Beloved, please turn with me and your Bibles to the Gospel of Mark as we continue our study of Mark. We are now in chapter 10, and this evening we'll look at verses 17 through 22. Would you please stand, if you are able, for the reading of God's inherent, authoritative, and efficacious Word. as a brief word before we read, it is so important, isn't it? That when we come to the preaching of God's word, that we recognize that this is indeed the very word of the living God. And insofar as it is communicated faithfully, then this is God's word to you, to hear, to receive, to respond to. And so we come to the word of God, to the preaching of the word with this attitude of humility, of learning, of growing, of changing by the grace of God. Please hear God's word in Mark chapter 10, beginning in verse 17. And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, 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, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother. And he said to him, teacher, all these I have kept from my youth. And Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said to him, you lack one thing. Go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. And come, follow me. Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. Amen. Would you pray with me? Our Father, as we come to this somewhat familiar text to many, we ask that you would give us illumination and insights by Your Spirit, that we would hear the truth and heart of this text, and that we would look to Christ. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Please be seated. A few years ago, George Barna, in one of his polls, came back with a statistic that 52% of Americans say that they are born again. You think, wow, that's pretty good, right? Well, 33% of those same individuals who said that they are born again said that they would go to heaven because they had lived a good life. The text before us this evening confronts this kind of erroneous thinking head on. My prayer is that this evening we all would be convinced that nobody will go to heaven because of their own moral achievements, because of our own spiritual performance. As good of a performance as we can put on, it's never going to reach the standard to which God has set forth, which is, of course, one of perfect holiness. We're going to see why trusting in oneself, then, is vanity. and why the gospel is such good news to sinners like us. Last Lord's Day evening, we considered Christ's exhortation to his disciples when he said, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child cannot enter it. That is, salvation is not something earned or merited, but rather it is received. received like a gift given to a helpless, incapable, dependent little child. It's like a little nine or 10 month old in the lap of their parent and you give that child something, that child would never grow up in their latter years and say, you know, I earned that. I was glad that that pastor gave me this gift because I was such a good child and I earned that gift. Nobody in their right mind would say such a thing. To receive salvation is to receive it as a helpless incapable, dependent child. Remember, Jesus said, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it. With this teaching fresh on their minds, verse 17 states that Jesus set out on his journey with his disciples. Here Mark reminds us once again that Christ had set his face towards Jerusalem. Christ was sent to the world to accomplish a mission, and ultimately that mission would be finally accomplished in Jerusalem on the cross and out of the empty tomb. It was on this journey that something extraordinary happened. as Jesus and his disciples were on their way, a young man, who Matthew tells us was a young ruler or a religious official in the local synagogue, ran up to Christ, just picture this, ran up to Christ and knelt before him and asked, what must I do to inherit eternal life? Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life. Now we see the question itself is faulty. The question itself is faulty. What must I do to inherit eternal life? From our perspective, okay, from a perspective, this guy was intent on becoming a follower of Christ. What an evangelistic opportunity, right? Amazing. But as usual, Christ does not respond in the way that we would expect him to. In fact, his initial response seems to be at best impolite and at worst a bit rude. If Christ were a good evangelist, wouldn't he have immediately led this guy to pray the sinner's prayer? Close the deal, as it were? Tell your friends, I led someone to Christ today. You know, we were in Peru many, many times in my former congregation, and one time we came back, there was a lot of dental mercy ministry that we would do, and then we'd also, of course, do a lot of teaching ministry, evangelistic ministry. I remember I shared with the congregation upon our return, I don't know how many people came to know Christ. People would raise their hand and outward response. Only the Lord knows who is truly converted, right? I said, but I do know how many teeth that we pulled. They were in a jar, it was gross. There were like 130 something teeth in the jar. I said, well, we know how many teeth were pulled on the mission trip, but not how many people were converted. Too often, evangelistic approaches, it's just done to seal the deal and to pray the prayer, and there's little connection with any local church or follow-up or discipleship. Jesus, of course, didn't do this. Perhaps His disciples were thinking, What a potential follower of Christ here. He's young, he's full of energy, he's got important friends, he's theologically trained as a ruler in the synagogue, and he's filthy rich. Who doesn't want someone like that as a part of the church, right? He's able to pay off the building program with one stroke of the pen. Let's bring him in. Among other things, we learn in the passage that Christ does not use, again, the slick evangelistic techniques of our day. Rather, he breaks all of our modern rules of evangelism and does two things. Here's the first thing he does. First, Jesus gives this potential convert a theology lesson. Look with me again at verse 17. The rich young ruler ran up and knelt before him and asked him, Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? Rather than answering the man's important question, the biggest and most important question that any man can ask, he immediately responds with the question, why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. Now, most interpret Christ's words to mean that he knew this young man did not believe him to be the Son of God, possessing the same perfect divine nature and goodness as that of the Father. Though this idea is probably true, I don't think that's what Christ means here when he asks this. In the context, it seems to me that this eager, religious young man greets Jesus by calling him good because he feels he has met someone whom he can relate to regarding his own moral attainments. Ah, he thought, finally a man I can relate to, someone who's good, like me. Indeed, though he had the appearance of humility and devotion by kneeling before him, I believe what he was looking for was for some reciprocity in his flattery. Perhaps this is why Jesus responds as he does with what at first seems to be a cold lesson on the theology of God, what they call in the systematic theology books, theology proper. Christ replies to this man's greeting and question with the following question and statement, why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. This young man's concept of good was Christ's obedience to the law and his own. obedience to the law, not the divinely perfect standard of God himself. This young man didn't believe that he truly was the son of God and perfectly good, but he believed that his own obedience was good enough and so was Christ and he wanted to relate to him. In other words, God is the ultimate standard of goodness, not mankind's feeble efforts to obey the law. What the young man believed about Christ's nature is not the issue here. Rather, the issue is the young man's standard of goodness with which he believes he can inherit eternal life. It is the problem people have when they say things like, or think things like, I am good enough to go to heaven. It's the common response you will have from people, from ordinary people, from good people that live in our society, good citizens, as it were. They think that to be good is what is going to get one to heaven, to earn oneself a place in heaven. Of course, there's the comparisons of oneself with others who are much worse than they are. This young man thought he was a good candidate for heaven for the same reason he thought Jesus was a good candidate for heaven. Good works. This is exactly why Christ takes him to the law, a glorious expression of God's goodness and perfect standards. God's character is seen in the law that he has revealed, his holy character. When these are understood correctly, we understand it's impossible for any sinful man to fulfill these laws. One commentator sums it up this way, Christ's design is to set straight the source of true goodness and that goodness in relation to the law. So first, Christ gives this young potential convert a theology lesson on the true source and standard of goodness, namely God himself and his law. Secondly, he leads him to the actual commands there. Doesn't this break all evangelistic protocol? I thought we were supposed to make things easy, to make things comfortable for folks who are searching for the truth. Christ, our Lord, takes him to the law of Moses. Why? To expose his sin, to show him that his version of goodness, namely himself and his own faulty obedience isn't good enough. Romans chapter three in verse 20. By works of the law, no man shall be what? Shall be justified. By the works of the law, no man shall be justified. Why? Because we do not obey them perfectly. The summary of the law, you'll remember, is love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. How many of us for one single moment have loved God with all of our hearts, all of our soul, all of our mind, and all of our strength? We have not done that for one moment of our lives. And so, Just that, and then have we ever loved our neighbor as ourselves, as we ought, in a perfect way? No, we have not. What's God's standard? God's standard, of course, is perfection. He created us in perfect righteousness. We rebelled against him. We're expelled from the garden. And since then, as I shared this morning, we've been living east of Eden with original sin and not with original righteousness. We got a big problem. We have a disease called sin. And also we, because of that disease, sin. We have original sin and actual sins. And they make us... unholy and condemned before God in our natural selves. And so Jesus, in verse 19, he says, you know the commandments. Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, which would be a saying that was probably an application of the eighth and ninth commandments. And finally, honor your father and your mother. Surely now, after hearing these commands from the second table of the law, this young man will recognize how short he falls in measuring up to God's standard of goodness. Well, not quite. He says something actually quite surprising here, almost something you would expect a child to say who was unschooled. Rather than throwing himself down in repentance for his sins, he says, something almost shocking in verse 20. Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth. Really? Really, all these I have kept from my youth. Since I was a child, he says, I've kept all of these commands. There are three things we don't want to miss here. I think there's little doubt that this young man was a sincere, earnest, committed, and relatively moral, religious individual. Probably those who knew him thought a lot of him. He had all of his proverbial ducks in a row. He was an impressive young man. For all we know, this man had friends. He had, of course we know he was wealthy. He had it all together. He was an upstanding citizen, in the eyes of the community, a good man. Secondly, we should notice that as a religious ruler, he probably, like Paul before his conversion, believed wholeheartedly that according to the law, he was blameless. Philippians 3 and verse 6. But we also know that he had a superficial view of the law. he had a superficial view of the law. Like many in his day and in our day, he did not understand that the law of God deals not only with our outward actions, but also with our inner thoughts and motivations and attitudes of the heart. You see, when we go back to these commands that Christ sets forth, remember, in the Sermon on the Mount, what Jesus does, In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus shows us that it's not just, okay, I haven't murdered anybody, so I have perfectly kept that command. It's that, have you ever hated someone in your heart? Oh, then by the way, you've broken that command. And I would go even further to say, if you are not perfectly loving people as you ought, then there is a sense in which you're breaking that command as well. How about, do not commit adultery? Well, you say, well, I've never committed adultery, and so I've obeyed that command my entire life. Well, have you committed adultery in your heart? Have you ever looked upon someone, not your spouse, in a lustful way? You've broken this command. Jesus says, do not steal. Have you ever longed for something that is not yours? Have you ever kept back something that was somebody else's? Well, then you have stolen. And the attitudes of the heart, the thoughts of the mind, all of these things play into this idea that we do not love God with our thoughts, our motivations, and the attitudes of the heart. Because of this young man's superficial view of the law, he viewed himself as a fine candidate for eternal life, someone who has earned the right of heaven, someone who has earned a place in heaven at the table. Indeed, like many in our day, his answer to the question, why should God let you into heaven? His answer would be, because I have lived a good life, or I haven't been so bad, something like that. In all of my evangelistic conversations over the last 30 years, I'll tell you this, that is the main thing that comes back is, You know, I am a candidate for heaven. I do believe I'm going to heaven. You ask them why? Because I've lived a decent life or I haven't been so bad. Well, what happens next? Look at verse 21. It's quite an astounding verse. It says that Christ looked at him and loved him. Christ loved him. This is the only time in the Gospel of Mark where an individual is pointed out as one whom Christ loved. Christ loved him. Christ did not take this young man to the law or give him a lesson on the doctrine of God because he wanted to publicly shame him. You know, oftentimes we're all guilty of this. Oftentimes we want to win an argument rather than win a person, right? When it comes to unbelievers, those who are unchurched, we want to argue and win an argument with them rather than win their heart. And Christ loves this young man that he is speaking truth to. He loved him. And he wanted him to know the truth. It is the truth that will set him free. Not easy believism, not slick evangelistic techniques, methods, but the truth of God in the hands of the Spirit. And we learn a valuable lesson here, don't we? If we love people, we will tell them the truth. Oftentimes we have a failure of nerve when we're reaching out to people with the gospel. Sometimes we have fear of being ostracized amongst friends or coworkers. We hold back. And I do believe there are inappropriate times to just burst out with an evangelistic kind of message or whatever. We want to be smart about this. We wanna be thoughtful and considerate and so forth, but part of the reason we don't reach out, and I shared with you in January that a major theme of my preaching this year is gonna be evangelism, so I'm holding true to my promise. We don't reach out to people as we ought. And we all fail, we all don't do as we ought, yes, but part of the reason we don't reach out more is because the love of God is not pulsating through our veins. Christ loved this rich, young ruler. He loved him. He wasn't trying to get something from him. He wasn't trying to manipulate him with evangelistic, slick techniques. He just loved him and so he spoke the truth to him. And how often do we find ourselves, just because of love for someone. compassion for them. We live, don't we, in a culture of censorship, a cancel culture, a culture of judgmentalism and tearing others down that may not have the same political stripe on the shoulder or the same denominational or maybe different in some way. We live in a culture where the news and all the talking heads, they exist just to tear down and to cancel and so forth. And we as Christians can be impacted by this. But if love is driving us, if love is pulsating in our breasts, the love of Christ, we will want to reach people. Let's pray. Let's make it a matter of prayer in our own lives. As I preach this, let me just share with you, I just preach to myself. Sometimes people say, Pastor, what preaching do you listen to mostly in your Christian life? I'm like, myself. I'm always preaching, I'm always teaching. Five times a week, I'm preaching and teaching at Christ Church. I am under my own preaching. It's kind of weird in a way, but it is the truth. And so as I'm proclaiming God's word, I am under that word and I am called to obey that word. And so as I say this to you, it's to me as well. And I want my own hearts to be stronger for the lost and to have compassion and not to see them as some kind of notch on the belt if I lead them to Christ or bring them into the church, but as someone that I love. because Christ's love is pulsating through my veins and I'm compassionate towards them and not judging them or looking at them in a way that is judgmental or so forth. May love drive us, amen? May love drive us in our Christian lives to reach out to others. Christ loved this young man. He loved him. These are touching words. He loved the rich young ruler. In verse 21 and 22, it states, and Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, you lack one thing. You lack one thing. Go sell all that you have and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven and come follow me. That's it. That's it, Jesus says, just sell all that you have and come follow me. That's all. Your measly empire, give it up, because I know that's what holds your heart, and come follow me. Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the second person of the Godhead, the Lord of glory, the one who will give you an inheritance so much greater, so much more valuable that is eternal and that makes this rubbish in comparison. That's all you have to do. Sell it all and follow me. Oh, I would hope by God's grace that everyone in this room would sign the paper immediately. I'm coming. I'm giving you everything, Lord. You can take my house, my 401k, all my furniture, all my books, yes, even all my books, and I'm gonna follow you. What does he do? Well, before we look at how he responds, a question, that, well, let me just say this, a young man responds by being disheartened by the saying. He went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. The question does emerge here, why does Jesus make this demand on this young man? Wasn't this a bit over the top? I mean, come on, Jesus, this is, I mean, he's so wealthy. He's got so much. Why don't you just say, can you give up like 50% and follow me? Nope. Now the reason Jesus does this is because he knows this young man's heart. And after attempting to expose his sin by pointing out his faulty view of God's goodness and God's standards in the law, he finally gets through to him when he asked the man to give up what he truly worships. And that is his wealth. He worships his wealth. I've said it before, I'll say it again. Do you want to know what a man or a woman worships? Follow the trail of their time and their money and their heart and emotions. What does a person value the most? It's follow the trail, follow the trail. This man had the appearance of being a man of sincere religious devotion, but in reality, he valued his material wealth more than God. It's the idol of our culture, is it not? Sometimes people ask me, you know, John, when you're preaching in Charleston, South Carolina, what are the main idols that you're kind of going after in your preaching? I'm like, well, it should be pretty obvious. It's wealth. People worship money and wealth and homes and boats and vacations and all these things. Again, not bad things in and of themselves, unless they hold your heart. Unless they hold your heart. There are wealthy people all over scripture. Abraham was wealthy. David was wealthy. Barnabas had money. but they, of course, loved God first. Sinclair Ferguson says this about the rich young ruler, quote, he honored God on the outside, but he loved and worshiped the idol of money on the inside. Christ did not make this demand on this young man to give up all of his riches because this is what every follower of Christ must do. Nor, of course, did he ask him to do it because by doing so, he could add this to his other long list of good works in order to earn eternal life. On the contrary, Christ made this demand because in this particular case, in this particular context, he knew that this was the one thing, the primary thing, that was hindering him from receiving Christ as his Savior and Lord. His riches were the obstacle and Christ knew it. Riches might not be the obstacle for some here this evening, or perhaps some that are watching online, it may be something else. Maybe a relationship. Only the Lord knows. Of course, it's not a sin to have wealth, but it is a sin for wealth to have you. You don't want your possessions to possess you. This is the young man's problem. The Jewish young man would have been familiar with the stories of Moses, of course, Hebrews 11, 26, that Moses counted disgrace for Christ as greater riches than all the treasures of Egypt. Think of what Moses left. It's one of the greatest things about Moses. We've been talking about Moses a lot on Sunday mornings in relation to Joshua. Moses was a great man for so many reasons, but He chose suffering for Christ as greater riches than all the treasures of Egypt. That is something, because there were many treasures in Egypt. Well, as we close and as we look towards coming to the Lord's table, what are we to think about this important historical narrative from the Gospel of Mark? Number one is that salvation is by grace, And it's a gift that can only be received by childlike dependence on the person and finished work of Jesus Christ. It's a gift, and we receive it like a child. The rich young ruler asks, what must I do to be saved? The answer is he can do nothing to be saved. Now you could say, of course, by God's grace, repent, believe the gospel, get baptized, join the church, but his focus was on his own works, wasn't it? J.C. Ryle said this, quote, the spiritual blindness here exhibited is unhappily most common. Myriads of professing Christians at the present day have not an idea of their own sinfulness and guilt in the sight of God. They flatter themselves that have never done anything very wicked. They forget that holy nature of the God with whom they have to do. Self-satisfied they live, self-satisfied they die. they die. Beloved, we glory and boast in nothing else but the gospel of Jesus Christ, amen? We boast and we glory in what Christ has done for us, not in what we do for God. You see, Christ fulfilled the law, every jot and tittle in his life. He was born in original righteousness and he lived his life staving off temptation, living in perfect conformity to the law of God, not just outwardly, but also inwardly from the heart. Christ loved God with all of his heart, soul, mind, and strength perfectly. And he loved his neighbor as himself perfectly for you and for me because we fail to do so. And then as a righteous substitute, as a spotless lamb, he laid his life down on Calvary and your sins and mine were nailed to the cross and Christ purchased us with his blood. He died for us and he paid for those sins. He paid the debt of our sins and then credited to us his righteousness. And on the third day, he rose again from the dead. He is risen, and after 40 days of teaching His disciples about the kingdom of God, He ascended into heaven, and it's there in heaven He has been since that day, and He intercedes for us. He is our prophet, our priest, and our king. He exercises these three offices in the life of His church through the ministry of the means of grace, and one day, He is coming again to take us to glory. How can you know God? By grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Turn from your sin and look to Christ for salvation. The second thing we see from this text is that being a sincere Christian, an authentic follower of Christ who has truly been born again, nothing will be more important to you. Nothing will be more valuable to you or precious to you in your outward actions or in the deepest recesses of your heart than the glory of Christ and the extension of his kingdom. This doesn't mean that your priorities are always perfectly lined up or that you are loving and valuing Christ always as you should, but when asked and looking into your heart, you know that Christ is your Lord, that you love him. You love him more than anything. You're ready to sign the paper. I'll give it all up, Lord, for you. That is not some higher level of Christianity. That is Christianity. If you want to follow me, deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me, right? And so we must understand this. Is Christ precious? We want Him to be more and more precious to us, and He becomes more and more precious to us as we hear His word preached, as we come to the table, Lord's Day after Lord's Day, as we remember our baptism, as we meditate upon the gospel, we grow and we flourish spiritually. And yes, we have ebbs and flows and ups and downs and challenges, and at times our faith feels challenged. That's why we need one another to exhort one another. in the life of the congregation, to walk with one another through life as pilgrims on our way to the promised land. That's why we come to the table together and not just individually. So we need to recognize that our hearts are in full view this evening. The Lord can just look right in there. And here's the thing, in Christ, we are forgiven. In Christ, we are objects of his mercy. In Christ, God loves us, even though, and then all the things. He loves you, dear one, even though you're a sinner. He loves me, even though I'm a sinner. and he is committed to my sanctification, and he's committed to your sanctification. God is more committed to our sanctification than we are. That's really good news, isn't it? Praise the Lord. But he looks right into our hearts, and we have to ask, is there anything we value more than Christ? Is it money? Is it the possibility of money? Is it a person or family that you value more than Christ? There are some who are reluctant to come to Christ because they don't want to disrupt things in their family. That's bad. Is it a career? Perhaps it's some kind of ongoing fascination with and love for this world and all of her superficial allurements. Whatever it is, Christ says, give it up. Give it up. Don't worship these things. Turn from them and follow me. Now, the reaction of the young man is interesting. It says his countenance fell. He was disheartened, disheartened when Christ asked him to give it all up and to follow him. The true state of his heart had been exposed. Like the seed that fell among the thorns described in the parable of the seed and the sower back in Mark chapter four, verse 19, this young man had an initial excitement about following Jesus, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires of other things entered in and choked the word and it proved unfruitful. Oh, that none of us would be found in this place. If you find that there is something that is holding onto your heart, that's gripping your heart, that's an obstacle to knowing Christ and walking with Him, I want to exhort you this evening to repent of that sin, to turn from it and look to Christ for grace and salvation and follow Him. You will not be disappointed. Let us come to Him as helpless, dependent children, throwing ourselves upon His undeserved mercy. casting off all rival loves, and following Him as His true disciples, as His beloved children, giving all that we are and all that we have for His glory. Amen. Well, let us pray. Our Father, we thank You so much for the good news of the Gospel, that there is salvation for sinners. that while we fail to obey your law, we thank you for Christ who obeyed it and went to the cross and paid for our sins. O Lord, you instruct us, you command us to come to the Lord's table. and to do so in remembrance of the person and finished work of Jesus Christ. Lord, we love to come to the table. We love to receive Christ. We love to receive your forgiveness, your grace upon grace upon grace, which like waves of the sea are constantly washing over us. We thank you, Lord, that you love us, that you will never leave or forsake us, and that we are your blood-bought children. Help us, Lord, to live in that love. We pray that this love would compel us to depend upon your grace, to abide in your love, and that that love would compel us to reach out to others, to have love for the lost, even as Christ had love for this rich young ruler. We pray that we would not hold on to anything, Lord, that would obstruct us from you. And may you receive all the glory in Jesus' name. Amen.