Bible Talks - Sunday Night Church
Series: New Preacher's Night · Talk No. 2
The Rich Young Ruler
Sunday, 05 March 2006
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Tonight we are going to start by looking at some extreme/outrageous statements
- He ate us out of house and home
- My sister uses so much makeup you could scrape off just the outer layer and put it on five other girls
- I think of you a million times a day
- My teacher is so old she remembers the tragedy of when the dinosaurs died
- Hyperbole, extreme and outrage statements
- In this passage Jesus makes three out rages statements, turn to the person closes to you and try and find all three.
- Outline the three outrages statements that Jesus makes
- Statement No. 1 ‘Why do you call me good? No-one is good except God alone’ verse 18.
- Statement No. 2 ‘Go sell all you have and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come follow me’ verse 21.
- Statement No. 3 ‘It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God’ verse 25
Jesus’ responses in this passage are designed to get the young man and his disciples thinking about a really important issue.
Before we really kick off who can tell me what was the end result for the rich young man in the story? The truth is we don’t know what happens to him or what he does, all the bible says is that he goes away sad. And it’s important not to leave the story there because the fact of the matter is this passage is not primarily about the fate of the rich young ruler it’s about the issues that his encounter with Jesus raises. Because Jesus takes this encounter and turns it into one of the most valuable lessons for his disciples.
How hard is it to enter heaven?
- In this story a young man from a wealth background comes to Jesus and asks a huge question and gets an answer I’m sure he wasn’t expecting.
- But what is really interesting is why did he approach Jesus? In the first century, just like today, wealth meant power. We know of the text that the man was very wealthy, which probably meant he was very powerful.
- But today, wealth and power often brings arrogance – look at people like the Murdoch’s and Packers for example.
- But this man was different.
He clearly took his Jewish faith seriously – he knew and claimed to work hard at keeping the O.T. Law. So what was it that bought him to Jesus?
What would bring a self-sufficient, independent, man of the world to seek out and address a preacher from the back blocks of Nazareth?
The answer is surprisingly simple, and it’s an answer that rings powerfully in our ears as well.
The man wanted the answer to one of the oldest questions in the world: How can I be certain what happens to me when I die?
That’s the question that has been on the lips of people ever since the fall.
It was no different for this young man in first century Palestine. - So this young man wanted to know what to do to get eternal life and one of Jesus’ responses was, ‘How hard is it for the rich to enter the Kingdom of God!’ verse 23 And at this the disciples were amazed, because in their culture to be rich was a clear assurance that you had God’s blessing.
- But that wasn’t all. Jesus goes on to say, ‘it is easier for a camel to
go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the
kingdom of God’ And at this the disciple were even more amazed or in the ESV
as Neil keeps remaining it says exceedingly astonished. What is Jesus getting
at? What is he trying to lead them towards? Well if we go back to statement
no. 1’ why do you call me good? No-one is good except God alone’ in verse
18 he is challenging not just the rich man but the disciple as well.
Jesus’ response in verse 18 to this question may seem strange at first as he says ‘why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone’.
Jesus saying that he him self isn’t good? That he’s a sinner? NO.
Is Jesus is also using his response to hint towards his true identity, that he is God.
Jesus is using the statement to try and help the young man realize that no-one is good, that no-one is perfect even him (the rich young ruler).
- But Jesus again tries to illustrate this point that no-one is good by asking the young man if he has kept the commandments. And the young man responses by saying he has kept all of the commandments since he was a boy. Now he answers with such confidence, and he has such confidence because keeping the law for a Jewish person was just a matter of external conformity, For example; the commandment do not murder, he probably never physical murdered anybody, so to him, he has kept the command do not murder. But did he ever hate his brother in his heart? This external conformity lacked the inner obedience, the spiritual obedience that Jesus was asking about, an obedience of the heart. This is in accordance with what Jesus taught in Matt 5:21 the ‘sermon on the mount’. If anyone murders than he is subject to judgment, and Jesus goes on to say ‘if anyone is angry with his brother he will be subject to judgment. If we could keep Gods commands in the true spiritual sense not just in an external sense then Christ died for nothing as Paul puts it in Galatians 2:21. But the truth is ‘No-one is good except God alone’ no-one can completely keep God’s law.
- Statement no. 2 in verse 21 ‘go sell everything you have and give to the poor than you will have treasure in heaven’.
- Why is Jesus saying this? Well Jesus knows this mans heart and he knows that his money is a stumbling block for him. The young man is at risk if he isn’t already of putting his wealth before God. Jesus was challenging him to sell everything, to get rid of any stumbling block that prevented him from putting his trust in God alone. Now this man didn’t have to sell everything he had to be able to put God first, because Jesus was using this statement to get the man thinking about what he puts first in his life. He was getting him to realize that his money was a stumbling block for him.
- And this is something we should reflect on as well, what is our stumbling
block? What do we put first in our life?
For this man it is fairly safe to assume it was his money, and that might be the same for you. Or you might be putting career before Jesus. You might think it’s more important to stay at work than to go to bible study. It might be family, your family might be the most important thing in your life and you put that before your relationship with God, so if that meant not doing regular quite times you wouldn’t do them. It could be study if you’re doing your HSC or if you are a uni student, you could be putting that before your relationship with Jesus or your relationship with your partner before Jesus. Are we putting Jesus first in your life? If we are putting something before God, we need to consider is it worth more than our eternal salvation?
All the things I have mentioned before are good things, as long as they are in the right place, under God.
So how do we know what we put first in our lives?
- We are going to watch a bit of a clip now and I want you to be thinking about this question whil
