Jesus Counsels the Rich Young Ruler
18 Now a certain ruler asked Him, saying, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”
19 So Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. 20 You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ ‘Do not steal,’ ‘Do not bear false witness,’ ‘Honor your father and your mother.
21 And he said, “All these things I have kept from my youth.”
22 So when Jesus heard these things, He said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.”
23 But when he heard this, he became very sorrowful, for he was very rich.
With God All Things Are Possible
24 And when Jesus saw that he became very sorrowful, He said, “How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God! 25 For 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.”
26 And those who heard it said, “Who then can be saved?”
27 But He said, “The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.”
In our text we have spiritual gold nuggets of sound redemption doctrine. From the lips of Christ himself, Jesus sets the record straight with his answers on some very important redemption doctrinal issues and questions that many have.
First of all we have a young man in our text that wants to be saved. Somewhere along the line of Jesus' many teachings this young man's ears heard of eternal life and that he wanted (WHO WOULDN'T). So he set out on a journey to find this Jesus who preached on the glorious eternal life he was seeking to inherit.
Well the time came when the young man found the Lord. In his excitement he hurries to the Master and says the words, GOOD MASTER, what must I DO to be saved, to inherit eternal life? Jesus hears the young man's zeal and he starts his response. The first thing Jesus ON PURPOSE responded to was to the first two words the young man said, he said "GOOD MASTER". Jesus took this opportunity to share with us all what he wanted that young man to know and all of us to know about who is really good, (Jesus knew this passage of his life and words was going to make THE BOOK-the BIBLE. He even knew that one day I would be writing on these words and that you would be reading them. What an ALL KNOWING MIGHTY GOD WE SERVE.
In His ALL KNOWING GLORY JESUS looks at the young man and says, Why do you call Me Good? THERE IS NO ONE GOOD BUT GOD. Jesus in saying that was teaching us all what WE ALL NEED TO KNOW. He was stripping from all people the idea that they are good WE ARE NOT.
The bible says that it is absolutely impossible for God to lie and that God has spoken unto us in these last days thru HIS SON. Knowing those scriptures THAT GOD CANNOT LIE and that GOD HAS SPOKEN UNTO US ALL IN THESE LAST DAYS THRU HIS SON, we must all agree with Jesus THAT CANNOT LIE that there is no one good, BUT GOD.
Let us think about THAT TRUTH for a moment. The best person we could know who is kind, generous, gentle and yet of strong spirit who is honest, loving, and giving; though he has some traits of good character that shows these things, IS HE WITHOUT SIN? No. Notta. No Way.
Good in God's honest eyes lines up with this, with these words. God is light and in God there is no darkness at all, not even a speck. Can any of us honestly say we are that pure in heart? Lets not kid ourselves. Some of the nicest outward appearing people even in the church, have some of the most awful secret sinful imaginations and other secret sinful things going on, on the inside. Jesus knows the heart of all of us for to Jesus the heart is the person and the person is the heart, not our bodies looks and physical organs. And when Jesus said, THERE IS NO ONE GOOD BUT GOD, HE WAS NOT LYING. So by the Lords own words, all of us together are stripped of any right to self boasting about ourselves or about others as to say that we or they are really good and that by being good enough we can save ourselves. As my dad often said and preached when he was still with us, such a thought is a devils deceiving lie.
Let us remember that God's thoughts are much higher than our thoughts and God's ways are far higher than our ways. Even as high as heaven is from earth, so are God's ways higher than our ways. None of us in the flesh can honestly say we are good like God for until you are light in whom there is no darkness at all not even the smallest speck, then YOU ARE NOT GOOD according to Jesus' high standard.
Friends when God judges the world in the future, He will be comparing and judging us according to HIS MOST HIGH WAYS, not according to man's deprived level of thinking. Whereever there is a speck, a spot, a wrinkle, or a blemish of sin or of darkness, we are tainted meat unfit to be called GOOD BY GOD. Since God cannot call us good, and yet we think we are really good, we are deceived. THERE IS NO ONE GOOD BUT GOD.
Now also in saying that there is NO ONE GOOD BUT GOD, Jesus was prepping us all for our great need of the blood of His Cross, and of HIS ATONING SACRIFICE. He did not die in vain (Galations 2:21)
Some time later in our text above, Jesus said some other needful light. He told us about a camel and the eye of a needle. After Jesus said that it is easier for a camel to fit thru the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God, Jesus took that opportunity (Being the wisest teacher ever) to lay down an unbreakable foundational scripture to make clear to us all an absolute doctrine of Christ truth. This truth was to be exalted and upheld unto all generations by all the elders of God's Church until the end of the age would come. Thru this doctrinal truths constant upholding and by the understanding of that doctrine of Christ, WE ALL WOULD FLEE INTO CHRIST.
The disciples hearing that it is easier for a camel to go thru the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God, these words astonished Peter, James, John and all the disciples. In their concern they cried, "Lord who then can be saved"?
Now what Jesus said IN RESPONSE TO THEIR QUESTION lays all the arguments to rest about how we are saved. The mouth of God himself spoke these words and as we learned earlier IT IS ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE FOR GOD TO LIE. Jesus answered the disciples saying this; He said, WITH MAN IT IS IMPOSSIBLE. Mans is stripped again by the Master Himself of any self dependence to save his own soul. What Jesus said reveals that man is in a lot more trouble than he can naturally reason or understand or get himself by himself out of. Jesus was revealing that man is in such a legal snare against his soul by Satan and sin that for man to save himself, SUCH IS IMPOSSIBLE. Jesus was saying and revealing that no matter what men do or say or try to do on their own to save themselves IT WILL NOT HAPPEN. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE. Man on his own IS HELPLESS AND WITHOUT STRENGTH TO SAVE HIMSELF.
When we become settled in our hearts about what Jesus was revealing to us all in these words, that it was impossible for us to save ourselves, we finally, realizing that none of us are good according to God's measuring sticks and that there is nothing that we can do to save ourselves, it is then we can finally ENTER INTO THE REST that He came to give us thru faith in His Ransoming Blood. For after Christ revealed to us clearly that no man can save himself and that such is impossible for any of us to do, we find Christ bringing in the NEW HOPE that could. And that NEW HOPE comes from these following words. For though it was IMPOSSIBLE for man to save himself, he did not leave us hopeless. Jesus said, YET ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE WITH GOD. And when you accept Christ you accept God whom salvation is possible only by.
Man was helpless. No one was good but God. Even those we called the nice people they did not fit the requirements for God to called them GOOD. The rich young ruler wanted to know what he could do to be saved. Jesus revealed in our text that there was nothing any man could do to save himself. SUCH WAS IMPOSSIBLE. BUT ALL THINGS JESUS SAID, WAS POSSIBLE WITH GOD. We Needed God to do it. We needed God to make His move from heaven for man on the earth and He did that when the Word became flesh (John 1:1-14).
Church, let us not kid or deceive ourselves. Even the sweetest of us are still NOT GODS GOOD when compared to HIS PERFECT LIGHT. Jesus that cannot lie said so. So we all bow our knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and thank God for doing what we could not do for ourselves. He saved us BY THE SACRIFICE OF HIMSELF. Jesus died for our sins and rose again for our justification by faith.......deno.......share freely.
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