The trick to preaching about the man who asks to follow Jesus but goes away when asked to give what he owns and give the money to the poor and then follow him, is to explain it without explaining it away. I’ll try to explain it, and see where that gets me.

I think we can get some help from Luke’s Parable of the Prodigal Son. (Lk. 15: 11-32) The Prodigal Son first takes his father’s money and then, rather than giving it to the poor, squanders it. Curiously, Luke uses the word ousia, which means substance, being. It is a term Greek philosophers use for this concept. That is, the Prodigal Son squandered his father’s substance. If we keep this in mind in considering the story about the man who was asked to sell everything, we can see that Jesus was asking him to give up everything he’s got. This calls our attention to how much our possessions seem to be part of our being, our substance. If I give up all of my possessions, my substance, what do I have left? Nothing apparently. This hardly softens or explains away Jesus’ admonition.

In Proverbs, the Sage gives us another angle of understanding Jesus’ admonition by urging us to seek wisdom “like silver, and search for it as for hidden treasures.” (Prov. 2: 4) Usually when we think of treasure, we imagine a chest full of gold dug up on a desert island where pirates buried it while continuing their life of crime. Even Tim Hawkins loses interest in treasure hunting after all the violence that accompanied the search on the island, suggesting he gains some true wisdom. Desirable as such treasure may seem to be in our dreams, the author of Proverbs redirects us to the ultimate treasure hunt: true wisdom. If we desire treasure, how much more should we desire wisdom? All the more as acquiring wisdom causes us to eschew the violence that goes with treasure hunting. It is worth mentioning that there is often economic violence of some sort with the accumulation of wealth. Jesus had told the man to follow the commandments, including not to steal or defraud. Had the man really followed these two commandments as he claimed? Unfortunately, systemic social violence is easily hidden, not least from those of us who practice it. When Jesus, elsewhere, compares the Kingdom of God to finding treasure, much like Treasure Island, he says that one sells everything to buy the field to get the treasure. (Mt. 13: 44-46) That is, to gain this treasure, we have to give everything we’ve got, which is what Jesus asked of the man who approached him. Contrary to the close parallels in Matthew and Luke, Mark only designates this inquirer as “a man.” He could be anybody. Maybe you or me. We only find out that he is rich when he leaves, shocked and grieving because of his many possessions. Perhaps being too rich to enter the kingdom of God is not about how much or how little we have, but how much we want to keep.

There is the saying: clothes make the person. Scripture suggests this is true, as the image of clothing is used frequently throughout the Bible, and not least in the writings of St. Paul. When he tells us to clothe ourselves “with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience,” and above all, to clothe ourselves “with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony,” (Col. 3: 12–13) he is telling us what kind of clothes we should be made of. We can only be so clothed if we give all we’ve got to bear such treasures on our person, and bearing such treasures involves bearing with one another and forgiving one another. Insofar as a community is built with such values, the community is a treasure more valuable than gold or silver. If we give everything we’ve got in this sense, we won’t be clinging to what money we happen to have.

Benedict, taking all of the above Scripture verses to heart, enshrines these values in his Rule. He is strict about personal ownership, but that doesn’t mean that a monastic should not have use of any material goods. He says that each monastic should be given a tablet by the abbot. That is very true today, even though the meaning of the word “tablet” has changed quite a lot since the sixth century. The point is that everything a monastic has use of, whether a communal object like a vacuum cleaner, or a personal item such as a computer, is a gift, and not something one has a personal right to possess. If everything we have is a gift, then we have nothing but gifts to hand on to others. Like Jesus, Benedict asks us to give everything we’ve got. It’s not enough to sell our possessions and give the money away. Echoing St. Paul, we are to support “with greatest patience one another’s weaknesses of body or behavior, to pursue what is better for others rather than ourselves, and to show pure love of our brothers and sisters.” To make these admonitions a little more concrete, Benedict would also have us give ourselves to mopping and vacuuming floors. Also like St. Paul, Benedict would have us “with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God”–a lot. (Col. 3: 15) What a treasure this is! And the more we give ourselves to it, the greater the treasure. We should prefer nothing whatever to Christ. (RB 72: 5–1) If we do that, what do we have left for ourselves? Jesus tells his disciples that by giving up everything, they will receive everything back a hundred fold. By giving up all of our substance, we become much more substantial in the hope that God will bring us all to everlasting life, our greatest treasure.