I’m Sure I Can Get this Camel Through that Needle!

I really have to be careful on this one. Because it’s a difficult subject. With no real simple answer. Also, I’m not a Bible scholar, by any means. But I've read a little. And I listen to the Gospel (usually) on Sunday mornings. And while I don’t know the whole thing, I think I've read or heard enough of the New Testament to at least get a “feel” for the kind of guy Jesus must have been. And I’m pretty sure He wasn't about rules. In fact, he seemed to go out of his way to break a lot of the rules. And he was proud of it. No, he wasn't a “rule” guy. He was an “accepting” guy.

He accepted anybody: the poor, the sinners, the tax collectors, all the people in society that the “Very Important Jews” looked down on. He even hung out with a lot of those people. And while they may have been sinners, he accepted them. Because that’s what he did.

But you know who he had real trouble with? Rich guys. He had a lot to say about those guys. Remember this one? “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.”  That was Jesus himself talking. Now I suppose you can argue that he technically never said being rich is a sin, but he does say a rich man is not going to heaven, so I think it’s a safe assumption to say he didn’t think being rich was a good thing.

Yet, so many of today’s “Very Important Christians” are extremely wealthy. Somehow, they don’t think of that as a sin. Because if they did, they’d give everything away. He said this to a rich man once: “Go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me. “ Wow. We just kinda ignore that one.

I find it strange that many Christians who think wealth is OK, are very strongly anti-gay. Because if we look the other way on the rich thing, we definitely should treat homosexuality the same. Keep this in mind. There are over 1,000 references in the Bible instructing us to help the poor or needy or oppressed, and Jesus himself backed this up grandly. And you know what he said about wealthy people. But Jesus never said a word about homosexuality. Not once. Of course there are other places in the bible that condemn it. But way less than 1,000. And Jesus himself never mentioned it. Maybe he forgot about it. It could have just slipped his mind maybe.

Yet many of us latch onto the “Homosexuality is a sin” thing, and just kinda ignore the “Rich man and a camel” thing. Personally, I find that odd. You may, of course, have a different word for it.

Like I said, it’s not a simple topic. You can think what you want. Honestly, I’m not sure how I actually feel on all this, so try to refrain from sending me hate mail. After all, a sin is a sin, I think. Feel free to check out my ideas, dispute them if you want, and maybe you can prove me wrong. Like I said, I’m no expert. But I know what Jesus said. And what he didn’t say. 

And so do you.