whole beings. Moses in Deuteronomy said to love God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength. To that Jesus adds the command to love Him with all your mind. Nothing is left out. Every part of yourself and your life is to be given over to loving God. And when you’ve done that, then it only follows that you will love others just as much as you love yourself.

         These great commandments are huge. It’s no wonder the scribe was almost but not quite there, “not far off” from full participation in the kingdom. What was left for him to do was much like what was left for the rich man in chapter 10, but it takes a different form. Last week the Gospel lesson told us how when Bartimaeus the blind man was healed he immediately got up and followed Jesus. That’s what this scribe had yet to do.

         Jesus is not just a clever teacher or a wise guru. You can’t just learn a few one-minute tips from Him and then go about your own business as usual. To really do what He says, to genuinely love God and love your neighbor, you have to follow Jesus, you have to get up and go with Him for the rest of your life. Almost is not enough.

         Mark felt that. He tells us about these other earnest young men, the rich man, this scribe, because he realizes just how close he came to being like them, to being almost there with Jesus, but not quite.

         I get Mark’s feeling about this because I almost didn’t finish my work for the rank of Eagle in the Boy Scouts. It had to be completed before you turned 18. My birthday is October 18 and I was away at my first semester of college and a month before that deadline when I drove home for several weekends to finish up a merit badge and complete my service project. It was only because my mother and grandmother pushed me and pleaded with me and even bribed me little that I got it done. I made it by the skin of my teeth.

         My friend didn’t make it. He helped me with my project. He earned lots of merit badges. He was almost there, but didn’t quite take the final steps to wrap it up. He was almost, but not quite an Eagle Scout. I could easily have been just like that, almost an Eagle, just like the rich young man and this scribe were almost saints.

         I just squeaked by to be an Eagle. There are other almosts that never happened for me. I admire Terry and Kay and Shelley because they are what I what I imagine myself as just almost. They are published authors. I’ve always pictured myself writing books. I’ve had several good ideas over the years. I’ve even got the start of several things tucked away in my computer. But I’ve never quite pulled a manuscript together and polished it. I’ve never done the hard work of finding a publisher. I’ve never followed through to be more than just almost an author.

         But the young man asked what was the most important commandment. Be an Eagle or an author, in the end, isn’t the most important thing. What matters for me and for us all is that we not give up on these two greatest commandments, that we not be content to accept a destiny as just almost saints. Mark shows us this scribe and how much Jesus cared about him so that we won’t end up like him, like Mark himself almost ended up, not far from, but not quite, saints of God, followers of Jesus.

         We have to accept Jesus as Savior and follow Him to be saints because we can’t do it on our own, anymore than I could have become an Eagle Scout without the help of my mother and grandmother and my friend, not to mention my scoutmaster and a lot of other people. Without help most of us would wind up in the almost-but-not-quite category in so many ways. Without the help of Jesus we would forever be almost-but-not-quite saints.

         Let us look at what Jesus tells us here. Is loving God and loving our neighbors in fact the best and holiest way to live? Is it the way to be a saint? If it is, then let’s not stop only part way into that life, let’s not sit outside “not far from the kingdom of God,” let’s not be almost saints. Let us together, with each other’s help, and especially with the help of Jesus Himself be altogether and completely saints. Let us trust and follow Jesus, accept His gifts of love and grace, and enter all the way into His kingdom.                              

         Amen.

         Valley Covenant Church
         Eugene/Springfield, Oregon
         Copyright © 2012 by Stephen S. Bilynskyj