I'll be reading out of Matthew 19, verses 16 to 26, out of the Legacy Standard Bible. The rich, young ruler. And behold, someone came to him and said, teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life? And he said to him, why are you asking me about what is good? There is only one. who is good. But if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments. Then he said to him, which ones? And Jesus said, you shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and mother. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself. The young man said to him, all these things I have kept. What am I still lacking? Jesus said to him, if you wish to be complete, go and sell your possessions and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven and come follow me. But when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieving for he was one who owned much property. And Jesus said to his disciples, truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. And again, I say to 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. And when the disciples heard this, they were very astonished and said, then who can be saved? And looking at them, Jesus said to them, with people, this is impossible. But with God, all things are possible. May the Lord bless the reading of his word. You may be seated. Morning, church family. So glad to see you this morning. If you're visiting with us this morning, I noticed that we have quite a few visitors. First time visitors here to HBC. We're so glad that you're here. And you need to know that we have been working our way through the gospel of Matthew for a little while now, and we find ourselves in that passage you just heard read, Matthew 19. And so if you haven't already, let's go ahead and turn in our Bibles to Matthew 19. And by way of reminding you where we've been, we have noticed, Church, that throughout this narrative of the earthly ministry of our King Jesus, when he called his disciples to himself, he said to them, come to me, I will make you fishers of men. It is a wonderful fruit of the Spirit of God when you're called to Jesus that you have a concern that others know Jesus. That you begin to fish for men in that sense. We saw that back in Matthew four. And disciples need to be taught, are you a disciple? That means we all need to be taught how to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom in different settings to different kinds of people, not a different gospel each time, the same gospel, but the gospel proclaimed in a way that recognizes we understand the nature of the one we're proclaiming to. And so Matthew has shown us Jesus training the 12, training his key disciples in these various ways to the contrite, to the brokenhearted, to those who came to Jesus terribly burdened about whether or not God could ever accept someone like them. Jesus said graciously, come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart. and you will find rest for your souls. I wanna just stop right here and say that if you have come through the doors of this place on this day by God's providence, and you've come burdened in your conscience because you know that you are a sinner, hopelessly separated from God, as Brother Dirk mentioned earlier, and you wonder if God would ever have someone like you, let me tell you, friend, he'll have you. as you come to Jesus, as you repent and come to Christ and follow Him. And so the gospel of God's grace is proclaimed with tenderness to those with burdened hearts. How is the gospel proclaimed, though, to those who are lacking such contrition? How is the gospel of the kingdom shared with the self-satisfied? People who think they're in no real danger of judgment from God because they're pretty good. In fact, we church folk, are you church folk? Sometimes even discuss quietly among ourselves how frustrated we are sometimes when we meet that person who is apart from Christ, but from an outward appearance, they seem to be better than some Christians. And we don't talk about that very much, because it's not churchy, right? How do you share Christ? with a person who feels satisfied with themselves in that way. Well, to those who felt secure within themselves, Jesus often confronted them with the law of God. Matthew 5, 48, you are to be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. This is Jesus' summary of his teaching regarding the law of God in the Sermon on the Mount. You are to be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. Not a different gospel, but a gospel presented in a different way to get the attention of his listeners. You see, those who come to Jesus spiritually afflicted find comfort in his gospel. Those who come to Jesus spiritually comfortable must be afflicted. This is a mercy from God in his law. This man we just met in Matthew 19 fits in that second category, wouldn't you think? The rich young ruler, as we call him, he feels awfully good about himself. And there is even an awful lot that commends him to us as we understand the story of his life. He's sincerely religious. He is heavenly minded. He's actually a seeker of Jesus. This guy is any seeker-friendly church's dream prospect. Smart. Influential. Very well off. Eager. Still young. We know that because Mark tells us he ran to Jesus. When you get a little older, running is reserved for survival, right? He's got all of this going for him. And yet, He's turned away, and you just gotta ask yourself, why? And if you're familiar with this account, and I understand that many of you are, you know that this young man actually turns himself away from Christ when he hears and understands rightly the demands of the gospel via the law of God. He got a straight answer to his sincere question, what do I have to do to have eternal life? And Christ's straight answer to this sincere question prompts this man to turn away grief stricken. It's unfortunate that most of our Bibles translate that as sad. Oh, it's more than sad. He is vexed in his soul. because he actually wants eternal life, but not on God's terms. And church, I pray that our familiarity with a text like this does not prevent us from fresh self-examination. I urge you to ask yourself, are you counting on something that you have done some things that you are doing. Maybe something that you've resolved to do in the future. Counting all of that to merit favor from God. Are you still trying to be good enough for God in that sense on your own? Are there competing affections in your heart that You've chosen over truly following Christ. How would you know? What does that look like? Well, we'll see that here in Matthew 19. I want you to notice with me, are you guys listening? Notice with me that Matthew begins his account of this fellow by describing a seeker's commendable interest. This man truly is interested in Jesus. Don't miss that. There's an awful lot about this guy that would commend him to us. And behold, as someone came to him and said, Mark says that the man ran up to him and knelt before Jesus. He's remarkably eager to meet Jesus. And yet it's astounding to me that he leaves disappointed. Think about how commendable he is to us. He's rich, he's young, I mentioned that earlier. You would hire this man if you had a job opening. You really would, he's that kind of guy. You would want him on your board of directors. You perhaps might even see him as the kind of guy you'd want to marry your daughter. If all you looked at was external things. He's on his way to hell, but he's gonna look good to an awful lot of people on the way. Don't miss that. And this seeker's commendable interest in Christ is all the more so considering the subject matter that he concerns himself with. He runs to Jesus not because he has leprosy, not because he needs a demon cast out as we've seen before in Matthew's gospel. He's not coming on behalf of a friend or a family member who needs some temporal blessing like that. No, this guy is heavenly minded. He's spiritually minded. He comes to Jesus asking the salient question for all of humanity, really, of what can I do to have eternal life? What can I do to be right with God? Because I think I'm almost there. I just need a little extra nudge of goodness. And so Jesus, will you tell me just what one or two things remain for me to do that I might merit God's favor? Now let me just say, I think all of us know the relief that we feel when someone else asks the question we're wrestling with, but we don't ask it because we don't wanna feel silly. And let me suggest further, that there may be some who came here today, again, by God's providence, and this very question has been on your mind. And you're grateful that somebody else is asking it. Because you don't want to let on that you're not so sure. What can you do to be right with God? What can you do What remains to be done to have eternal life? Christian, I wonder how you would respond, interacting with a moral person like this, a guy who just seems to have it all together. He's got it more together than you do. I pray you'll notice that this man's great interest in Jesus does not save him. But please hear this, mere interest in Christ, however sincere, however enthusiastic, saves no one. Jesus did not come to build a fan club. And church, I mention this in light of God's blessing of growing us numerically For many years now, I think that's a wonderful thing, don't you? I wonder, do you folks in Priestley Hall think it's a wonderful thing? Of course you do, if you know the Lord. But how many of you know numerical growth in and of itself is no measure of a group of people knowing Jesus? This guy's really interested in Jesus. And yet he leaves disappointed. And so in contrast to his commendable interest, Matthew shows us this seeker's surprising ignorance. A surprising ignorance. Look at verse 16 still. We're making tremendous progress. Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? This man believes that he can somehow by himself earn favor from God, merit favor from God. What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? It's all about what he can do for God. Let me just say, this is a very common misunderstanding in our culture. This is a very common heresy that is preached in buildings with crosses on them. So we don't want to just shrug this off as elementary. A better word for it might be foundational. What Jesus is teaching his disciples here. The gospel is a call to receive by faith what God has done in Christ. Not what people do for God. You're hearing this. I'll come back to that. I'm calling this a surprising ignorance because I think this fellow had to be surprised when Jesus began to show him just how much he really doesn't have it all together. Moral as he is, impressive as he looks to others, no one earns God's favor by their good works. And his ignorance is actually multifaceted, but it's to do with this word good. And so we're just gonna squeeze it a little bit. This fellow wants to know what good thing he shall do to have eternal life. Jesus answered with the same word, good. And so we're meant to focus on this business of personal goodness. What is that? I mean, this word was used in a, a kind of casual, colloquial way, multiple times already today. Hey, how are you doing? Good. One of our elders, Pastor Earl, his dear mother, May Plager, delighted to ask people how they were doing. And if you said good, she's with Jesus now, but if you said good, she would say, there's none good, no, not one. There's a total setup. Jesus says, why are you asking me about what is good? There's only one who is good. Who's he talking about? Well, Mark remembers it this way. Jesus said, no one is good except God alone. That word good in scripture describes moral excellence, supreme virtue. God alone is the standard of perfection for goodness, not people. God. Goodness is actually an attribute of God. In other words, God doesn't only do good things. He does. God is good. Good is who God is. Man's imagined goodness is infinitely inferior to the goodness of God. I pray we understand this. Oh, taste and see that Yahweh is good, sings David. How blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. I wonder this morning, have you taken refuge in the goodness of God? as I mentioned earlier, goodness is not merely what God does, goodness is what God is, and that is not true of us. Can we agree to that? That we are not morally excellent? Purely and perfectly virtuous without mixture? Now this goodness of God, One of his attributes, infinite, as all of his attributes, is nonetheless a communicable attribute. I'll come back to this, but I simply mean when something is communicable, it means what? It's catchy, right? It spreads. In a negative sense, the flu that's going around, thank you to whoever gave that to me, it's a communicable thing, right? It's catchy. God's goodness. is communicable to his people, we are enabled by grace to reflect the goodness of God in some measure, but it's not native to us. We are not its source. Closely related in meaning to God's goodness, you still listening, is his holiness. I was fascinated to be reminded that in Isaiah, that when Isaiah got his commission from the Lord, He describes holy angels bowing before the Lord, worshiping Him, but covering their eyes as they sing, holy, holy, holy is Yahweh of hosts. The whole earth is full of His glory. Holy angels. are doing this in the presence of God. When Moses wanted to see God, the Lord said to him, Moses, look, you can't see my holiness and survive. You can't see my goodness and survive. So he said, I myself will make all my goodness pass before you as I cover you hidden in the crevice, in the rock here. and I will proclaim the name of Yahweh before you. In other words, go as deep as you could possibly go into God and you will find only that which is good, only that which is perfect, moral, supreme perfection without mixture. And a thinking person has to conclude that you have not been good in that sense, one second of your life. This man, sincere as he is, is sincerely wrong. In fact, the Bible says that any attempts at goodness apart from faith in God are woefully Insufficient. Isaiah 64, 6, as you know, says this, we are all infected and impure with sin. When we display our righteous deeds, they are nothing but filthy rags. That's a scripture that speaks of people using the right measure for goodness. When you measure goodness by yourself, as this man does, you usually come out pretty good. You get it? You measure yourself by the right measure. You measure your own imagined goodness by the measure of God and His goodness. And you see how silly it is to even imagine such a measure. The difference between us is infinite. Infinite. So this seeker of Jesus has been measuring himself with the wrong yardstick. And let me just stop here and encourage you a little bit here. It's possible that you are here today, and you've been measuring yourself by the wrong yardstick, because you've been going to church, and you've lived a pretty wholesome life, and every once in a while, your friends will tell you about the gospel of grace in Jesus Christ, and you think to yourself, I don't know that I need that, you see, because I'm doing pretty good. I pray you see from scripture, you could not be more wrong. This seeker is sincere, but he's sincerely wrong. He's not good at all. He's not just one or two good deeds away from sealing the deal with God. He has not been good by God's measure from the first breath he drew the day he was born. And neither have any of us. By the way, this is sometimes referred to theologically as total depravity. And I'll mention this. If you tiptoe through Calvin's tulip, you start with the T, right? Tulip starts with T. The T is to do with total depravity. And don't think of total depravity as meaning that we're all as horrible as we could be. That's not what that is about. It simply means that even the best of us is thoroughly tainted by the curse of sin. That in Adam, we have inherited this tendency towards sin, and it runs through us like poison. There's no getting away from it, apart from Christ. And so the gap between us and God who is good, as I said earlier, is infinite. This man, in his surprising ignorance, thinks way too little of God, and he thinks far too highly of himself. He's using the wrong yardstick to measure himself. So church, let me just ask you, for the children who are filling out their sermon notes today. Can anyone be good enough to earn eternal life? No, no. So Jesus is using the law to help this man see his ignorance. Look at verse 17. But if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments. The law is being brought to bear on the conscience of a man who thinks he's doing pretty good. And so it is the height of proud ignorance to think that you've kept the law of God. But incredibly, this man seems to fit that description. Keep the commandments, he says, and then in verse 18, okay, which ones? I mean, maybe there's some I'm not aware of, because by my measure, it seems like I've kept them all. So Jesus puts a finer point on it. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and mother, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. The Jews believed, as we've seen in Matthew's gospel repeatedly, the Jews believed that obedience to the law, keeping the law, was all about external appearances. is that it was all about what was seen and observable. So as long as you didn't literally murder somebody, as long as you didn't sleep around, as long as you didn't steal or lie or diss your parents, you were good to go. And Jesus is coming to this man and saying what he has said before in Matthew's gospel that has never been the intent of God's law, don't think that. He calls his people to obedience from the heart. He calls his people to sincere love and adoration toward himself, toward God. And obedience, that's a reflection of loyal love toward God. Man was created to reflect God's holiness, created to reflect God's goodness, not merely to appear so to others. Do you see the difference? First Samuel 16, God sees not as man sees. Man looks at the outward appearance, but Yahweh looks at the heart. I urge you to consider your heart. What is your conscience telling you this day about your heart in its relationship to the goodness, the holiness of God? And Matthew has already shown us that Jesus came along in the Sermon on the Mount and he said to God's people, look, I know you've been taught all this stuff about keeping up appearances, but I say to you, you've been taught wrong. The law has always been to do with the spirit, with the heart. If you think murderous thoughts, you've broken the sixth commandment. You mean even those thoughts I had about the guy in traffic on the way to church? How could he possibly not see that the light was green? If you've lusted your private thought life, if you've lusted You've broken the seventh commandment. You are an adulterer at heart. So this man missed the lecture we call the Sermon on the Mount. I think more significantly, he missed the heart of God in the law and the prophets that he thought he knew so well. Totally missed the point. He still thinks that keeping God's law is only to do with what is outwardly seen, observable, Obedience. So the young man said to Jesus, all these things I have kept, what am I still lacking? As far as he can figure, he's met the demands of the law. Even as it's recited by the law giver, God the Son. He's not slept around. He's not killed anyone. He's rich, but not from stealing from other people. His parents love the nursing home he put them in. I mean, that's good, that's all good stuff. How much more good do you need to get? Notice his last statement, though. What am I still lacking? What am I still lacking? You might circle that in your friend's Bible. What am I still lacking? Do you realize that this man's dissatisfaction with all that he thinks he has achieved for himself and for God, that dissatisfaction is actually a mercy from the Lord? That longing of soul that says to you, there must be more, I think I'm missing something than all of this good stuff I've been doing, feeling good about it. And what's sad to us about this narrative is that he squanders even that mercy from God, that tug on his conscience, that he still doesn't get it. Mark remembers Jesus' response this way, and looking at him, Jesus loved him and said to him, one thing you lack, For love's sake, Jesus does not tell this man he's doing just fine, just keep at it. Church, please hear this. Let's not proclaim our king's gospel that way. Jesus, for love's sake, does not tell this man to pray a little prayer and fill out a card and somehow in the doing of that, if he really meant what he was doing, For love's sake, Jesus does not affirm whatever this very interested seeker wants affirmed for the sake of adding another man to his church. And I believe, HBC folks, I believe there's a caution here for us as God's people. For love's sake, Jesus very pointedly lets the law of God do its good work of exposing this proud man's ignorance. And it shows him that in his ignorance, he has been harboring a secret idolatry. A secret idolatry. What is that? Jesus said to him, verse 21, if you wish to be complete, go and sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me. Jesus is not teaching this man that everything will be just fine if he keeps the law, or that he'll be saved by giving to the poor, salvation by philanthropy, that sort of thing. He's showing this man that his claim to be good is a fraud. He's self-deceived. Because the very first commandment is what? This is one of those talking in church things. The first commandment is what? You shall have no other gods before me. That is the first one. And yet this man loves his money more than he loves God. How do we know that? Because when God the Son tells him what to do with his money, he's not gonna do it. Not that. When push comes to shove, money is this man's God. Despite what he says, despite how he appears to others. Go and sell your possessions and give to the poor. There's the push. Come, follow me. There's the shove. How can anyone have eternal life then? Jesus has been proclaiming his gospel of the kingdom for almost three years now. In Matthew's narrative, we've seen this, and the gospel is a call to repent. It's a call to repent of your sin, your self-sufficiency, your idolatry. That simply means putting other things before God. and believe upon Christ, God alone who is good, and follow him as Lord. Anyway, this rich young ruler loved money more than God. I wonder, would it be hard to find such a person today in our culture, do you think? Of course not. You're all sitting here thinking, well, what else is new? Because we live in such an atmosphere. We're surrounded by this. And friends, men and women today in America practice idolatry in much the same way as the Buddhists and the Hindus practice idolatry. It's just that our idols are not little statues on the dashboard stuck in a cupboard someplace in the living room to be worshipped. Our idols are materialism or jobs, careers, a reputation, that sort of thing. Lots of people in our day are very, very interested in Jesus until it comes to actually being identified with the Jesus people. And then it costs too much. It's awkward. even the very best things in life that God gives to us can become idols. And so Jesus confronts this seeker who has such a commendable interest in him, and yet such a great interest and ignorance, and that ignorance has led him into this idolatry. Money has a stranglehold on this man's heart. And God comes to him in his gospel and says, you enter the kingdom by repentance. You turn from your idolatry. You let go of all that you've harbored as more important than the Lord's Christ. And you turn to him by faith. Jesus who is God, God alone who is good, offers to all who come to him on this basis his goodness. Oh, what a joy to be credited with the goodness of God himself. That's what is grasped by faith when you come to Christ. And for this rich young ruler, repentance would look a lot like giving up his particular false god, his money, his imagined goodness, and turning to Christ fully by believing in him and following him and obeying his instruction. Let me just say this before we close. And by that, I don't mean terribly soon, but reasonably soon. Jesus will not share the throne of his people's hearts. with anyone or anything. Jesus will not be that little something extra that a person imagines she needs because she's pretty good and is almost there in terms of being right with God. You don't just need a little help from Jesus. You need all of Christ and none of yourself. Are you hearing this? The English Puritan Thomas Manton put it this way, he says, unless every affection and interest of ours be laid at the feet of Christ, we are not throughly converted to him. You have to think about quoting these old dead guys as they use funny words like throughly, but you get the point. Matthew shows us this commendable interest that is nonetheless so insufficient. And he shows us this surprising ignorance, this secret idolatry. And then we'll just end with this, this seeker's eternal impoverishment. Look at this, verse 22. When the young man heard this statement, he went away grieving, for he was one who owned much property. See, this young man thought he was rich in all of the things that mattered, but he walked away from Jesus with absolutely nothing of eternal value. And because God is gracious to sinners like us, he can't even enjoy his riches. That's why he's coming to Jesus saying there's something missing here. Unable to be satisfied materially, knowing he's not right with God, and yet unwilling to let go of his idol that he might grasp the salvation he seems to want so badly. Jesus said in Matthew 16, 26, for what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world? and forfeits his soul. Do you realize he's not using hyperbole there? What will a man give in exchange for his soul? Do you realize? Do you realize that there are actually two rich young rulers in this narrative? There's the guy we've been focusing on, but then there's also the man Christ Jesus. Listen to 2 Corinthians 8. Paul says, for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though being rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich. Now that's the gospel, isn't it? Jesus, eternal God himself, left the rich glory of his heaven to be born into humanity, born into a human race, impoverished by sin, though he is the sinless one. He became poor in that sense, and he came to live out in humanity the goodness of God that man was created to live out and has failed to live out. I've failed, you've failed. And he came to go to Calvary's cross and exchange the record of his real goodness with your rap sheet of not so goodness, your sin. and then to shed his blood and die on that cross where he took the hell that your desperate lack of goodness requires from God. Jesus took that for you and for me. And he rose again that you through his poverty might have the riches of his eternal life. Let me just say that eternal life, don't think of heaven, but don't just think of heaven. That phrase eternal life is talking about so much more than quantity of life. It's a quality of life. It's the life of God. It's a life released from bondage to materialism and selfishness and any kind of sin that has power to hold us captive, Jesus has come to set his captives free. Amen? Sin no longer has the power to dominate the lives of God's people. Now, we yield to temptation towards sin, but in the power of the Holy Spirit, we don't have to, is the thing. And as this man left, Jesus turns to his disciples now and says what? He says, truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven, and again I say to 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 say this by way of saving us all time in light of the clock. When we came to this text in Mark's gospel several years ago, I remember a handful of people coming up to me after both services and saying, Pastor, didn't you know that there was a gate around the city of Jerusalem called the Eye of a Needle? And if you got a real skinny camel and got it down on its knees, it could somehow squeeze through that gate. Let's just not go there. One, that's not true. And two, that's not the point of what Jesus is saying. Jesus is saying it's an impossibility for you to enter the narrow gate of eternal life clinging to your sin, clinging to your idol. You must let go. You must repent and come to Christ. The disciples are influenced and shaped to a degree by their culture. They're used to living among people who assume that if you were rich, that meant God favored you. So here they are trying to picture a camel trying to get through the eye of a needle. They get it. It's not just hard. It's an impossibility. And the issue here is not wealth, per se. It's fallen man's tendency to choose wealth or some other thing, temporal thing, and value that above God, above Christ. That has to be why Jesus earlier in chapter 19 had pointed to little children and said, hey guys, don't you prevent those children from coming to me? Of such is the kingdom of heaven. These little kids come to me empty-handed. These little kids come to me not thinking they've earned anything. In fact, that's not even on their minds. They've just come to me needy and for love's sake. And I've blessed them. And when the disciples heard this, they were very astonished and said, who then can be saved? And looking at them, Jesus said to them, with people, this is impossible, but with God, all things are impossible. Let me just say, and I will say this in closing, for real. If you're here this morning, still morning, and you, by God's grace, have had brought to your attention an idol, something that for you until this day has been more important to you than God himself. I'm not talking about how other people perceive you, I'm talking about what the Holy Spirit is speaking to your heart. And you're thinking to yourself, this is an impossibility to let go of this. though I understand Jesus' teaching, I urge you to consider and respond with confidence to Jesus' words, with God all things are possible. You see, it's a work of the Spirit of God to bring you to repentance. It's a work of the Spirit of God to enable you to turn in faith to Christ to trust in his goodness, not your own. And if the spirit is so moving in you now, what do you do? You cry out to God in the quiet of your heart and you repent of your sinfulness and you come to Jesus. And you begin to follow with God's help this Jesus who was born into this world to be good enough for you, amen? Let me just say this, the gospel is a call to receive by faith what God has done for his people, not what people do for God. Church, let's proclaim the right gospel. All right, let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this truth from your word, and Lord, for so many of us, it's familiar, and yet, once again, we are amazed as we see our Savior's love for those who come to him self-satisfied, for those who come to him thinking that they're just about good enough for the kingdom. And Lord, we thank you for reminding us that not one of us is by nature good enough, but we have a mighty king. We have a glorious savior who has lived out the goodness of God for his people. And we thank you that we can do, as David sang, find refuge in him. Lord, I pray that you would enable that among us today. I pray that you would enable your people to share the gospel of the kingdom using your law. If that's the kind of conversation it is, would you give us an enablement to do that, Lord? We thank you that the law is a tutor pointing us to our need for you. Jesus, we ask you all of these things, believing you desire to give them. And so we ask with confidence and we ask for the sake of your glory. Amen.