There's a comment by one of my professors that is just stuck in my head recently. We were in class discussing Hosea, and there's a section in chapter 2 where God tells Israel that He is planning to take them back into the desert, and they will remember their love for Him, and call Him their husband instead of their master. It's a very tender scene: picture a husband begging his wife to go on a second honeymoon so they can rekindle their love. And in the discussion, my professor said this: "When you are in the desert, God is all you have. And you are all God wants." What a contrast between desire and dependence! God comes to us in passionate love and desire, and we respond so often by only turning to Him when we have exhausted every other possibility. It's as if I chose to spend all my time and energy on other people, and only saw Dale when everyone else was tired of me! In times of great joy and contentment, when I have all I want, how often to I turn to God and offer him my love? Isn't it more often that in times of struggle I turn to God and cry out in desperation? God almost has to take us into the desert to get us to even talk to Him.
So much of what we teach in Christianity has to be turned on its head to make sense from God's perspective.
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Your post gives a clue as to the meaning of the scripture that it's harder for a rich man to go to heaven than a camel through the eye of the needle. We tend to feel self-sufficient when things are going well. When we hurt, we remember that God is our strong tower: our yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
And Christ did come to set the world on a totally new track. All Christians everywhere would benefit by a year or two in the Gospels. If we would all become "red letter Christians" then the problems of the church universal could be solved.
Kyrie eleison
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