The scripture reading is Acts chapter 5 verses 1-11. This is the account of Ananias and Sapphira. verses one through 11. Now I almost switched this scripture reading, although this is applicable as well, back to Isaiah one, where the Lord is recounting his case against the wicked in Israel and talks to them, rebukes them, tells them basically quit coming to church because you've got blood on your hands and so forth. And you know, With some regularity, what we are hearing you see in the news media, we saw it again this last week. Let's face it, we have evil people in high places, in high offices. This is not just a matter of what political party someone is in or preference or something. This is people that are evil and they're promoting evil, insane wickedness in our nation and you know what kinds of stuff they're doing. So then you'll hear them claim to be Christians and they'll quote Scripture so the speaker of the house, you know this time chief. She's had to break in at their house and so where then she's quoting from Isaiah and and applying that promise to herself that God is a comfort to his people and so on well I've got news for the speaker. He's not a comfort to you. He's a terror and She has blood on her hands literally and and I mean, these are people that are promoting abortion and radicalizing just the murder of babies and so many other evil things. So anyway, well, Nancy, Isaiah 1 is your chapter. You can go home and read that. And she's certainly not the only one. And there's probably a few maybe in our political party that need to take heed in the same way as well. But here we have Acts chapter five beginning at verse one, Ananias and Sapphira. But a man named Ananias with his wife Sapphira sold a piece of property. And with his wife's knowledge, he kept back for himself some of the proceeds and brought only a part of it and laid it at the apostles' feet. But Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back for yourself part of the proceeds of the land? While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? Why is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You've not lied to men, but to God. When Ananias heard these words, he fell down and breathed his last, and great fear came upon all who heard it. The young men rose and wrapped him up and carried him out and buried him. After an interval of about three hours, his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. And Peter said to her, tell me whether you sold the land for so much? And she said, yes, for so much. But Peter said to her, how is it that you have agreed together to test the Spirit of the Lord? Behold, the feet of those who've buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out. Immediately she fell down at his feet and breathed her last. When the young men came in, they found her dead and they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. And great fear came upon the whole church and upon all who heard of these things." That's the inerrant word of God. It is true, and we are to receive it as such. I would imagine a bit of a understatement there, that great fear fell upon those who heard about it. And of course, that's the point of the whole account. God, this is really a New Testament account telling us that the same God who struck down Hophni and Phineas for offering strange fire is the same God and he will be regarded as holy by those who draw near to him. And that fear and reverence of the Lord and his holiness is to be something that characterizes us then as well. Because if any who draw near to him do not regard him as holy, and think, for example, they can lie to him and so on. Well, he will see to it that he is regarded as holy, and that's what he did here with Ananias and Sapphira. Well, we come then to the account of the rich young ruler, once again found in Luke chapter 18, and we want to continue with our study of that passage as well. Let's ask the Lord's blessing on us as we do. Father, we thank you for even the severe warnings, sobering warnings that your word gives us, because we need those warnings. We need to remember that you are a holy, holy, holy God, and that As we profess to be your people, we of all people should exemplify that aspect of your character, that holiness. And though it's quite imperfect in us, nevertheless, we must, as we come to worship you, worship you in spirit and truth, worship you according to your instructions. and obey you in regard to how we are to approach you. And we want to remember these things now and this week. Also, as next Lord's Day, we will come to the Lord's table. And we remember that little church so long ago at Corinth that did not regard you as holy and they feasted and partied at the Lord's table, and you struck numbers of them down. And so, Father, we pray that we would come before you in a right and worthy manner and that we would carefully examine ourselves this week as the Lord's table approaches. Father, we ask your blessing now as we look into your word. And we also, Father, we also want to remember Vicki, that you would watch over her, keep her safe. We pray that you would bless her and grant her peace and that someday we'd be able to be with her again. And we pray this all in Christ's name, amen. Paul wrote to Timothy, sixth chapter of 1 Timothy, But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. Those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. It's through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. Well, that warning was a warning that the young man, the rich young ruler that we're going to look at again this morning, did not take to heed. He came to Jesus, you remember, In all appearances, if you'd have been there, you'd have thought, this guy here is a humble man, here is a sincere man eagerly coming before Jesus. He even kneels down before him in spite of his position. He was a ruler and he was extremely wealthy. We find out that that initial impression would soon be demonstrated to be false. This was a man, think about it, rich, young ruler. Here was a man who was used to success. Everything just came up roses for this guy, whether it be economic, social standing, you name it. Rich, popular. And apparently, he had a reputation of godliness. He would have been known, as he claims here later, he would have been known as an eminently holy, saintly person because of his outward keeping of the law. That also gained him a reputation. jump forward centuries into our day and imagine someone who has everything going their way, right? Everything, you know, the Midas touch economically, anything they touch turns to gold for them. And they are not used to having anyone point out any kind of flaw or deficiency in their life. A person like that is probably quite confident that even God himself would praise them. Well, here comes a blow for the rich young ruler. This man, he comes to Jesus, and this may be the first time in his life that he's ever been told right to his face You have never done a single good thing in your entire life. That was not the statement that he thought he was going to receive. I think he thought that he was going to be commended by Jesus. And I think that was the real reason that he was running up to him. Well, this is what happens. He's told, you don't measure up. You don't measure up to God's standard. Well, listen to it, let's read it again, beginning at verse 18. And a ruler asked him, good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And we know from Matthew and Mark, some of the detail, we know that he runs up there and even kneels down before Jesus. Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus said to him, why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments, do not murder or do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not bear a false witness, honor your father and mother. And then here, the statement, and he said, all these I've kept for my youth. When Jesus heard this, he said to him, one thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. And come, follow me." By the way, if Jesus had been a preacher and evangelist of our day, so often he would have said, sell all you have and give me the money, right? But he doesn't, he doesn't. When he heard these things, he became very sad for he was extremely rich. Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, said, how difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God. For it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God. Those who heard it said, then who can be saved? But he said, what is impossible with man is possible with God. And Peter said, "'See, we've left our homes and followed you.' And he said to them, "'Truly I say to you, there is no one "'who has left house or wife or brothers or parents "'or children for the sake of the kingdom of God, "'who will not receive many times more in this time "'and in the age to come eternal life.'" Now we're not going to be able to spend really any time on those last few verses, so I'll just do it right now. And this is the positive, this is the promise for all of us, all of us who take up our cross and follow Christ, dying to ourselves and following and obeying him. We are not losers. We don't lose a thing. We gain everything. And we're gonna see that someday. Someday when we're with the Lord and we're in his presence, we're going to realize that actually what we gave up is just rubbish. That's what Paul said about it. I press onward. for the upward call of the Lord in Christ Jesus. No Christian is ever going to get to heaven and say, eh, I don't know if this was worth it or not. It's not going to happen. Well, let's look at this statement of this young man. All these, meaning the commandments, all these I have kept from my youth. I've always kept these, I've always obeyed the law. Now we saw last time, this guy's concept of good or goodness was seriously flawed. He thought he was good. And really, when you get down to it, necessarily because of his idea, deficient idea of goodness, he thought that God wasn't so good. He might not come, he wouldn't come out and say that, but his idea of God's, the attribute of God's goodness, the goodness of God fell far short. You see, he thought that his goodness measured up to the goodness of God. So that's what man the sinner does. He exalts his goodness and he brings the goodness of God down. That's what necessarily then happens. But we found out last time as we saw that God's goodness is infinite and perfect. infinitely high above man's goodness. Well, there's lots of people today. Lots of people today, just like the rich young ruler. Many of them who even claim to be Christians. They think that they're good. Not perfect, you know, they put on some kind of a show of humility, but you know, I'm not perfect, but I'm pretty good. And by that, what they mean is I'm good enough for God, just like this rich young ruler. Their goodness, they think, measures up to God's required standard of goodness, which he alone possesses. And if you doubt that, just ask them and they'll let you know. When in fact, there's none who does good, not even one, we know that from scripture. If you think further about that, how dare any human being claim to be that they are as good as God? Now, they say, well, I'm not saying I'm as good as God, but in fact, yes, you are. You're saying that your goodness rises up to the standard of God's good, that's what you're claiming. Is that what you're saying? Well, I don't mean that. Oh, then you mean that you're not so good after all, you see. When Jesus heard this, and what would he think? When Jesus heard this, this incredibly foolish, arrogant, wicked statement, he said to him, one thing you still lack. Now if there was any kind of a pause there, the wheels would be turning in the rich young ruler's mind. But what he was about to hear was the last thing that he thought he was going to hear. One thing you still lack, sell all, all that you have. and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me." We don't know where this guy's wealth came from. We're not told. Did he inherit it? We're not sure. We do know that the Pharisees, many of them were corrupt. They raided widows' estates and houses, and they loved to, to get the money, but here he is, he's an extremely wealthy man, and Jesus is telling him, you gotta drop it, it's gotta go. He expected Jesus to probably say something like, oh, wow, yeah, you know what, you don't lack anything. I'm really pleased with you. You are perfectly suited for God's kingdom and eternal life is yours. See, I don't think this guy was humble at all. I think it was a show, his eagerness and his kneeling down, just a false confidence that once again, he was going to be commended for his success. And he's gonna remember there's a crowd standing around when this is going on. The last thing that he, you know, you don't measure up, you still lack something. And as we're going to see, you've got an idol, you've got a false god, and you've got to get rid of it. You don't have treasure at all, you're not rich at all. You don't have treasure in heaven. And if you're ever gonna get it, you gotta get rid of the treasure that you have. Now, Jesus had just cited to him, quoted to him, from the commandments that are taken from the second table of the law, the second table of the 10 commandments, that concern how we are to love our fellow man. Don't steal. don't commit adultery, don't murder, and so on. But this man, obviously, had entirely missed the fact that, as Paul says, the law is spiritual. The law is spiritual. Now, why did Paul say that? How did the lights go on for Paul? Well, notice that Jesus omitted the 10th commandment here. What's the 10th commandment? The 10th commandment, the last commandment, is the one that tripped up the Apostle Paul. It's the one that destroyed his so-called righteousness. He tells us that in Romans 7. And it's simply this, you shall not covet. You shall not covet. And I think Jesus left that out in talking to the rich young ruler because he's going to bring it home to this man powerfully and show him how miserably he failed to keep any of the law. So think about coveting. Coveting as a sin. When it comes to murder, I can claim, I can make the claim, I'm not a murderer. I've obeyed that commandment because I've never killed anybody. Or a thief, or an adulterer, or a Sabbath breaker. I can claim that I have never broken any of those commandments, that I've always kept those commandments, I'm not, no, I've always remembered the Lord's day to keep it holy. I've always been in the synagogue. I've always been in church and just look at me and you can see my obedience to these laws. And that's what Paul had done when he was a Pharisee. In fact, you remember, he says that his law keeping excelled All of his fellow Pharisees. As far as the law goes, he was flawless. He was meticulous. But then, the last commandment, the law came to him. You shall not covet. And Paul was honest enough with himself. The Lord is turning on the lights here. to realize it, to think about the sin of coveting. How do you fake that? How do you fake, now notice this commandment is also a negative one, you shall not covet. Okay, so how do you pretend that I've kept the commandment, you shall not murder? Well, I just don't take a gun and shoot somebody. Okay, there, I haven't done it. But how do you fake coveting? There's no outward act, right? There isn't any outward act visible that I can do. Coveting is committed in one's heart, in my heart, in my spirit. And that's why Paul says, wait a minute, wait a minute, the law of God is spiritual, but I'm carnal. I am fleshly. God requires obedience to his law perfectly from the heart. Here it is, Romans 7. What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means. Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. I would not have known my sin, right? For I would not have known what it is to covet. If the law had not said, you shall not covet. But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, because the law is the power of sin, springs it to life, through the commandment, producing me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law. But that is, I didn't get it yet. And in my eyes, I was fine. I was alive before God. But when the commandment came, you shall not covet. Sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. So it hit him hard. Verse 14, for we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh. sold under sin, and that's why, you know, that's why Jesus said, if you are angry with your brother, you are guilty of violating the commandment, you shall not murder, right? If you are, and then covetousness, covetousness, as you think about it more, the sin of the heart, It's a root foundational sin. I think you can probably almost trace covetousness as being the root of others. I mean, you shall not steal. Why do I steal? Because I covet what that person has. And I think you can trace Why do you commit adultery? Because I covet that man's wife. Why do you murder someone? Think about it. Coveting, jealousy, it all plays in. And so the law that this rich young ruler so confidently maintained that he had perfectly obeyed his whole life, he's telling Jesus this. is spiritual, it has to be obeyed in the thoughts and intentions of one's heart and mind. And only a fool would claim that they've kept then the law of God. Oh, no, I've never had a sinful thought, ever, right? Thing is impossible for the sinner. The law is meant to show us our sin, so the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Did that which is good then bring death to me? By no means, it was sin, my sin, producing death in me through what is good, through the law, in order that sin might be shown to be sin. and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. There again, we saw it this morning in Pilgrim's Progress, right? The dust in the man's heart, and here they come sweeping it up, and the law is this broom, and all it does is make a big cloud. It brings the dust alive, and that's all it can do. Romans 3, again, by works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight. since through the law comes the knowledge of sin. And that's one of its good thing, it shows us our sin. 1 Corinthians 15, the sting of death is sin. The power of sin is the law. And this is why, by the way, that the law's demands had to be perfectly and fully dealt with us, for us by Christ, so that we're no longer under the law's demands and therefore not under the law's curse. If we're in Christ, if we've been born again, the law doesn't have dominion over us. The law's curse isn't upon us anymore, we're not under condemnation because Christ has dealt with the demands of the law for me and now I am in a covenant of grace. But to get there you must be born, you must be born again. All of this and more this young man had missed. The law should have been, he was familiar, as Jesus said you know the commandments, as a Jewish boy he would have been taught these commandments, he had them memorized. The law serves as a mirror to show us our sin. But not this guy. He had heard those commandments his whole life. He claims to have kept them. He looks in the mirror and says, my, what a good boy am I, right? That's what he does. I'm just doing fine. And so Jesus here is bringing this man, shoving his face right into the mirror to show him, let me show you what your miserable condition really is like. before God. So he is showing him this tenth commandment, you shall not covet. Because once the man realizes that he's guilty of covetousness, he's going to necessarily be devastated by the fact that the law is spiritual and he's never committed, he has never kept a single commandment. He didn't even get past the first one. You shall have no other gods before me. Did he? Yes, he did. It was his money. It was his money. That's what Jesus tells him. You've got to give it up. It's an idol. One thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven and come follow me. You've got a God. You've got a God besides God. And you've got to turn from it. You've got to repent and come and follow me. Sell it all. Come and follow me. I think this would be one of those moments, I suppose. It's not recorded here, but we can extrapolate a little bit here. What is a guy thinking when he hears Jesus say that? It's almost going to be kind of surreal to be like, excuse me? Right? What did you say? Could you repeat that? And remember, there's a crowd standing around. Here's one of their best. Here's the rich young ruler. Well, look at this guy. We've always admired him. And the crowd hears this. And if this guy didn't measure up, what about them? Where does that leave them? I put a note here in your handout. It is necessary to give up our idols, but that's not enough. He tells the man, sell all your possessions, give the poor, and come and follow me. You can't just, okay, I'll shape up my life here. I'll get rid of this idol and that. But then you've got to follow Jesus. He's the one that we're justified and saved by. It's his righteousness to just give something up. That is not enough. You can sell all your possessions. You can be a monk or a nun. You can take a vow of poverty, live as a religious hermit out in the middle of nowhere. But if you don't follow Jesus, if you don't trust in him, if you don't believe in him and who he is and what he says, if you don't believe in his good news of the gospel, then everything is still lost. So it's not by mistake that Jesus says, sell it all, give the proceeds to the poor, and come and follow and follow me. Neither is Jesus teaching here that everyone, in order to be a Christian and be saved, has to sell everything that they own in order to be saved, right? No. He's telling, what he's teaching is, you gotta give up your idols. And this young man's idol was his money, and actually it was his reputation as well. He enjoyed this social standing. If he followed Jesus, there would be his social standing, it's gone. That reputation is gone. Now, the rich young man's response is the typical and predominant response to Jesus' demands that most people have. When he heard, verse 23, when he heard these things, he, this is the rich young ruler, he became very sad. for he was extremely rich. And Matthew adds this, when the young man heard this, he went away sorrowful for he had great possessions. He left. He walked away from Jesus sorrowful. He was sorrowful, but it wasn't a sorrow that leads to repentance. He was Grieved, but why? We don't know for sure. He liked to think about what was going on in his mind. Where did this sorrow stem from? Well, it stemmed from sin. We know that much. He was sorrowful because, because I can't I didn't get the answer that I wanted. I didn't get praise from him. But there's no way in the world that I'm going to give up everything that I own. So he walks away from the only one who could give him the eternal life that he had come asking about. It's like he clung to a penny and rejected billions. That was what he had done. Extreme wealth and great possessions, Jesus says, are mere pennies compared to the kingdom of God. Verse 20, I'm referring you back here to Luke chapter 12, to another foolish rich man, God said to him, fool, you know, this is the guy that's gonna build more barns and so on. Fool, this night your soul is required of you and the things you've prepared, whose will they be? So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. See, Jesus was talking to the rich young ruler about heavenly treasures. Do this, follow me and you'll have treasure in heaven. 1 Timothy 6, again, as for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They're to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life, that which is truly, truly treasure, you see. You know, increasingly in our day, we're seeing, well, it used to be that a millionaire was kind of rare. Seems like millionaires are all over the place now. And now billionaires are even seemingly all over the place. And you see young people making all kinds of money and boasting about it. And things like that don't last. I think we could expect the Lord through economic judgment He can dry up that wealth just like that. He'd done it before. Overnight. And then what will you do then? Tonight your soul is required of you. Now you don't have any earthly treasure. What are you going to do now? There is increasing covetousness and greed spreading in our day, and it is idolatry. Colossians 3, put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you, sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. What went through the Apostle Paul's head when that 10th commandment, you shall not covet, came home to him and he realized he was an idolater. He was worshiping a false god. He was rejecting the Lord Jesus. He was rejecting the Messiah and persecuting him. Let me ask you this and put the question to myself and all of us. If Jesus stood before you, If you put yourself in the shoes of the rich young ruler, and he said to you, sell all you have, give the proceeds to the poor and come and follow me, what would you do? The question is, what are you doing? Now, what are we doing? Because he does put that question to us. And remember, selling all our idols and not keeping a penny of the proceeds is just the start. Then we have to follow him. And that means denying ourselves, go where he went, believe all he has said, trust him for who he is, being willing to suffer in this wicked world as he suffered. to be persecuted in this wicked world. What would you say? What are you saying? These are things that we need to be ruthlessly honest with about ourselves. It's easy to point our finger at the rich young ruler for walking away. But how many people are walking away? See, in a sense, it's easier to fake right now, isn't it? This guy, Jesus was right there. He's talking to Jesus face to face. And pretty quick, Jesus is gonna walk away. Is he gonna follow him and obey him or not? It is decision time, you see. Well, the same requirement is put to us as well. Am I craving popularity with people? Jesus is saying. Let it go. That's an idol. Well, I want to go to heaven, but I don't want to be hated by my family. Maybe that's kind of the source of the sorrow that the rich young... I want eternal life, but I can't give up my money. You see, that kind of a thing. Christ knows our idols. He knows your idols, he knows mine. He sees them hidden in the mind and in the heart. And if I won't give them up, he won't let me be his disciple. He won't have me. And that brings us then to verses 24 and 25. Jesus, seeing that he'd become sad, said, and here Jesus I think is saying to the whole crowd, how difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God. It's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God. Now, you may know that lots of ink has been spilled trying to sort out what is this camel business and what is this eye of the needle? I was listening to R.C. Sproul preach on this, and he said that people have often suggested that there must have been a gate in Jerusalem that's called the Eye of the Needle, and it was a very narrow gate. purpose it was for, or whatever. But it would have been a gate that a camel, certainly loaded down, couldn't go through, and people would never take a camel that way. But as Sproul said, there's absolutely no historic evidence showing that there was any kind of a gate known by that name in Jerusalem. So it lacks historic support. I can tell you what I think it means, and I think by just drawing the main principle out of here, we can get it right. And you can maybe state it like this. You cannot enter the kingdom of God packing along your idols. To enter, to follow Christ on the narrow way through the straight gate, you've got to jettison everything calling for your worship and worship God alone. A camel loaded down with cargo stands a better chance of going through the eye of a needle than an idolater has of entering the kingdom of God. And the rich are in particular danger here. It's not only the rich, but wealth has a particular danger. John ends his first epistle with this emphasis, little children. Keep yourselves from idols. Watch out. Look out. You know, well, I am well thought of in the community for all of my service. And God's response, get rid of that idol. That's an idol. You know, we've seen people, I've known people that are busybodies around the community. They're on that board and this committee and they just crave it. They're in this church and doing this and they just, that's a God, that's an idol. And Christ will not have such a person. They've got to get rid of that idol. Well, I've done a fine job of raising my children. I'm a model parent. It's an idol. If you're feeding off that, it's an idol. Get rid of it. I come to church every Sunday and we should, right? I've been baptized, I tithe generously, I do all of these things. But if you're throwing that up in the face of God, if that's the thing that you're all about, it's an idol and you've got to get rid of it. I'm working hard and making money so I can fulfill my dream of a nice house and enjoy my retirement years. Get rid of it. If that's what makes you tick, If that's the thing that's driving you, then you've got a false God and you've got to get rid of it. The single sin that takes the sinner to hell, the fundamental root sin of the sinner is idolatry. It is the worship of a false God. That's why Romans 1, that's why men refuse to give thanks to God or even acknowledge Him because they've got their own God. They want to worship and serve the creature rather than the creator. So they create. You know, as I've been going through the midweek Bible studies and so forth, one of the things that, especially the book of Revelation, has impressed upon me. Did you know, you know, Israel has never been a godly nation. Israel has always been an idolatrous nation. And that's somehow, somehow we can get it in our minds as Christians that, well, an Israelite, you know, Israel, the Jews, the covenant people of God, somehow, now there's special people and they were, but that somehow, They were closer to God than us and so on. But the account of scripture is, from day one, they were idolaters. They're right there at Mount Sinai. And before the ink on the tablets of the Ten Commandments is dry, they're down here making their own idol and worshiping it. And we live, in a time when the lure and pull of idolatry is just as powerful, if not more so. Satan's ultimate goal is to cause us to worship an idol, which is to worship him in his favorite tactic. One of his favorite tactics is wealth. You know, just fall down at my feet. I'll give you all the kingdoms of this world. I'll give this to you. This can be yours. His tactics don't change. That's why we know, we can know the tactics and schemes of the devil, because he plays out of the same playbook. He knows what works. Jesus, verse 24, seeing that he'd become sad, said, how difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom And then in verses 26 and 27, here's a question. Those who heard it said, then who can be saved? I mean, if that's true, who can be saved? And Jesus responded, what's impossible with man is possible with God. Now, this crowd did not like what Jesus told the rich young ruler. This guy was one of their model citizens. What would the crowd have been saying about Jesus because of what he told the guy? They'd be saying the same thing that people say today. Hey, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's way too harsh. And this guy, I don't know about this guy, this rabbi, he's just, he's laying it on too thick. He's too narrow. We're not going to listen to this guy, because we know that this rich young ruler, this guy that we know, we know that he's a godly man and God approves of him. We'll go find some rabbi that is more balanced, more pleasant to hear. But the question, who can be saved, is a reasonable one. if, even though there are motives in asking, and I think we're wrong, but look it, bottom line, a camel can't go through the eye of a needle, right? It isn't gonna happen. And what Jesus is saying, I think, is that this impossibility of a camel going through the eye of a needle is more possible than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. It's an impossible impossibility. But what is impossible with man is possible with God. Look, here's something that we need to be humble about. It is impossible that you are a Christian. It's impossible. And I think Jesus would apply this then to all of us. Salvation of the sinner is impossible as it regards man's ability to pull it off. And I think that's what Jesus is telling us here. You're right, it is impossible for a man to be saved. It's impossible. You're absolutely right. There's nothing any of you can do, as he's looking out on the crowd, there's nothing any of you can do to pull off your salvation. Forget it. And that's where this rich young ruler was dead wrong. He thought you could. But you can't. You can't do it. There's nothing you can do. That's what we read earlier from Luther there in his commentary on Galatians. If I'm gonna be saved, God's gotta do it. Salvation is of the Lord. Now, you can apply that principle in other ways in regard to serving the Lord. For example, building his church, right, building his church. In spite of all the church growth gurus around, in spite of all the stuff that you might read, God is the only one who can build his church. Because how do you build his church? Well, you save sinners. Who can save sinners? Only God can. So Jesus said it, I will build my church. He will do it, we won't. So we pray and we ask him to save sinners and even to use us to present the gospel to them and so forth. But in the end, it is his work. We as human beings are capable of filling pews. We are capable of building a church. But really, when it comes down to it, what we're capable of is building a synagogue of Satan. That's what we're capable of. Because if we're preaching some kind of a message that enables human beings to save human beings, then human beings are not being saved. And all that's going to happen is you're gonna bring tears into the household of God that think they're weak, when in fact, when in fact they are not. But what is impossible with man is possible then with God. And next time, We are going to plan on seeing just such a divine miracle performed because we're going to go to another chapter in the Gospel of Luke, and we're going to meet a short little rich man named Zacchaeus. And his response was quite different than the rich young ruler. There's also at the end of your handout a note and some observations here from good old J.C. Ryle that you can read about that applies to the Rich Young Ruler account as well. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for saving us. Thank you, Father, that we who were headed for hell, and justly so, were rescued by you in Christ. You grabbed hold of us You granted us faith and repentance, and we give you thanks for it. Father, we pray if anyone is listening today that's still dead in their sins, maybe deceived like the rich young ruler was, we pray that you might show them mercy, open their eyes, and that they might call out to you alone for salvation. And we pray this all in Christ's name, amen.