‘They were more astonished than ever,’ Mark tells us (Mark 10.25). They had just heard Jesus say that wealth could not gain entry to the kingdom of God. But that was impossible. That was the way the world operates. Rich men can pay the price. Rich men pull strings. Rich men are powerful. Start knocking the people who run things and you will end up poor.
This was not just the way land-workers at the eastern end of the Mediterranean saw things. From their enclave in a puppet kingdom they thought the rest of the world was much like theirs only bigger – much, much bigger. But the Roman Empire was not just bigger; it was organised. It had policies and power to implement them. It had soldiers and engineers who got things done. It inherited books of philosophy and works of the imagination. The children of Israel had their own literature but it was just enough to give some of them a taste of rhetoric and an appetite for more. The Hellenising urge was strong in those who looked upon anything else as primitive, and clumsy.
Of course, if it were true that the Maker had taken on humanity and become one of us, this would have been a surprising and totally overwhelming event. It would have been like coming across a Mozart, a Leonardo, a Shakespeare rolled into one. Jesus continues to fascinate – by the parables he composed, by the way he dealt with inquirers and the needy. And these qualities continued to gain significance after the crucifixion. We defer to our geniuses but we don’t see geniuses like that.
Children are better than we grown-ups at recognising a world of wonders. Jesus himself endorsed this. See Mark 9.37.
It may be a bit late to say so but Christianity is astonishing. It is probably inadequate to say we need more of it. But a bit of astonishment can be a tonic.
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