“What must I do to get to heaven Jesus?”

It was a very good question being asked by a very good man. He was the kind of man that you would say “he is so sure of his faith, look at how well he lives his life.”

Everybody loved him. You would immediately think of this guy being an elder in the church. From where we sit we couldn’t see any flaws in him at all. We describe him by saying things like Godly, righteous, filled with the spirit. He was also the owner of a large corporation and we would ask him to come and speak at things like the businessmen’s full gospel lunches, or he would say grace at the prayer breakfast in the Aotea centre. He was the kind of man who commanded respect wherever he went not because he demanded it, but because there was something about him that would make people volunteer it.

People would be drawn to this aura that he had surrounding him that seemed to say, “I am so sure of what I believe that I live it out in every detail.”

And he did. You couldn’t fault him. Not even slightly. He knew the bible. He knew how to follow it. He had tapped into something that we find so hard and made it look easy, he tapped into how to live what the bible says. So convinced was he by the importance of the divinely inspired words he found in scripture that he found it easy to follow them. Word for word.

Who wouldn’t want that? Who wouldn’t want their faith to be so strong that it was easy to follow the word of the lord? Isn’t that what we all want? Isn’t that what we are all striving for?

And he had come to see Jesus this particular day 2000 years ago. He strolled up to Jesus, knowing all eyes were fixed squarely on him, doting wannabees, affirming scholars, dreamy-eyed poor people, envious marketers, proud friends (well, they weren’t really friends but just people who wanted to be able to say they knew him).

His fashion sense was stunning : it was the latest stuff that he was wearing. I won’t even try to pretend that I know what he was wearing, but if he was wearing clothes from today, well I assure you that he wasn’t wearing mossimo or stussy, dickies or addidas, no, he would think labels were crass and unsightly. He wore clothes made by designers with Italian names (not that they were necessarily Italians). You’d look at him and think, ‘he’s a snappy dresser … but something would jar inside you as you tried to come to terms with this strange aesthetic beauty that he embodied before you : stylishly godly — that’s how he looked. The unease with this phrase you would brush aside because it was clear that he had once again managed to tap into finding the balance between scripture and real godly living in this world and this time through fashion. God likes style right? God created aesthetics right?

So you’d watch this fashion machine, strutting down the cobbles toward Jesus, occasionally acknowledging some people as he walked past them. Ever so polite. Ever so confident. Oozing righteousness as he went on his way.

And he walked up to Jesus, “Good teacher,” he said it without thinking. “what must do to get to heaven?”

He asked a question looking for an answer that agreed with him. He wanted to hear Jesus say “nothing, absolutely nothing, you’ve made it gee, you’ve scored the highest marks out of anyone here and I tell you, you’re hip and jiggy wid it, you’re top of the class you righteous mango. Well done.”

But Jesus paused and looked at him, gave a quick smile and said “obey the commandments.”

The ten commandments? thought the young hip mango. Ok, let’s just cover all my bases, and just make sure of it. “Yeah, that’s cool Jesus, but which ones in particular?”

Jesus tilted his head, the smile remaining and looked at him out of the corner of his eyes. “Well, let’s see, “Don’t kill anyone.” The young man said “check”. “don’t take what’s not yours” Check. “don’t have sex with anyone who is not your wife” check. “don’t tell lies about anyone” check. “respect and obey your parents” check. 5 out of 5. so far so good. People were very impressed with him.

But Jesus was being selective with the commandments he was suggesting because he knew darn well that the other five were where he stumbled.

Jesus threw a sixth one in for good measure. “Love your neighbour as yourself.”

The young man was taken aback. That’s not in the ten commandments he thought, and he got his little micro-gideon bible out of his pocket thumbed through the pages.

There was a little tremor in the aura as people saw this. Suddenly it was a little tense as they for the first time saw some weakness in this man. They waited patiently until a local minister who knew the bible much better (well he was paid to read it day in and day out wasn’t he) came up and showed him Leviticus 19:18. and sure enough there it was. “Love your neighbour as yourself.”

“It’s a bit woolly,” he thought to himself and contemplated thinking about it some more except that he remembered all these people were watching him. Just smile and tell a slight but necessary lie, ‘check’ he forced out. Hopefully everyone will gloss over this. Hopefully everyone will just let that little white lie slide.

Jesus said, “good-o” with a you-don’t-get-it-do-you tone and began to go about his business. The crowd and the young man sensed dissonance in the air, it wasn’t the end of the matter, something was amiss, something was unresolved.

‘Jesus,’ called out the righteous hip mango, ‘Jesus, I’ve done all that, but you seem to imply that I still haven’t found the answer. You seem to be suggesting that you don’t believe me or something. I hope you’re not calling me a liar?’

Jesus looked at the man and said quietly, “look, you are clearly a very law abiding man (a compliment in that context), but if you want to really be complete then sell all that you have and give the money to the poor — I guarantee you that you will have tremendous treasure in heaven—Then come follow me.”

The young man blinked, looked sidewise a few times without turning his head, his nose just a little lifted up. After a while his gaze wilted and he looked at the ground.

He was undone.

His whole world folded before him and before others. Suddenly everyone saw who he really was. It was like an invisible garment of visible righteousness that shielded people’s eyes from seeing the true character, from seeing the shallowness of his motivation, from seeing the selfishness and his insecurity, it’s like this invisible garment that had somehow hidden his true self from sight, was ripped off him and he was standing there in naked indignity. The crowd was quick to turn on him as crowds do and they shook their heads as they wandered away from him…leaving him to try and scrape together what was left of his…what was left of his pride.

His whole life he disguised his insecurity by building up a little kingdom for himself. He owned so much property and it gave him recognition and respect in the community because it also gave him power. But with that he made sure that he followed the law of the land so that people might think that he was prosperous because he was righteous. So the two things fed each other.

He held his worth in the quantity of what he owned. Everything he bought contributed to making himself feel better, more important, more relevant. And he had self-worth invested in his obedience to the law. But there was no heart in it.

What was in fact so crushing was that his entire self had to dissolve before he could be acceptable in God’s sight. “but I am my things,” he thought to himself. And he was.

Small wonder he went away feeling very, very sad.

There’s plenty to talk about in the passage that we’re looking at tonight so I’m going to do more on it next time we look at James which probably won’t be for a while. Tonight, I want to look at in what is my opinion the worst verse in the bible.

God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble.

It’s a horrific verse. And I shy away from it every time I read it. It’s awful because everyone suffers from pride in one form or another. It’s something that’s intrinsically part of us, it’s what makes us selfish. It is the original sin. It is what produced the first thought in the garden of Eden that said, “let’s just go ahead and eat that thing.” It was pride that brought us to eat the forbidden fruit, the idea that we know better than God, the idea that we don’t need to be pushed around by rules and regulations.

It’s pride that is often at the centre of many disputes. Where one person’s opinion is the right one at all costs. It’s rare to find an argument that isn’t a clash of egos. Pride won’t let someone back down, pride is what made the words “to serve” dirty. Pride is what motivates us to make lots of money, be really good at things, be successful. It drives us to do so many things. We’ll quickly get upset with people because it makes us feel better to trounce over someone else. Pride will engage us in gossip, “ooh at least I’m not like that.”

Our self esteem has an insatiable appetite for recognition and superiority. Usually when we’re not the best at something we become the best critic. Just listen to a group of guys watching the rugby. How quick we sitting in our lounges are to have our opinions about how those professionals who live and breathe rugby should play rugby. ironic really.

What the verse means is basically that if we are proud, we are in opposition to God. This is not a small thing. This is huge.

It haunts me. Has done for years because I know for a fact how easy it is for me to be proud and how much that pride can provide all the energy for a negative attack on something or someone. I’ll bitch and moan righteously. I did it heaps at my last job, I’d spend hours talking with other employees about how stink our bosses were. Part of it was venting, and part of it was actually just wanting to feel like I was actually better than the employer. That my boss didn’t actually have control over my life. That I hadn’t signed over 40-50 hours of my week to someone to just treat like crap. I wanted to be better than that, I felt like I deserved more than that. The truth is, that I set myself up in opposition to God and ironically, in opposition to my employer.

I was not an agent of love because love sets even those who are opposed to us above us. Bless your enemies says the bible. Don’t curse them. Love your enemies. Serve like Jesus served. Become least and then you will be first.

There are too many examples in the bible of great figures who had to go through incredible pain and humiliation beforehand. Abraham, couldn’t have son and finally when he did he was asked to sacrifice him . . . not that he had to go through with it, but he had to be prepared to. Joseph sold as a slave into Egypt, imprisoned for a number of years before becoming 2nd in command of the Egyptian empire. Moses, and the Israelites having to walk around in the desert for 40 years. David, just the smallest and weakest of the 12 brothers being anointed king.

Or then there’s examples of the just how the proud are struck down by God, Elijah and the prophets of Baal where they were humiliated, Israel time and time again, punished for her indecision. Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4

29 At the end of twelve months he was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon,

30 and the king said, "Is this not magnificent Babylon, which I have built as a royal capital by my mighty power and for my glorious majesty?"

31 While the words were still in the king's mouth, a voice came from heaven: "O King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared: The kingdom has departed from you!

32 You shall be driven away from human society, and your dwelling shall be with the animals of the field. You shall be made to eat grass like oxen, and seven times shall pass over you, until you have learned that the Most High has sovereignty over the kingdom of mortals and gives it to whom he will."

33 Immediately the sentence was fulfilled against Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven away from human society, ate grass like oxen, and his body was bathed with the dew of heaven, until his hair grew as long as eagles' feathers and his nails became like birds' claws.

34 When that period was over, I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted my eyes to heaven, and my reason returned to me. I blessed the Most High, and praised and honored the one who lives forever. For his sovereignty is an everlasting sovereignty, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation.

It’s clear that those who think they are great are in opposition to God. There’s no room for pride in the kingdom of heaven. And that’s a word to me as much as anyone.

“I can’t do it” she said to herself as she paused at the doorway. Part of her wanted to rush out right then and there to confront Jesus with her sickness. she wanted God to release her from years of agony and humiliation, she wanted to be accepted by people as being normal, she couldn’t carry her affliction any more and she knew Jesus could help.

The problem was that for her to find Jesus, she had to venture outside into a world that actually, no exaggeration, despised and rejected her. It was nothing to do with who she was, it was everything to do with what she was. She was a woman who suffered from menstrual haemorrhaging for over 12 years which meant that she would often be embarrassed by blood stains appearing on her clothes. According to Leviticus, this made her unclean and she would remain unclean until the bleeding stopped.

It had been twelve years now and all the doctors she had gone to tried their darndest to heal her but to no avail. She had spent all her money on them in search of a new treatment but nothing. Did she pray about it? You bet everyday, but her prayers had turned from pleas for healing and into angry shouts, into pleas for comfort and back to angry shouts as those who have wandered in the desert will understand.

She was lonely and dejected, tired and worn out, at the end of her tether, and she really didn’t know why she kept living. She really didn’t know why she kept living.

She looked out the door of her house and into a world that didn’t want to know her. And felt bleak.

“if it’s not now,” she said, “it will be never” and then bolted toward Jesus.

She raced through the crowd and pushed past people who shrieked when they realised who touched them. When they realised they were now unclean they raced after her so angry that she had done this to them. They wanted to catch her before she made everyone unclean. Soon there was an angry little wake behind her as she pushed her way through the crowd.

Jesus was right there now. So she pushed forward, keeping just out of reach of peoples clutches and she threw herself at him and brushed the side of his cloak with her hand before crashing to the ground. She’d done it.

In that touch, in that instance it seemed like the whole world had taken on a different sunlight. She could see things differently, she could see things from a different perspective and she was amazed. It was like this heavy burden had been lifted off her shoulders and that she had been able to touch the very heart of love. Her body flowed with a warmth that she’d never experienced before and she knew that this time she had been healed. No-one else knew that though so she picked herself up and started to saunter back to disappear into history unnoticed.

Jesus called out “who touched my clothes?” Everyone thought he was having a laugh because there were about three hundred people gathered around him tightly and at any one time he probably touched three or four of them. “who touched my clothes?” he called out again. The crowd stopped, well as much as a crowd can.

The woman turned around amazed. She knew it was her and it was the strangest feeling. She knew she had taken something from the very hand of God and not been thankful for it. She knew that she had taken and walked away better without acknowledging the source of her healing. And part of her wanted to keep walking, she didn’t trust the crowd. They crowd would surely beat her to a pulp if they found out that she had by the very act of touching, made Jesus the prophet unclean. Jesus must be mad and is obviously just wanting to rip her apart like he did the Pharisees—he wasn’t always nice.

She didn’t trust that she would be safe and wanted to run. Even more, she didn’t want to be despised by Jesus and the crowd for what she had done, no more humiliation, not today, people wouldn’t understand. She wanted to escape, she really wanted to.

But what could she do? Deny this gift that she had extracted from him? Could she live with that healed but ungrateful, almost a thief of God’s power?

And so she turned and made eye contact with Jesus. Jesus approached (with the crowd hanging off him). There was hate and disappointment in the air, unsaid accusations spitting from people’s eyes. Not a word was said, but she felt stripped of her being by all of this around her. She felt tiny and insignificant, there was nothing left in her to keep her standing, why should she, she was worthless to everyone, in fact everyone wanted her to be a problem that would disappear. Any dignity she did have, faltered. And she collapsed on the ground at Jesus’ feet and hid her face – partly because she was ashamed partly because she was afraid of a beating and it was just instinct. She trembled.

“I just wanted to be healed—and I knew that even if I just touched you that it would be ok. I can’t live like this anymore. I can’t. And you are the only one who could make it ok.” She had no more words to say.

“my precious daughter.” Is how the sentence began from Jesus. If words could cradle it was these. Daughter, cherished and loved, precious and valued, a person and receiver of love, place in the world, identity. Daughter, own flesh and blood. “your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

Instead of a beating she received a benediction. And she was free from her suffering.

James says that if you draw near to God he will draw near to you. Tread carefully though you may not like it when God draws near to you. There’s consequences there and it’s not all nice fuzzies inside a worship song. As we draw close to God, something happens, the rich man drew closer to God and was stripped of his pride, rendered lowly, lost and helpless. Are we really prepared to see how rotten we are inside? Cleanse your hands you sinners. Purify your hearts you double minded.

If we become consumed by our own self importance we are walking on dangerous ground. The minute we think we are great, we are in opposition with God. God doesn’t need great people to rise up and win the nation! God needs humble people who will serve the nation. We need not be at odds with the world because we are there to help them. The needs of evangelism revolve not around winning people to Jesus by sharing the four spiritual laws, but by actually caring for the people through our service to them. Putting ourselves under and not over them. We are not that crash hot, we are products of grace. Our light that we shine is not a moral light, but a light of love and God’s grace and mercy in us. It’s not because we are strong that God is revealed in society but because we are weak! Then we don’t have to pretend anymore. We can be weak in this faith and still be acceptable.

Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned into mourning, and your joy into dejection.

It’s not a verse of hope. It’s not a verse that makes you feel good but it is a verse that will bring you to a correct understanding of the pecking order of things. this is not a popular teaching. I’ve never heard it much at evangelistic meetings. But the call for people to be Christians is about people submitting to God which means submitting as servants to others. Remember that staggering truth that the son of God came to serve not be served? The king of glory who we sing about, came to serve us? Washed our feet?

Be humble and God will exalt you. She wept at his feet and trembled in his presence. She knew she had done wrong. She did not run, she came to seek mercy — and the woman who bled was healed and brought back to life.