It seems as long as we’re sin-conscious enough, we can identify ourselves as Christians. A good friend of mine, a minister, used to do a funny imitation of the “holiness movement” of his boyhood. Screwing his face into a righteous scowl, he’d declare, “Bless God, I don’t swear, drink, smoke, spit or chew or go with those who do, and I don’t play cards, dance or go to movies!” Conversely, we could add the positives: “I go to church regularly, tithe, vote for every “family-values” legislation I’ve been told is right, and even my minivan is sanctified by a chrome fish.” And it’s a wonder that so few have noticed that in the life and teaching of Jesus in the gospels, this exaggerated sin-consciousness is peculiarly absent — except among the religious fellows whom Jesus corrects for missing the point, or for their hypocrisy. But today also, the question is rarely considered as to whether living for such distinctions really has anything to do with compassion for your fellows or delight in God. Often it comes from clinging allegiance to an abstraction, a code of “Christian conduct.” Dead. But the problem really reminds me of the man who ran up to Jesus, fell to his knees and said, “Good Rabbi, what must I do to gain eternal life?” Jesus raised up a question mark against his notion of goodness and gave him what Zen Buddhists might call a koan:
“Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.” Jesus continued:
“You know the commandments: Do not murder; Do not commit adultery; Do not steal; Do not bear false witness; Do not defraud; Honor your father and mother.” The man said, “Rabbi, all these have I kept since I was a boy.” And Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “There is one thing you lack: go, sell all you have and give it to the poor, and you will have heavenly treasure; then come and follow me.” When the man heard this his face clouded over and he went away sick at heart, for he was a man who had large estates. And Jesus looked around at his disciples and said, “Children, how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”
What is good? Jesus ignored the man’s claims to following an abstract code and asked the man to do one thing based on true compassion instead of moral conceptualism. And, you want to know eternal life? A camel doesn’t get through the eye of a needle unless it becomes nothing. Jesus told his followers. “Unless your righteousness is deeper than the righteousness of the scribes [copyists of the written religious/moral law], you will never enter the kingdom of God.” Confucius said it in his way, “Goody-goodies are the thieves of virtue.”
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