Now as He was going out on the road, one came running, knelt before Him, and asked Him, “Good Teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?” 18 So Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. 19 You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ ‘Do not steal,’ ‘Do not bear false witness,’ ‘Do not defraud,’ ‘Honor your father and your mother.’ ” 20 And he answered and said to Him, “Teacher, all these things I have kept from my youth.” 21 Then Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “One thing you lack: Go your way, sell whatever you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, take up the cross, and follow Me.” 22 But he was sad at this word, and went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
(Mark 10:17-22)
When confronted with this conversation it may leave some people confused. “Are we not saved by Grace and not by works?”, some may be asking, “Why is Jesus telling people things to DO to inherit life?”
While there seems to be a command in doing, there’s a greater underlining problem here.
Notice how the young man approached Yeshua: “Good Teacher”. There was a fundamental flaw in this man's perception of Christ. Yeshua is not merely a “good teacher”. This man respected Yeshua’s thoughts and opinions but he missed the fact of who Christ was. Then you have Yeshua’s response to this mans comment, “Why do you call me good…”; as if to say, this guy has no clue who he was talking to. Yeshua never sets to be a good teacher, He is set to be our Sovereign Lord.
This man wanted Y’shua as a good teacher to respect but he did not want Him as a Lord to obey, and there is a huge difference. Scores of people look to Christ as a good teacher to guide but they do not want to allow Him to Lord in which we will obey. When we come to Christ, we give up the choice to decide what is right for our lives.
This is where we get to the root of what’s happening here. This man was faced with a decision to make: faith in the sufficiency of his stuff or faith in the sufficiency of Christ (Luke 16:13) (See also: Believe in). The fact is, Christ was not telling this man to do something to be saved. What Christ was doing is revealing to this man where his heart lied (Luke 12:34); because our faith is proven by our actions (James 2:14-24). These actions are a response to the words of Christ. If we say we follow Christ we do what Yeshua says. This is not salvation by works, rather obedience to God. In verse 21, Yeshua it's calling for this man to follow him, Have faith in him. If this man would have sold everything he had and given it to the poor it would have been an outward sign of his faith in Christ.
Don’t miss this point though. This is not a reality that Christ was just revealing to a man in the first century. This is a reality that He is revealing to anyone who has the money to be able to search out this article and read it. Are we so comfortable with our lives that we can ignore the multitudes dying each day from preventable diseases and hunger? Yeshua’s call to Salvation requires TOTAL surrender. This is why, when you get to Acts, there's only 120 people left following Christ. The multitudes of the others left.
The fact that Yeshua did not command ALL of his followers to sell everything they have brings comfort only to the kind of people to whom he would issue that command.
Ask yourself this question," if Jesus were here today do you believe that he would tell you to do the very same thing?" If your first response is wanting to give reasons for why he would not tell you to do this same thing, then be worried.
Thing is, we seem to care so much about the things, the stuff, in this world; when we know we are going to die and leave it all. The things so many try to gain, the memories so many try to build, will all me lost one day very soon. None of that will do any good in eternity.
Y’shua does not want to strip us of our pleasure, He wants to give us HIS Pleasure (Mark 10; Matt 13:44). Materialism is not pleasure, it’s dumb. If we are holding onto anything in this world then we have no clue of what it means to have treasure in Heaven.
“He is no fool who gives what he can not keep in order to gain what he can not loose” (Matt 6:19-21)
The love of possessions will inevitably and ultimately rob us how the joy for which we have been created.
This is the only scene, in the book of Mark, in which we see someone refusing Yeshua’s invitation to discipleship.
Why did He refuse?
1. He could not come to Christ with the faithfulness of a child trusting their father. It appears that Mark chose to put the story of the children directly before the story of this rich man for a reason.
2. His eyes were blind - money is the whole context of what Christ is saying in Matt 6:22 money, and other gods, blind us to our sinfulness and blind us of our need to the poor. He came to Christ eager and walked away sad. He walked away from real treasure because his hands were so full of earthly things.
You can’t serve two masters. Our use of money is a sure barometer of our present spiritual condition. Our use of money is a sure indicator of our future eternal destination.
“You are not the child of today; you are a child of tomorrow. You're the eternities, you’re the offspring of deity. You belong to the Infinite. If you make your fortune on the earth, poor sorry silly soul, you have made a fortune and stored it in a place where you cannot hold it. Make your fortune, but store it where it will greet you on the dawning of a new morning.”
- Morgan
See also: Hundred Fold
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