Not Far Is Not Enough

Sermon for the Tenth Sunday after Trinity 24^th August 2025

Text: Mark 12:28-34

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

There’s a phrase we use when we’re giving directions to someone who’s lost. They call us, frustrated, and say, “I think I’m close, but I just can’t find it!” And we try to get our bearings from their description and we say, “Okay, it sounds like you’re not far now. You’re really close.”

“Not far.” It’s a hopeful phrase. It means the destination is within reach. The struggle is almost over. But let’s be honest: “not far” is not the same as arriving. If you’re “not far” from the airport but stuck in traffic, you’re still going to miss your flight. If you’re “not far” from the finish line with a broken leg, you still haven’t won the race. “Not far” means you have understanding, but you still lack possession.

This is the crucial, and perhaps surprising, place we arrive at in our Gospel text today. A scribe, an expert in the religious law, comes to Jesus. And unlike the other religious leaders who have been trying to trap Jesus, this man seems sincere. He has been listening to Jesus’s answers and is impressed. So he asks a question that was a common topic of debate among the rabbis: “Which commandment is the most important of all?”

Jesus’s answer is beautiful and foundational. He doesn’t hesitate. He reaches back into the very heart of Jewish identity, to the words known as the Shema, prayed by every faithful Jew twice a day: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”

This is the vertical dimension of faith: a love for God that is total, complete, and all-consuming. It engages every facet of our being—our emotions, our will, our intellect, and our physical effort. This love is our response to the God who first loved us.

But Jesus doesn’t stop there. He immediately adds a second commandment, from Leviticus: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” He yokes the vertical love for God inseparably to the horizontal love for our neighbor. You cannot have one without the other. To claim a deep love for God while harboring contempt for His image-bearers is a lie. And to try to love your neighbor with a self-generated, humanistic love, apart from the source of all love who is God, is a recipe for burnout and failure.

The scribe gets it. He understands perfectly. He summarizes Jesus’s teaching back to him and even adds his own profound insight: “To love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

This is brilliant theology! He sees that a relationship of love is what God truly desires, not just empty ritual. He understands that the heart of the law is love, not legalism. Jesus looks at him and says, “You are right.” How many of us would love to hear those words from the Son of God? “You have answered wisely.”

And then comes the stunning, sobering verdict: “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

Not far. This wise, theologically astute, sincere, and honest man was not far. He understood the map better than anyone. He could explain the route to eternal life with stunning clarity. He knew that love was more important than sacrifice. But he was still on the wrong side of the line. He was not far, but he was not in.

Why? Because the kingdom of God is not entered by passing a theology exam. It is not accessed by having the right answers or even by having a sincere heart. The kingdom of God is entered through the King.

This scribe knew about God, but he did not yet know God standing in front of him. He knew the commandment to love, but he had not yet encountered the embodiment of that love, who would soon hang on a cross to prove it. He knew that love was better than sacrifice, but he had not yet looked upon the one, final, perfect sacrifice for the sin of the world that would make all other sacrifices obsolete.

He understood the law of love perfectly, but the law, even perfectly understood, cannot save us. It can only show us how far we fall short. Can any of us say we have loved God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength? Can we say we have loved our neighbors—the difficult ones, the ungrateful ones, the ones who have hurt us—as much as we love ourselves? The law, even this beautiful law of love, shows us our sin. It shows us our need. It leaves us, like the scribe, “not far” but still outside.

The Gospel for this scribe, and for us today, is that the King has come close to him. The Kingdom of God was standing right in front of him in the person of Jesus Christ. And the King doesn’t just give the command to love; He fulfills it for us.

• He loved the Father with all his heart, soul, mind, and strength, perfectly obeying His will all the way to the cross.
• He loved you, His neighbor, as Himself, laying down His life for you to forgive your failure to love.

The doorway into the kingdom is not our perfect love, but our trust in His. We are not saved by our love for God, but by God’s love for us in Christ Jesus. We love, because he first loved us.

So, where are you today? Are you “not far”? Do you have the right answers? Do you understand what a good Christian life should look like? Do you know the doctrines and the commandments? That is a good place to be… but it is not the place of salvation.

The call today is to move from “not far” to “in.” And the way in is not trying harder to love, but falling in faith at the feet of the One who is Love itself. It is to stop looking at the commandment and to start looking at the Christ who fulfilled it for you. It is to receive the kingdom not as a reward for your understanding, but as a gift of grace from your King.

You are not far. The Kingdom is at hand. In Jesus, it is right here, for you. Come in.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Children's Sermon: The Two Best Rules

Good morning, everyone! Come on up and gather around!

(Hold up a single, large, beautiful heart. You can cut it out of red construction paper or use a plush heart.)

How are you all doing today? Great! I have a question for you. Have you ever tried to remember a really long list of rules? Maybe your parents have rules at home, your teachers have rules at school, and there are even rules for games! It can be pretty tricky to remember them all, can't it?

Well, a long, long time ago, a man came to Jesus with a question just like that. He asked, "Jesus, there are so many rules in the Bible. Which one is the most important?"

And you know what? Jesus gave a wonderful answer. He didn't make it complicated. He made it simple and beautiful. He said the most important rule is all about love. He said there are two best rules that make all the other rules make sense.

He held up one finger for the FIRST best rule. (Hold up one finger)

"Love God with all your heart."

Jesus said we should love God with EVERYTHING we have!

• With all your heart: That means with your feelings! We love God by singing to Him, praying to Him, and thanking Him for all the good things in our lives, like our families and our favorite toys.
• With all your soul: That's the special part inside of you that makes you, you! It means loving God on the inside, where no one else can see.
• With all your mind: That means with your thoughts! We love God by learning about Him, by listening to Bible stories, and by thinking about how wonderful He is.
• With all your strength: That means with your body! We love God by using our energy to help others, by sharing, and by being kind.

So, the first rule is to love God with everything! (Hold up the big red heart) Our whole heart belongs to God.

Then, Jesus held up a second finger for the SECOND best rule. (Hold up two fingers)

"Love your neighbor as yourself."

A "neighbor" isn't just the person who lives next door. It's everyone! Your friends at church, the kids in your class, your brothers and sisters—even people who are different from you.

And "as yourself" means to love them the same way you already know how to love you! You make sure you get lunch when you're hungry, right? You want to be safe and happy. This rule says we should want that for other people, too!

So how do we love our neighbor?

• By sharing your cookies.
• By inviting someone who is alone to come and play.
• By sticking up for someone who is being picked on.
• By giving a hug when someone is sad.

That's how we show love to others.

So what did Jesus do? He took that second rule and connected it right to the first one. (Tape or hold a second, slightly smaller heart right next to the first one, making a connected pair)

He showed us that you can't really love God, whom you can't see, if you don't love the people right in front of you that you can see. And the best way to love other people is by knowing how much God loves us first!

It’s like a big, beautiful circle of love: God loves us -> We love God -> We love others.

So instead of trying to remember hundreds of rules, we can just remember these two: 1. Love God. 2. Love People. If you do those two things, you’ll be following all of God’s rules!

Let's pray together:
Dear God, thank you for loving us with your whole huge heart. Please help us to love you back with everything we have—our hearts, our thoughts, and our actions. And help us to see everyone as our neighbor and to love them just like we love ourselves. Amen.

Now, I have a little reminder for you to take back to your seat. (Hand out small heart-shaped stickers or cut-outs) Whenever you see this heart today, remember Jesus's two best rules: Love God, and Love Others