The Peril and Opportunity of Riches (Matthew Sermon)

I. The Rich Young Ruler: The Perfect “Seeker”?

The “Perfect Seeker”

Well, he was, it seems the perfect seeker, he was rich. Verse 22 said he had great wealth, think of all the ways he could use that money for the kingdom, all those poor people that he could help, all the missionaries he could support, all the church plants that he could sponsor.

He was young. Verse 22 again, says the young man, so there he was, he was young. He had all of his years ahead of him, so it seemed, all his time to spend on the kingdom, all that youthful zeal and energy and enthusiasm and idealism, vision for the kingdom. Just think of all that he could do in the years to come, for Christ.

He was a ruler. Luke 18:18 says, a certain ruler asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” So he had a position of influence the Greek implies, he was a government official of some sort. Just think of how he could use that influence to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to shape and mold the future direction of the country.

He was pious, he was deeply concerned about his soul, he said he had kept all the commandments of God from his childhood. Clearly, someone for whom religion and religious issues were paramount, he was in some sense humble, he recognized that there was something missing in his life, he wasn’t satisfied with his life or his piety. Verse 16, “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?” Verse 20, “All these I have kept,” the young man said, “What do I still lack?” So there was a certain measure of humility in recognizing that he lacked something, he was on the outside looking in.

Usually a rich, young powerful man, like this feels he has the world by the tail. Whole life ahead of him, just like that, Rich Fool in Jesus’ parable, who said to himself, “Self, you have plenty of good things laid up for many years, take life easy, eat, drink, and be merry.” That wasn’t this man’s attitude. This man knew himself enough to know better. And he was highly interested in Jesus, he sought him out, he was looking for Jesus. It’s not easy to get to Christ back in those days, constantly surrounded by a huge multitude of people. Rich, young ruler tracked him down, presented himself to him. He was seeking Jesus, Jesus didn’t need to seek him out.

He was respectful, even somewhat worshipful towards Jesus. In Mark 10:17, it says, “As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. Good Teacher,” he said, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” So he’s falling on his knees before Jesus respectful, very respectful for Jesus. And he was eager it seemed for eternal life. “What good thing must I do to get eternal life?” Eternal life is not usually a thought in a young man’s heart, but his future condition was of great importance to him.

Jesus: A Failed Evangelist?

So in all of these ways, and perhaps some others, he seemed to have been the perfect seeker, what happened? He walked away sad. Did Jesus, the great physician of the soul, botch the case? If Jesus were a trainee in some of the evangelism seminars, I’ve been to, they would have come to that conclusion. You don’t do this to this kind of a seeker, especially a rich one. You don’t want them walking away sad, you do everything you can to draw them in. One might say, “Look at this prime candidate, for the Kingdom of God and look how you blew it. He came to you eager for the Kingdom of God and you sent him away miserable. What were you thinking?”

Randy Alcorn put it this way: “We would certainly handle the situation differently than Jesus did. First, we would probably commend the rich young ruler for his interest in spiritual things. Then we might tell him ‘Just believe, that’s all. Just ask God into your heart. You don’t really have to do anything.’ When he said, ‘Okay, I believe,’ which no doubt he would since it cost him nothing. We would have considered him from that moment forward a follower of Jesus Christ. Think how blessed we would feel knowing that God’s Kingdom was greatly enhanced by the conversion of this well-known and wealthy man. Soon there would be articles and books about him. He’d be on TV and radio talk shows, he’d be put on mission and church boards, speak at rallies, he’d receive invitations to share his testimony at churches and conferences across the country likely making him a richer young ruler. … Notice that Jesus didn’t tell the young man to give 10% to the poor. (If he was a law-abiding Jew, he already did that.) Neither did Jesus say ‘Set up a trust fund, keep the principal intact, and give the interest to the poor.’ The young man would gladly have done that. Instead, Jesus stopped him dead in his tracks by telling him to give up everything and follow him.”

Well, the end results of this encounter was that this prime candidate, so to speak, walked away from Jesus sad, he came to Jesus all filled with enthusiasm and Jesus squashed him with a request that very few people in history could have measured up to. But let’s remember something about Jesus Christ, shall we? He is God in the flesh, therefore he is omniscient, he doesn’t look at the outward appearance of things, he looks at a man’s heart, he is unerring in his ways, everything he does is right, and he is able to peer into the heart of a man and understand what that man needs.

Says in John 2, when Jesus was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, “many people saw the miraculous signs he did and believed in his name, but Jesus would not entrust himself to them for He knew all men. He did not need anyone to tell him about a man because He knew what was in a man.” And so Jesus supernaturally read this rich young rulers heart, and diagnosed his spiritual condition and his spiritual need. He needed an idolectomy, he needed a deadly idol cut out and removed from his heart. For those of you that are not medically trained like me. He needed the idol cut out and removed. And what was that idol? That idol was materialism, the idol was money.

II. Probing the Young Man’s Heart

The Rich Young Ruler’s Question

And Jesus knew it, and so, He probed this young man’s heart. The rich young ruler’s question was this in verse 16: “Now, a man came up to Jesus and asked ‘Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?’” Putting together the full account from Mark and Luke, this question is full of the word good actually. Mark 10:17, “As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him, fell on His knees before him. ‘Good teacher, what must I do to get eternal life?’” So the man says both “good teacher” and what “good work” must I do to get eternal life.

So the question is filled with the idea of goodness. But the question shows a fundamental flaw in this man’s thinking. He clearly believes as we shall see, that he is not far from the Kingdom of Heaven and just needs one good work to put him over the top. He thinks all it’s gonna take is some significant deed, some act of love or something like that, some heroic act of obedience, and he will be good for the kingdom of heaven. Check that box and we’ll be fine.

Now, the fullness of Scripture teaches that all of us have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. “There is no one righteous, not even one, no one who understands, no one who seeks God, all have turned away.” And the Bible tells us that our sins cannot be atoned for apart from the shedding of blood, without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness. We cannot use our good deeds to pay for our sins for two reasons. First, we don’t have any, we’ll get to that in a moment. And second of all, we can’t do it any more than a murderer on trial for his life for a crime he admits to committing can exchange a promise or pledge of future good deeds or even evidence of past good deeds to pay for that crime. They are irrelevant. And this rich, young ruler as I just said a moment ago, doesn’t seem to understand how sinful he is.

For it says in Isaiah 64:6, “All of us have become like one who is unclean and all of our righteous acts are like filthy rags.” So this man’s understanding of eternal life and of salvation is seriously fundamentally flawed. It’s also very popular to what many of us think. What good thing must I do to get eternal life? He didn’t think he was sinful, he thought obtaining eternal life was simple. Just add some good work, and there it is.

Jesus’ Significant Rebuttal Question

So Jesus asks him a significant question. “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only One who is good.” We who dwell here on earth cannot begin to fathom the depth of this answer. We have a hard time believing what Jesus is really saying here. We creatures are good only by having something added to our nature. God alone is goodness itself. Our goodness is like a drop. His goodness a vast and, I say, infinite ocean of goodness. He is good in his essence, he is eternally and immutably good, he is infinitely good without a shadow of evil in his character whatsoever. Closely related to the idea of His goodness is His holiness.

Only the Scriptures can give us a sense of the perfect holiness of God. Revelation 15:4, up there in heaven this is what they say, “Who will not fear you, O Lord, and who will not bring glory to your name for you alone are holy.” Scripture presents the infinite, the perfect holiness of God, with generally two metaphors: that of elevation or height and that of fire or brightness. God is elevated high and lofty, exalted separated from all creation. Isaiah 57:15 says, “For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: ‘I dwell in the high and holy place.’” Isaiah 6:1, “I saw the Lord on a throne, high and exalted.” Isaiah 40:22 says, “He sits enthroned above the circle of the Earth, and all its people are before him like grasshoppers.” Psalm 97:9 says, “For you, O Lord, are the Most High over all the earth, you’re exalted far above all gods.”

And so we see elevation, infinite separation between God and His physical creation. God also is portrayed as bright, burning light. Exodus 24:17, “Now, the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel.” Deuteronomy 4:24 says, “For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.”

Now, this brightness of God’s glorious holiness is augmented by the fact that no one can look at it and survive, even the seraphim of Isaiah 6, say they cover their faces. God told Moses “No one can see me and live.” Paul said that God “dwells in unapproachable light,” and because we don’t have a right sense of this great holiness and loftiness and exaltation and light of God, we don’t have a right sense of the perfection it takes to be in His presence, and how completely defiled we are in sin. And so Jesus starts right there. Why do you ask me about what is good? In effect you’re throwing the word “good” around and you don’t know what you’re talking about. “There is only one who is good.”

Mark 10:18, “‘Why do you call me good?’ Jesus says. ‘No one is good — except God alone.’” Do you know what goodness is? Do you know who God is? Do you know who I am? Do you know who you are? That’s what he’s getting at right at the beginning. The core problem this man has is he’s deeply sinful and has greatly, greatly underestimated the holiness of God. We’ll all find out on Judgment Day. We’ll all find out how exalted and holy and pure he is, but it’ll be too late then, for salvation. We need to know now by faith, how exalted and holy he is. Oh, that my words might give you a vision of that if you’ve never trusted Christ. That you might have a vision of just how high and lofty and holy he is and how you are completely unfit to stand before him without Jesus’s help, without his righteousness imputed to you you will not survive the encounter.

And even deeper this man didn’t know who Jesus was. Why do you call me good? Don’t you know that no one is good but God alone, do you understand who I am? Don’t just come and call me good teacher. Jesus was ironically the only good man that ever lived, in this sense, the only perfectly good man that ever lived.

Jesus Strangely Hands Him the Law

And this rich, young ruler was standing in the presence of perfect goodness, and so Jesus, in a perfectly good way deals with this man’s problem, and he does it by handing him the law of all things. What a strange moment in evangelistic history. If you want to enter life obey the commandments. Wait a minute, I know what you’ll say. Romans hadn’t been written yet, he didn’t know that there’s no one justified by works.

Oh, he knew. Well, what is he doing? This is standard Judaism, it’s all it is. Leviticus 18:5, “Keep my decrees and laws, for the man who obeys them will live by them, I am the Lord.” However truly broken-hearted Jews like David, for example, in Psalm 51, knew that the obedience of the law was impossible for him. And he needed forgiveness from God. Paul knew this righteousness by the law well, he’d spent his whole life trying to attain it and never could, he found it impossible. And so he wrote in Romans 3:24, “By the works of the law, no human being will be justified in His sight, since through the law comes the knowledge of sin.” Peter was the same, he called the law, in Acts 15:10, “a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear.”

Simple reason, let’s put it this way, present and future obedience cannot pay for past disobedience. You can’t exchange the two. And we have all disobeyed. Christ knew better than any human being alive that no righteousness by the law could save our souls, that’s why he entered the world, that’s why he would go to the cross, he knew better than anyone that the law cannot save that’s why he was there, for it says in Galatians 2:21, “If righteousness could be gained by the law, Christ died for nothing.”

Oh he knew. So why did he say it, if you want to enter life obey the commandments. Well, he’s exposing the man’s self-righteousness, he’s exposing the man’s independence, he’s exposing the man’s sin.

The Young Man’s Self-Righteousness Emerges

And so look what the rich young man says, “If you want to enter life obey the commandments,” verse 18, “‘Which ones?’ the man inquired, and Jesus replied, ‘Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother, and love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Alright, so the man begins by seeking to justify himself by asking which of the commands did God have in mind? Well, obviously this is off base since the same God has given all the commandments, the same God has said, “You shall not murder,” also said, “You shall not commit adultery.” If you do not commit murder, but you do commit adultery, you’ve broken the law. James tells us that. And yet, for all of that, Jesus just goes right along in the conversation and complies by giving him a truncated list of God’s commands. Five of the 10 Commandments, all of them horizontal dealing with human beings, other human beings. And then the summation of all that, the second great commandment “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Amazingly, this rich, young ruler felt no twinge of conscience whatsoever when he heard these laws. None. “‘All these I have kept,’ the young man said, ‘from my youth,’” Mark 10:20.

Oh, the blindness of sin. It’s what causes me to tremble as I preach today. Let me cut to the point. I think all of a struggle with idolatry, every one of us here, perhaps even with materialism, just like this man, and we are blind to it, we don’t see our own sin in the matter, we think it’s the other guy, it’s the rich young ruler, it’s not me. Can you really say you don’t struggle with idolatry, you have no idols in your heart, you don’t struggle with money, material possessions? The blindness of sin. Did this man perfectly obey all of these laws, all of them from his youth, every one of them? He loved his neighbor as himself every moment of his life, he honored his father and mother?

Let’s bring mom and dad in and ask, how has it gone with rich young ruler? Has he perfectly obeyed this commandment? Well, there were some moments that it wasn’t the best, but he’s a good boy. Alright, we’ll get to good later with mom and dad. That’s a whole other discussion.

Had this man’s heart really been so pure, so free from sin, so perfect. Oh, what a shock will Judgment Day be for multitudes upon multitudes gathered in the valley for judgment. Oh, how shocking it will be to find out what the standard really was. When I evangelize and I tell them… Jesus commentary on the law. “You’ve heard that it was said ‘You shall not murder,’ but I tell you, if you were even angry at your brother, you’re in danger of the fire of hell. And you’ve heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ but if I tell… I tell you, that if you even look at a woman lustfully, you’ve committed adultery in your heart.” People will think that wasn’t on the test. It’s an unfair question, but this is the standard of perfection, and holiness. And yet, the man says “All these I have kept. what do I still lack?”

III. Challenging the Young Man’s Idolatry

And so Jesus goes now to the heart of the matter. Look at verse 21, “Jesus answered, ‘If you want to be perfect, Go sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, then come follow me.’”

Christ Drives the Stake Through His Pride

Jesus drives a stake right through the man’s pride. The goal is perfection. Do you wish to be perfect? Do you want to be perfect? We learn in the Sermon on the Mount that you must be perfect as the Heavenly Father is perfect. If you’re not perfect, you will not go to Heaven. You can’t spend eternity in the presence of such a Holy God, and not be perfect. Do you want to be perfect? Well then, this is the path for perfection for you. Even if he had kept all the horizontal laws dealing with other human beings, there was still the vertical component of his relationship with God, and now, Jesus goes to that issue right away.

The root issue here is idolatry, in Exodus 20:2-5, “I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery, You shall have no other gods before Me, you shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above, or the earth beneath, or the waters below you shall not bow down to them or worship them for I the Lord, your God, am a jealous God.” And Colossians 3 in verse 5 identifies greed as idolatry.

The Basic Issue of Life: Whom Will You Worship, Whom Will You Serve?

So the basic issue of life for every one of us as created beings, as human beings is to whom will we give our highest affection our highest allegiance, to whom will we bow down, who will we serve? Romans 1 uncovers the central matter of sin and calls it idolatry. Idolatry is worshipping and serving any created thing, more than the creator. Romans 1:25, “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things more than the Creator, who is forever praised. Amen.” That’s the great exchange of idolatry, you exchange the truth of God for a lie.

Recently at the 2020 conference at Southeastern Mark Driscoll was talking about this, and he shared an insight that he believed, at least he understands it to be this way, “They exchanged the truth of God for the lie.” It’s not just any lie, it’s not just one of many lies. It is the lie and that is that a created thing can take the place of God in your heart and satisfy you, it can be the center of your life.

Mark Driscoll went on to tell a story about a mission trip he made to a remote village in India and as he was there in this remote village, he was becoming increasingly disgusted with the idolatry he saw, in fact, he saw them sacrifice a chicken to some kind of a chicken idol, and there were feathers everywhere, and all that, and he was talking to the wife of one of the pastors there, about his time in India and about different things, and he had already resolved in mind, he’d never go back to India, he was just so turned off by what he saw. This pastor’s wife and he were talking and he said, “Have you ever been to America?” She said “Just once, but I’ll never go back.” “Well, why not?” “Because of all the idolatry in your country.” He said, “What idolatry? I just got done looking at a chicken god, okay, with feathers everywhere. What idolatry are you talking about?” She said “You Americans worship your stomachs, there are restaurants everywhere. You worship sports, there are huge stadiums filled with thousands of sports fans who are worshipping. You worship entertainment. So all the family rooms have at the center, the most expensive television that you can buy. You worship sex, so the culture is saturated with it. There are actually idols everywhere.”

Wow, what a moment [chuckle], what a moment. Could it be we have a hard time seeing our own idols when we can see other people so clearly we’re often blind to it. When a Christian young woman pursues a relationship with a non-Christian guy she’s committing idolatry. She’s worshipping at the altar of the good feelings that guy can give her. When people commit sexual immorality they’re worshipping at the altar of central pleasure; when a man downloads internet pornography he is doing the same. It’s idolatry.

When an ambitious professional sacrifices his family so he can become a partner in a law firm or a CEO of Fortune 500 company, or just succeed in some ways, worshipping at the altar of power and worldly success. It’s idolatry. When a young mother wraps her whole existence around her children, so that her walk with Christ is neglected, her marriage is neglected, and if one of her children should die, and she’s angry at God and comes to doubt him, then her idolatry, has been exposed, she’s idolized her children. They’re everywhere, these idols are everywhere. It is the great danger of our time here, in the world. Thousands and thousands of other examples of idolatry, where people exchange the truth of God for the lie and worship and serve created things more than the Creator, who’s forever praised. We’re blind to our own idolatry and so is the rich young ruler. His idol was money and he was unwilling to give it up. And unless he gave it up, he could not be Christ’s disciple, and so Christ as a skillful heart surgeon exposes the blockage in his heart.

Christ a Heart Surgeon: Skillfully Exposes the Blockage

The gospel of Mark reveals that Christ for all of his toughness, here actually loved this young man. It says in Mark 10:21, “Jesus looked at him and loved him,” incredible verse. He’s moved with compassion for him. I think it’s similar to the feelings he had of compassion for the leper who’s covered with disgusting effects of his disease and sores and wounds everywhere and Jesus is moved with compassion And touches him. I am willing to heal, this man is just as filthy inside spiritually and yet Jesus is moved with compassion, wants to reach out and touch his heart. And so that’s why he gives these striking commands for all of His promises as a seeking future disciple, he cannot follow Jesus with this idol in the center of his heart. It’s impossible. He cannot serve both God and money, as he says in Matthew 6.

Overwhelming Commands and an Eternal Promise

He could not accept a so-called convert a man whose heart is still en-wrapped with an idol and so he gives some overwhelming commands and an eternal promise. Look at verse 21, “If you want to be perfect, go sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

Sell everything, give to the poor, follow me. These must have been like hammer blows to his heart. The encounter is not exactly like any other that Jesus has in the gospels, but it’s similar to others. For example, as He walked by Peter, John, James, and Andrew by the sea of Galilee, he says, “Come follow me, and I’ll make you fishers of men,” and they left at once their boat and their nets and followed him. He walks by Matthew’s tax collector booth and he says “Come follow me.” And at once, Matthew gets up from his life as a tax collector and walks away and follows Jesus. He says, actually, to anyone who would follow him, “If anyone who would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” It’s the same command, it’s just a version of it for this particular rich young ruler.

The command to sell everything as much like Christ’s marvelous parable, the treasure in the field. “The Kingdom of Heaven is like treasure hidden in a field when a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy, went off and sold everything he had and bought that field.” In his joy, he did that, Sold everything. So he could have the field. The idea is that entering eternal life, entering to heaven of a right relationship with Almighty God through Jesus Christ is worth anything. Anything at all that you need to give up to get it. “Follow me” means to do what I was willing to do. Do what I was willing to do. “For you know the grace of our lord Jesus that though he was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich,” 2 Corinthians 8. “Who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death — even death on a cross.” Jesus, then is the ultimate rich, young ruler, who is willing to give it all up, that he might gain us.

That he might gain a multitude from every tribe, and language, and people, and nation, who will worship around the throne And so he gives this man, these amazing commands. Follow me, do what I was willing to do Live the life of self-sacrifice and then he gives them an amazing promise. Sell all your possessions give to the poor. And you will have treasure in heaven, treasure in heaven, The desire for treasure is not evil frankly, actually, the desire, if the treasure is the right one, the desire is absolutely required, it is of the essence of sin that we don’t desire the treasure that Jesus has in mind here. Treasure is something of great worth something that attracts the eye that draws in the heart where your treasure is, there your heart will be, that’s the treasure. And the treasure, my friends, is God himself.

Genesis 15:1, “The Lord said to Abram, ‘Fear not, Abram. I am your shield, I am your very great reward.’” I’m your treasure, I’m what you get. You get me for all eternity, you get me in face-to-face fellowship you get me and perfection, you get me forever. But it goes beyond that. You also get me in some specific ways, in that I’m not unjust and I will not forget anything you’ve done. And if this man had by faith sold all of his possessions, and they were many, and gave them to the poor to alleviate in some small measure, the suffering of the poor in this life, the Lord would never have forgotten it and he would never let the rich young ruler forget it, to all eternity. I remember what you did well done, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” enter into the joy of your Master. Let’s celebrate that one forever.

You’ll have treasure in Heaven if you do it, so the treasure in heaven is God’s pleasure in our righteous acts done by faith here, not to forgive for the forgiveness of sins, that’s impossible, but by faith to the service of God, he’ll never forget it. Here in this place, then, we see the opportunity of wealth. Do you see it? You have money, You have it for a little while, use it wisely. Store up treasure in heaven with it, give it away. For the sake of the kingdom, give it away. In difficult economic times, give it away. In abundant economic times, give it away. That’s the opportunity of wealth.

The Man’s Sad Reaction

But in the rich young ruler’s response, we see also the peril of wealth. Verse 22, “When the young man heard this, he went away sad because he had great wealth.” He goes away, he walked away. If this young man is languishing in hell now, oh, what he would give to have this moment back, to do it all over again. He made his choice between two jealous masters, Christ and money, and money won. And what would it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul? And what would a man give in exchange for his soul? The rich young ruler chose poorly and notice that now he has none of those things. I don’t know where he is, but if he’s in hell, he’s not rich anymore, and he’s not young anymore, and he’s not a ruler anymore. That was just temporary. And it’s interesting, as he walks away, he’s sad. Don’t you find that amazing? He’s getting what he wants, he’s making the decision the way he wants, but he’s not happy with it. You know why because it’s an idol and doesn’t satisfy, and he knows it.

But he just can’t seem to bring himself to give it up. It doesn’t make you happy, you know what makes you happy? God, and God alone, You have created us for yourself, O Lord, and the heart of man is restless until he finds his rest, its peace, its joy, its meaning, in God, in God alone. How unlike the man, and the treasure hidden in the field parable who, for joy, sells everything, How unlike Zacchaeus who gladly stands up at that lunch with Jesus, and says “Look Lord! Here and now, I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” He is so happy salvation’s come to his house. So why is the rich, young ruler sad? Because he knows that he’s made a bad choice he just can’t seem to stop it.

IV. The Stunning Lesson: Only God Can Save a Rich Man!

And so then Jesus turns and gives His disciples a stunning lesson, that is only God can save a rich man. Jesus declares the danger of wealth. The general assumption of Jesus’s Day, is that wealth is a sign of great blessing by God, God has blessed you with this wealth. So also today the health and wealth gospel teaches the same lie. Jesus actually identifies it as a great danger to the soul. Look at verses 23 and 24: “Jesus said, then to His disciples, ‘I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, I tell you, 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.’”

Let me just cut to the chase, about the camel in the eye of the needle. It’s impossible. I know there are other stories out there, I just wanna say Jesus is citing an example of something that is impossible. It cannot be done. You can spend a long time trying to get that camel through the eye of the needle, but it isn’t gonna go and everybody knows it, it’s an impossible thing, that’s what Jesus is highlighting here, it is actually impossible for a rich man to be saved apart from the work of God.

And the disciples are stunned by it. Look at verse 25: “When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked ‘Who then can be saved?’ And Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.’” Every true conversion is a miracle of God’s grace. But rich people face special obstacles to entering the Kingdom of Heaven, that’s what Jesus is saying here.

V. Applications

More on that in a moment. Let’s look at some applications, and all I wanna do is just take a few of the phrases from this text and apply them.

“No one is good but God alone…”

First, the phrase “No one is good but God alone.” Meditate much both on the goodness of God and the wickedness and the evil of man. Understand what Jesus is saying here. Do not make much of your own righteousness, meditate rather on the perverseness of sin and the pervasiveness of sin in your life. Understand that the doctrine of the total depravity of man, is foundational to the need that people have for Christ. People are not essentially basically good and they just need a little help, no they need Christ And worship the God who is good; swim in the ocean of His goodness. I often think of God as somebody who’s ready to whack me every time I do something, Have you ever thought that way? That God’s up there and he’s just trying to get us. I always wait for the other shoe to drop. I’ve had a blessed life. I keep waiting for the curse to come, alright.

God is good. If there is any whack coming in my life, it’s because I need it and there’s some sin in my life and he needs to deal with me but he’s immensely loving. We should meditate on how wide, and long, and high, and deep is the love and the goodness of God and swim in that ocean and forget your own goodness. Jesus has already commented on that.

“If you wish to enter life…”

Secondly, “If you wish to enter life,” Jesus said. Do you want to enter life? Are you lost? Do you have idols in your heart and you know you have never come to Christ? Trust in him, flee to Christ. Leave your idols behind, and if he tells you to do something hard, then do it. Trust in him and His righteousness and His death on the cross for your salvation. I worry about idolatry, I worry about idolatry in the church, I worry about it in this church, I worry about it in my own heart. Is it possible that many rich, young rulers, have entered American evangelical churches never having been stripped of their idols? And they were assured by people who graduated from those evangelism schools that they have been saved and that they’re fine now, and they’re going through life never having come face-to-face with the covetousness and greed in their own hearts? Examine yourselves to see if you’re in the faith. Test yourselves, see if there are any idols in your heart, and ask God to free you from them.

“Sell your possessions, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven…”

Thirdly, Jesus said, “Sell your possessions and give to the poor and you’ll have treasure in heaven.” We all know that this is not a universal commandment. He said to Zacchaeus, who offered only to sell half his possessions, “Salvation’s come to this house.” It’s not the same for everyone, but this much is the case: Jesus will have no rivals, and if he’s going to be your Lord, He must be Lord of all. And we must understand that there are poor people out there that are suffering, there are poor Christians that are going through persecution and hunger and suffering. And the Lord has, in some way, blessed the American evangelical church, with an abundance of wealth that we might be generous to others, even in times of economic stricture. And if we are, we will never lose our treasure in heaven.

“It is hard for a rich man to be saved…”

Fourthly, “it is hard for a rich man to be saved.” Paul said, “Command those who are rich to be generous and not put their trust in wealth which is so fleeting. People who want to get rich fall into temptation, in a trap and many foolish and harmful desires, that plunge men into all kinds of ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” So Jesus said, “Be on your guard against all kinds of greed.” It’s hard for a rich man to be saved and we are rich men. So it’s hard for us to be saved.

“With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible…”

But finally “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Focus then, on the sovereign power of God to save a sinner like you and me focus on that. When you go out to evangelize, can I urge you, please, to consider carefully, your involvement in the health fair outreach next Saturday? The health fair isn’t next Saturday, the outreach, we’re going out to invite people to come to the health fair. It’s a ministry in and of itself.

If the people never come to the health fair, it’s okay as long as they come to Jesus, that’s not a bad thing, you know that don’t you? If they come to Jesus and come to faith in Christ and never come to the health fair, I’m sure the doctors in our church will be totally okay with that and the dentists too. But we have an opportunity to go out in a good cause, in a way that gets us easily into conversations with people right around this church and talk to them about Christ. Won’t you come? That’s next Saturday afternoon and Sunday after church, either one of those days. But as you go out, keep this in mind, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” God has His people in this community. We can go out and find them.

But as we do, let’s leave the results to God, and when you pray, keep this in mind, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Don’t trust in yourself, your prayers, your own righteousness or any human thing, but trust in God, who can do incredible things.

Close with me in prayer. Father, we thank you for the time we’ve had to study the case of this rich, young ruler and all that he means to us. Lord, he is a warning to us. Father, I ask that you would please give us repentance, help us to see the idols in our hearts, help us to know when some created thing has shouldered you out of the center of our lives and has edged you out of the uppermost place of affection in our hearts. Help us to love you above all things, help us to be open-handed and generous to the poor and needy. I pray that there’d be a river of generosity and benevolence flowing from this church to this community and to the ends of the earth. Through mission, support of missions, through benevolent works done here to the poor and needy, even in this, in our own congregation. Please do it, we pray for your sake, in your glory. Amen.

These are only preliminary, unedited outlines and may differ from Andy’s final message.

I. The Rich Young Ruler:  The Perfect “Seeker”?

A. The “Perfect Seeker”

1. He was rich

Matthew 19:22  …he had great wealth.

a. Think of all the ways he could use those resources for the Kingdom… all the poor people he could help, all the missionaries he could support, all the churchplants he could sponsor!!!

2. He was young

Matthew 19:22  the young man …

a. He had years ahead of him… all that time to spend on the Kingdom

b. He had all that youthful zeal, strength, energy, idealism

c. Just think of all that he could do for years to come in service to Christ!!

3. He was a ruler

Luke 18:18 A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

a. He had a position of influence

b. The Greek implies he was a government official of some sort

c. He could use all that influence to shape and mold the future direction of the country for Christ

4. He was pious

a. He is deeply concerned about his soul

b. He says he has kept all the commandments of God from his childhood

c. Clearly someone for whom religion and religious issues were paramount

5. He feels something missing in his life… he is not satisfied with his life or his piety

Matthew 19:16  “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?”

Matthew 19:20  “All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?”

a. Usually a rich young powerful man like this feels he has the world by the tail

b. Usually such a man feels like the rich fool in another parable of Christ

Luke 12:19  And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”‘

c. This man knew himself enough to know better!

6. He was intensely interested in Jesus… seeking Him out

a. It was not easy to get to Christ

b. He was surrounded by a huge multitude of people all the time

c. This rich young ruler tracked Jesus down and presented himself to Him

d. He was seeking Jesus;  Jesus didn’t need to seek him out

7. He was respectful, even worshipful toward Jesus

Mark 10:17  As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

8. He was eager for eternal life

Matthew 19:16  “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?”

a. “eternal life” is not a thought usually in a man’s heart

b. his future condition is of great importance to him

B. Jesus:  A Failed Evangelist?

1. If Jesus were a trainee in a standard evangelism course, He would receive a failing grade for this encounter

2. One might say, “Look at this PRIME candidate for the Kingdom of God… and look how you botched it!  He came to you eager for the Kingdom of God and you sent him away miserable.”

Randy Alcorn:  “We would certainly handle the situation differently!  First, we would probably commend the rich young ruler for his interest in spiritual things.  Then we might tell him, ‘Just believe, that’s all;  ask God into your life—you don’t really have to do anything.’  When he said, ‘Okay, I believe’ (which no doubt he would, since it cost nothing), we would consider him a follower of Christ.  Think how blessed we would fell, knowing that God’s Kingdom was greatly enhanced by the conversion of this well-known wealthy man!  Soon, there would be articles and books about him.  He’d be on TV and radio talk shows.  He’d be put on mission and church boards, speak at rallies, and receive invitations to share his testimony in churches and conferences across the country, likely making him a richer young ruler…

Notice that Jesus didn’t tell the young man to give ten percent to the poor.  (If he was truly an obedient Jew, he already did that.)  Neither did Jesus say, ‘Set up a trust fund, keep the principal intact, and give the interest to the poor.’  The young man would have gladly done that.  Instead, Jesus stopped him dead in his tracks by telling him to give up everything and follow him.”  [Money, Possessions, and Eternity, p. 4-5]

3. The end result:  this prime candidate walks away from Jesus sad… he came to Jesus all filled with enthusiasm and Jesus squashed him with a request that very few people could measure up to

4. But let’s remember some things about Christ

a. He is God in the flesh… therefore, He is omniscient

b. He doesn’t look at the outward appearance of things

c. Man looks at the outer appearance, God looks at the heart

John 2:23-25  Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many people saw the miraculous signs he was doing and believed in his name.  ²⁴ But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all men.  ²⁵ He did not need man’s testimony about man, for he knew what was in a man.

Jesus supernaturally read this man’s heart and immediately diagnosed his spiritual need:

He needed an IDOLECTOMY from his heart;  he needed a deadly idol removed from deep within him—like a cancerous tumor to be removed

II. Probing the Young Man’s Heart

A. The Rich Young Ruler’s Question

vs. 16  Now a man came up to Jesus and asked, “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?”

1. putting together the full account from Mark and Luke, his question is full of the word “good”

Mark 10:17  As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

2. so the man says “Good teacher” and asks about “Good things” he might do to earn eternal life

3. the question obviously shows a fundamental flaw in the man’s thinking

a. he clearly believes (as we shall see) that he is not far from the Kingdom of Heaven

b. he thinks all it’s going to take is some significant deed, some heroic act to earn or merit eternal life

c. the fullness of Scripture teaches that all of us have sinned and fall short of the glory of God

d. our sins cannot be atoned for apart from the shedding of blood

e. we cannot use good deeds to pay for sins, any more than a murderer on trial for his crime can offer the judge some good deed to pay for his sin

f. but there is an even more fundamental flaw in this man’s thinking:  he doesn’t understand how holy God is

Habakkuk 1:13  Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrong.

g. AND he doesn’t understand how sinful he is in the sight of such a holy God

Isaiah 64:6  All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags

This man’s understanding of eternal life and of salvation is seriously, fundamentally flawed

He didn’t think he was sinful… and he thought obtaining eternal life was simple… just doing some good work could earn it for him, and that good work was easy to do

B. Jesus’ Significant Rebuttal Question

vs. 17  “Why do you ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good.

1. we who dwell on earth cannot even begin to fathom the significance of this assertion by Jesus

2. We creatures are good only by having something added to our nature… God alone is goodness itself;  our goodness is like a drop, His goodness is a vast ocean… he is good in His essence, eternally and immutably good, infinitely good, with no shadow whatsoever of evil or darkness

3. closely related to the idea of God’s goodness is His holiness

4. only the Scripture can give us a sense of the perfect holiness of God

Revelation 15:4  Who will not fear you, O Lord, and bring glory to your name? For you alone are holy.

a. scripture presents the holiness of God with generally two metaphors:  elevation, and fire

b. God is elevated, high, lofty, exalted, separated from all creation

^ESV Isaiah 57:15 For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place

Isaiah 6:1  I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted

Isaiah 40:22 He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers.

Psalm 97:9 For you, O LORD, are the Most High over all the earth; you are exalted far above all gods.

c. God is bright, burning, pure like fire, glowing, radiant

^ESV Exodus 24:17 Now the appearance of the glory of the LORD was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel.

Deuteronomy 4:24 For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.

d. This brightness of God’s glorious holiness is augmented by the fact that no one can look at it and survive

i) Even the seraphim in Isaiah 6 are covering their faces in God’s presence

ii) God told Moses “No one can see me and live”

iii) Paul said that God “dwells in unapproachable light”

5. because we don’t have a right sense of God, we don’t have a right sense of the perfection that is required for us to dwell with Him in heaven

6. AND because we don’t have a right sense of God, we don’t have a right sense of how completely defiled we are in sin

7. So Jesus says this amazing thing:  “Why do you ask me about what is good?  And why do you call me good?”  in effect, “You’re throwing the word ‘good’ around as if it were easy to be good…

“There is only One who is good.”

Mark 10:18 “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good– except God alone.

8. the core problem this man has:  he is deeply sinful and has greatly underestimated the holiness of God

9. even deeper, this man didn’t know who Jesus was… he didn’t know he was addressing the God-Man… the only perfectly good man that has ever lived

C. Jesus Strangely Hands Him the Law

Matthew 19:17 If you want to enter life, obey the commandments.”

1. This was standard Judaism… all Jews had been instructed in this

Leviticus 18:5  Keep my decrees and laws, for the man who obeys them will live by them. I am the LORD.

2. However, truly broken-hearted Jews, ready for the grace of God, recognized how impossible it was to be saved by works of the law

3. Paul knew this righteousness by the law well… he had found it impossible

Romans 3:20 For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.

Peter the same—he called the law…

Acts 15:10   a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear?

4. Simple reason:  present and future obedience cannot atone for past acts of disobedience

5. Christ knew better than any human being that ever lived that the law was no path of salvation… for if it had been He would have never been born as a man:

Galatians 2:21  if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”

6. So… why did Jesus hand this eager young seeker the law?  Well… as a diagnostic tool of the heart; the law EXPOSES sin, and so it does here as well

D. The Young Man’s Self-Righteousness Emerges

Matthew 19:17-19  If you want to enter life, obey the commandments.”  ¹⁸ “Which ones?” the man inquired. Jesus replied, “‘Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony,  ¹⁹ honor your father and mother,’ and ‘love your neighbor as yourself.'”

1. the man begins by seeking to justify himself concerning WHICH commands he needed to obey

2. obviously this is off base… since the same God has given all commandments, and expected obedience to all of them

3. yet, Jesus complies by listing five of the Ten Commandments… then adding the “Second Great Commandment”

4. it is noted that all of these commandments deal with the horizontal element—our relationship with other human beings

5. amazingly, the man actually felt no twinge of conscience in any of these areas!!!!  He had kept every one of those since his childhood!!

Matthew 19:20  “All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?”

Mark 10:20  “Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.”

a. O the blindness of sin!!

b. Think carefully:  had he perfectly obeyed all of these?? Had he actually perfectly honored his mother and father?  Had he truly loved his neighbor as himself?  O how readily we excuse our sins and how loftily our pride elevates our meager achievements and calls them perfect!!

c. This doesn’t even cover the heart issues of anger as the root of murder, and lust as the root of adultery… had this man’s heart really been so pure from childhood?  So perfect??

d. O how shocking Judgment Day will be for so many who have little or no consciousness of their own sin; and NO CONCEPTION WHATSOEVER of the standard of holiness inherent in the person of God

e. Yet, amazingly, he still senses that he has something lacking;  he is short of something needed for heaven

“What do I still lack?”

III. Challenging the Young Man’s Idolatry

Matthew 19:21  Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

A. Christ Drives the Stake Through His Pride

1. the goal is perfection… the very thing required by heaven

2. So, Christ lays out the issue of perfection

3. Even if he had kept all the horizontal laws, dealing with other people, there is still this issue of his love for God

4. the root issue here was idolatry…

Exodus 20:2-5  “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.  ³ “You shall have no other gods before me.  ⁴ “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.  ⁵ You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God

Colossians 3:5  greed, which is idolatry.

B. The Basic Issue of Life:  Whom Will You Worship, Whom Will You Serve?

1. Romans 1 uncovers the central matter of sin:  idolatry

2. idolatry is worshiping and serving any created thing more than the Creator

Romans 1:25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator– who is forever praised. Amen.

Mark Driscoll:  At a recent 20-20 conference at SEBTS, he shared his insights about this passage;  he said it is more like this:  we sinners exchange the truth of God for THE lie… and THE lie is that created things can take the place of God in our hearts, that created things can be worshiped and served as we were meant to worship and serve God

Driscoll went on to unfold various types of common idolatries:

He related a story in which he was preaching in a remote village in India;  he had been overwhelmed by all to obvious idols in that country;  there were idols everywhere;  he had just seen a shrine to a god where chickens were sacrificed to that god and there were white feathers everywhere;  it turned his stomach and he said he would never go back to India!  But as he was speaking to the wife of one if the pastors there, he asked her if she would ever visit America.  She said “I did once and I will never go back!”  Mark asked her “Why not?”  “Because I can’t stand all the idols in America.”  Mark asked “What idols?  Where are the shrines, like here in India?”  She said “You Americans worship your stomachs… there are restaurants everywhere!  You worship sports, so there are huge stadiums where thousands of sports fans can worship.  You worship entertainment, so all the family rooms are centered around the most expensive TVs you can buy.  You worship sex, so the culture is saturated with it.  There are idols everywhere!”  Mark realized that idolatry is the central problem all over the world, but we are often BLIND to our own idolatries

·      When a Christian young lady pursues a relationship with a non-Christian guy, she is committing idolatry… worshiping at the altar of the good feelings he gives her

·      When people commit sexual immorality, they are worshiping at the altar of sensual pleasure

·      When a man downloads internet pornography, he is worshiping at that same altar:  illicit sexual pleasure

·      When an ambitious professional sacrifices his family so he can become a partner in a law firm or a CEO of a Fortune 500 by age 40, he is worshiping at the altar of power and worldly success

·      When a young mother wraps her whole existence around her children so that her walk with Christ is neglected, her marriage is neglected… and if, one of her children should die, she is angry with God and comes to doubt him… her idolatry is exposed:  she has worshiped her children

In every case and thousands others, human beings are making the central exchange of worship that Paul talks about:

Romans 1:25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator– who is forever praised. Amen.

We are often BLIND to our own idolatry

So it was with the rich young ruler

His idol was money, and he was unwilling to give it up

Unless he gave it up, he could not be Christ’s disciple!!!

C. Christ a Heart Surgeon:  Skillfully Exposes the Blockage

1. Mark reveals that Christ, for all of His toughness here, actually loved this rich young ruler… that’s why He challenged him so deeply

Mark 10:21 Jesus looked at him and loved him.

2. Jesus is as moved with compassion for this man as He was for the leper He healed… that man’s body was covered with bleeding sores and he was repulsive to look at, but Jesus was moved with compassion for him;  this man’s soul was covered with the callouses of idolatry and he was repulsive spiritually;  but Jesus was moved with compassion for him

3. that is why he gives these striking commands

4. for all of his promise as an earnestly seeking potential disciple, he would have been worthless to Christ unconverted… for he would have sought to serve two masters… God and Money;  and Christ said very plainly that its cannot be

Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.

Christ could not accept as a so-called “convert” a man whose heart was still enslaved to money

D. Overwhelming Commands and an Eternal Promise

Matthew 19:21  Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

1. the commandments:  SELL EVERYTHING, GIVE TO THE POOR, AND FOLLOW ME

2. this encounter is not exactly like any other that Jesus gives in the New Testament… yet it has its parallels in some other cases

a. as Jesus walked by Peter, John, James and Andrew, he called them away from their fathers, their boats, and their livelihoods with the same command he gives here:

“Come follow me.”

b. As Jesus walked by Matthew’s tax collector’s booth, he issued the same command:

“Come follow me.”

c. And to all who would come after him, Jesus issues this command:

Matthew 16:24-25  “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.  ²⁵ For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.

3. the command to sell everything is very much like the man in Christ’s parable of the Treasure in the Field

Matthew 13:44 “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.

4. the idea is that entering eternal life, entering the heaven of a right relationship with Almighty God through Christ, is worth anything has to offer

5. “follow me” = do what I was willing to do

2 Corinthians 8:9  For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.

Philippians 2:6-8  Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,  ⁷ but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  ⁸ And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death– even death on a cross!

Jesus is the ultimate rich young ruler who left everything to serve the poor… and He gained the treasure in heaven of a multitude of people from every nation on earth worshiping him

6. the promise:  you will have treasure in heaven

a. the desire for treasure is not evil… actually, if the treasure is the proper one, we MUST desire it… it is of the essence of sin that we DON’T DESIRE the treasure in heaven Jesus mentions

b. treasure = something of great worth, that attracts and capture our hearts; the delight of the eye and the desire of the heart

c. treasure in heaven implies that the treasure has something to do with God… “something to do with” is far too weak… we find the unified testimony of Scripture is that the treasure IS God… God Himself, God face to face, God in intimacy

Genesis 15:1  After this, the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.”

d. God is the reward… but God also rewards righteous actions, He gives special treasures of Himself for specific acts of courage and faith and love

e. If the Rich Young Ruler would obey Christ and sell all His earthly possessions for the sake of Christ, would give the proceeds of the sale to the poor, He would have an eternal treasure of the PLEASURE OF GOD in that amazing deed

f. For eternity, this man would bask in the glow of the pleasure of God in that action… that action would live eternally in their face to face relationship

Matthew 25:21   “His master replied, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!’

g. The treasure in heaven is God’s eternal esteem and pleasure in the action, which He will share with us personally and intensely

h. And that treasure can never “perish, spoil, or fade” says Peter; “moth and rust cannot destroy and thieves cannot break in and steal it”  it is “kept in heaven for us”

7. Thus do we see the immense OPPORTUNITY of wealth… every dollar we get can be transformed into something useful for the Kingdom… it is a chance to store up treasure in heaven

8. But in the very next moment, we will see the immense PERIL of wealth as well

E. The Man’s Sad Reaction

Matthew 19:22  When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

1. He goes away!!!  He walks away!!!

a. If this man is languishing in hell now, how much he must yearn to have this moment to live again!

b. He makes his choice between two jealous masters:  Christ and Money;  Money won

c. In walking away from Christ, He was walking away from eternal wealth, eternal joy

Matthew 16:26 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?

This rich young ruler chose poorly… now he has none of those things… neither rich nor young nor a ruler any more…just a soul standing before God on Judgment Day stripped of all earthly trappings

2. In his misery, his downcast face, his walking away, how different from the man in Christ’s parable of “The Treasure in the Field”

Matthew 13:44   “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.

a. That man was filled with joy at selling everything he had

b. He was delighted to gain eternal life… and was willing to turn away from everything else to get it

3. How different also from wealthy Zaccheus, who GLADLY made the exchange Christ commanded

Luke 19:8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”

4. Why is the rich young ruler sad?  He freely made his choice!  He should be glad!

a. But in his conscience, he knew that he was sinning;  he laments his own inability to live for perfection

b. He is sad because he can’t have BOTH Jesus AND money!

c. His sadness as he walks away is a warning to all who choose money above Christ:  it does NOT satisfy, it does NOT bring joy

IV. The Stunning Lesson:  Only God Can Save a Rich Man!

A. Christ Declares the Danger of Wealth

1. the general assumption was that wealth was a sure and certain sign of God’s favor and blessing

2. now Jesus actually identifies it as a great danger to the soul

Matthew 19:23-24  Then Jesus said to his disciples, “I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.  ²⁴ Again I tell you, 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.”

B. Understanding Christ’s Statement

1. many say there was some gate in the city of Jerusalem called “the eye of the needle” and camels with huge packloads had to be stripped of those loads in order to enter the gate

2. they say this is a picture of ridding yourself of earthly possessions in order to enter heaven

3. nice story:  two problems

a. problem 1:  in a moment, Jesus does not say it is DIFFICULT but rather that it is impossible… he is talking about an impossibility

b. problem 2:  there is absolutely no biblical or archaeological evidence that there was ever such a gate in Jerusalem through which camels could go if they were stripped of their packs!!

4. Christ wants to highlight that rich people face special obstacles in entering heaven

C. The Disciples’ Stunned Reaction… and Christ’s Second Stunning Statement

Matthew 19:25-26  When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked, “Who then can be saved?”  ²⁶ Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

D. Every True Conversion is a Miracle of God’s Grace

1. Actually, though rich people DO face special spiritual problems in coming to Christ, yet the fact is that NO ONE can be saved apart from the sovereign actions of almighty God

2. People are naturally “dead in their transgressions and sins” and need a spiritual resurrection

3. Only if God gets directly involved will the person be saved

4. More on this in a moment

V. Applications

1. “No one is good but God alone…”

a. Understand the doctrine of the depravity of man

b. Reset your expectations of human nature

c. Meditate on the pervasiveness of sin in your own life

d. Cry out to Lord for grace… it is the only force strong enough to handle sin’s dreadful plague

e. Worship the God is IS good, meditate on the perfection of His goodness, know and understand how GOOD God is, and how GOOD Jesus is and how GOOD the Holy Spirit it

f. And know that, when God is done with each of us, we will be good too!!

2. “If you wish to enter life…”

a. Come to Christ, if you are presently on the outside looking in

b. You must ENTER the Kingdom of Heaven… you must be born again into it, since no one is naturally born into it

c. Do you have the desire to enter life?  Come to Christ!!!

3. “Sell your possessions, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven…”

a. We know that this may not be a universal commandment that Christ ia giving to all people, that if they want to go to heaven, they must divest themselves of all their earthly property

b. However, we need to understand how generous God wants us to be

c. Too many Christians are caught up in the idolatry of wealth

d. The surest remedy is to begin to live a simpler life, a life of open-handed generosity to the poor

e. Randy Alcorn’s Treasure Principle, and Money, Possessions, and Eternity are excellent books to help us develop an “Eternal Perspective”;  as a matter of fact, that is the name of his ministry!!!

f. Meditate much on heavenly treasure, heavenly rewards, our heavenly life;  strive to gain as much glory and as many rewards as you can by living sacrificially now

4. “It is hard for a rich man to be saved…”

a. Understand the special dangers of wealth in the Christian life

b. Watch out for idolatry here

c. Paul says

1 Timothy 6:9-10  People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction.  ¹⁰ For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

d. Be on your guard against all kinds of greed!!!

5. “With man this is impossible…”

a. Human salvation is impossible, if only humans are involved

b. It doesn’t matter how effective an evangelist you are, no one will ever be saved unless God gets involved

c. Worship God, therefore, if you are a Christian!  You are a miracle of God’s grace

6. “With God, all things are possible…”

a. Trust fully in God to lead others to Christ

b. Understand how omnipotence functions to advance the Kingdom of Christ

c. Let the statement “With God, all things are possible” characterize your outlook, your prayer life, your optimism, you hope!!!