Matthew chapter 19, title of the message, salvation with
men is impossible. Absolutely impossible. Now we have a rich young man
here, a rich young ruler. In the other gospels, he's called
a ruler. No doubt a civil ruler. He's
rich, he's young, and he's a ruler. He's been very successful. Money buys a lot of things, doesn't it? It
can buy a lot of things. You know what Solomon said? Solomon
said, money is a defense. It can keep a lot of troubles
away. Now, it brings its own troubles, but it can keep a lot
of problems at bay. But the one thing that money
cannot do, it cannot buy eternal life. It cannot buy favor with
God. It can't do it. That's why the
Scripture teaches us not to be a respecter of persons. Number
one, it's just wrong. But we have a real tendency.
If a rich person walks in the door, we have a real tendency
to be drawn to him, don't we? Yeah, we do like flies. We have
a tendency to be drawn to them. The scriptures, Solomon said
this in the scriptures, the rich hath many friends. Another place he said, the rich
speak roughly, but the poor entreat, they beg. Riches brings its own set of
problems, but Here we see that this man, because he's successful
in business, he's made a lot of money at a young age, and
he thinks, he believes that he can merit eternal life just like
he did the money he has made in the position that he has.
Not recognizing that God has given him what he has. I make
rich and I make poor. I lift up and I bring down. That's
what God said. And then all men and women have
a strong tendency. It's just a real natural tendency
in everyone to want to work their way to heaven. We don't naturally
want to work for anything else. We'd like to win the lottery,
wouldn't we? There's one reason we like to win the lottery. Almost
everybody that wins it or would like to win it says the first
thing they're gonna do is what? Quit their job. I'm gonna go
in and quit work. But when it comes to heaven,
when it comes to salvation, we wanna work that out. All men and women, they have
a, where they put a real value on their services. They value their services too
highly, don't they? I've never heard anyone say that
they were paid too much. Have you ever felt like you've
paid too much? I never have. I've never felt
like anybody paid me too much. That's because I put such a high
value on my service, and because of that, we think we can merit
salvation. We think we can earn it. because
we put such a high value on our service. Well, salvation is merited. It's merited. It's merited by
the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation is by works. He is,
not ours. It's His work for me. Eternal
life is not a human achievement. It's an achievement made by the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now here in this chapter, we
have such a man who believes that he can merit eternal life,
and I'm sure And speaking of eternal life here, he's talking
about going to heaven and living in heaven forever. He's not talking
about the quality of it, the life of God in the soul. That's
not what he's talking about. But that is what eternal life
is. It's the life of God. Christ
is eternal life. To have eternal life is to have
Jesus Christ. Everyone born in this world is
going to live forever, one place or another. But eternal life
is to have God, but that's not what he was talking about. He
just wanted to make sure he ended up in the right place. Everybody wants to go to heaven,
but nobody wants to die to self and sin. It becomes evident this man didn't,
because the Lord said, go sell all you have and come follow
me. And he couldn't do it. He couldn't do it. It takes the
power of God to bring a man or a woman to the end of themselves
and give them an understanding, a real understanding of value
and what's really valuable and what's not. You know, when the doctor says,
You don't have much longer to live. It's amazing how all these
things that you've done don't look so valuable anymore, do
they? All those things you've achieved just don't look so valuable
anymore. Our Lord has said this, except
you lose your life, lose your sinful self, lose your sinful
ambitions and come follow me. Here's a man who's been very
successful, and because of this, he believes he can merit salvation,
because he says this, "'What good thing must I do?' And Marcus says, "'To inherit.'"
The meaning of inheritance means you don't do anything, doesn't
it? The very meaning of it is you don't really do anything.
It's who you know. It's who you're connected to.
You inherit things from your parents. They didn't give it
to you because you earned it. They give it to you because you're
a son or a daughter. But he says here, what good thing must I
do? Tell me what good thing that I must do and I'll do it. I've
done it all my life. So he said, I've been a good
boy all my life. I've kept these commandments
all my life. How sad to be that confused. Don't confuse success in material
wealth with God's favor. Don't make that mistake. If we
do not have Christ, we do not have God's favor. If we have
Christ, even though I'm poor as can be, I have God's favor.
I have His favor. Now, there's three things we'll
look at. The man, the question, and the answer. Here's the man. He was young. He was rich. He was a ruler. He was religious. Very religious. From his youth
up, he was religious. He said he had kept all the commandments
that Christ quoted from the second table of the law. He said, all
these I have kept from my youth up. And no doubt he's a very moral
man. But he was spiritually ignorant.
He was spiritually dead. When He came to our Lord, He
said, Good Master. That's all He saw Jesus Christ
as, a good master, a good man. He was judging by outward appearance
only of what He saw. He was judging the works of Christ
the same way He judged His own works as just being good works. And our Lord sets the matter
straight. He said, Why callest me good? Why do you call me good? There's none good but one, that's
God. What a powerful statement our
Lord made to this man, and it went right over his head. There's
none good but God. Now if I'm good, I must be God. That's what He's saying. If I'm
good, I'm God. The scripture says there's none
good, no, not one. Now, if you're in Christ, if
you are in Christ, God has made you good. In him you are. You are the work of Christ. We
are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus on two good works,
Ephesians 2. But what he saw here, he saw
Jesus Christ as a man only, as a good teacher, as a good man. And our Lord says, if that's
all you see, you don't understand what's going on. If we ever come to see God as
the only standard of good, God is the standard of good.
And if we see that, that's when we will see our great need of
the Lord Jesus Christ. When we see that God is the standard
of good. God is the standard of perfection.
You know, when God in creation, He saw all that He had made and
He said, it's what? Very good. And the reason He
said it's very good is because it was perfect. It was perfect. Nothing I've ever done has been
perfect in any way, shape, or form. He wanted to know what good thing
must I do. Here's one thing I can tell you
about works. It will never let you rest. He said, all these have I kept
from my youth up. Well, why are you here? If you've
kept all these from your youth up, why are you asking the question,
what lack I yet? What's troubling you? He knew
something was missing. He knew it. Works will never
let you rest. You will never rest until you
find all that you need in Jesus Christ alone. That's when you
can rest. Rest. You're not trying to do
something to please God. You rest in Christ who pleased
God. This is My beloved Son, He said.
He spoke from heaven saying, This is My beloved Son in whom
I am well pleased. That's the one He's pleased with.
And He's pleased with all those who are in Him. Now the Lord
says to him, If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments. Now, he's
gonna show his ignorance here. The Lord said, keep the commandments,
plural, all of them. And he says, which one? Which
one? He said, keep the commandments.
He didn't say which, all of them. If you're gonna be saved by the
law, by your works, you gotta keep all of them. Every last
one of them. Not only outwardly, but you gotta
keep them inwardly. You got to love your neighbor
as yourself. Nobody has done that. Nobody has done that except
one, the Lord Jesus Christ. He did it. He did it. He says, which one has eternal
life attached to it and I'll keep it? That's what he's saying. Tell me which one has eternal
life attached to it and I'll keep it. And he's serious, too. And then there are verses 18
and 19, the Lord quotes the second table of the law. And he says,
thou shalt. And he says, thou shalt. And then he replies in verse
20, all these have I kept from my youth up. His parents, no
doubt, taught him when he was just a little fellow. You'll
be a good little boy and you'll go to heaven. Keep this. This is how you go
to heaven. This is how you please God. You've
got to keep all these commandments. And he grew up under that. He
grew up under that. All these have I kept from my
youth up. He didn't realize that to offend
in one point of the law was to break the whole law of God because
the law of God is really one law. You have all these commandments,
but it's really just one law, and it's God's law. And to offend
in one point of it, in any way, shape, or form, you've broke
the whole law. It's like me taking this glass
and dropping it on the floor, and it just shatters. You've
shattered it. If you've not loved your neighbor
as yourself, you just shattered it. If you've hated your brother
without a cause, you've just shattered it. Just because he
thought, well, I haven't shot anybody. Well, you'd like to.
I guarantee there's a few people you'd like to shoot. Well, the Lord said, that's to
commit murder. Anybody who'd like to slap? Really,
seriously. He said, that's to commit murder.
That's serious business. That's serious. See, God does
business in the heart. Now, when you realize that, you're going
to run to Christ. That's when you're going to run to Jesus
Christ because He's the only refuge you have from the avenger,
from the law, because you broke the law. You know, the law says,
you know, you shall not steal. Now, if I go out here breaking
somebody's house and they turn it in, I've got to hide. I've got to be looking over my
shoulder because the law's after me. I tell you this, outside of Jesus
Christ, the law is after you. God's law. And I tell you, God
is very real and God's law is very real, and He's not going
to let it go. He's going to honor it. He's going to honor His justice. That's why as I say, any sinner
run to the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the refuge. Christ is the only man, He's
the only one who could say, All these have I kept from my youth
up. He is the only one who could
say that. That young man said, what lack I yet? Well, you lack
life. You don't have it. You don't
have spiritual life. What lack I yet? All of it. You absolutely lack all of it. We bring nothing to the table
but sin. That's the only thing we bring
to the table, sin. And the Lord reveals what he
lacks. He's gonna show him here in verse 21. If you will be perfect. Now, this goes on. I was just
talking about being good. The Lord said, if you would be
perfect, sell all that you have, give it to the poor, come follow
me. Here's what the Lord is doing. He's revealing His covetousness. Thou shalt not covet. He's revealing
His covetousness. He couldn't do that. He couldn't
sell all that He had and give it to the poor, give it to His
neighbor, and follow the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the true
riches. Ed read this over in a proverb
back in the study there a little bit ago. And I thought it just
went with this message. In Proverbs 8, he's speaking
of wisdom, which is the Lord Jesus Christ. He's speaking of
the Lord Jesus Christ. In Proverbs 8, he's the wisdom
of God. Jesus Christ is the wisdom of God. He says here in verse
17, I love them that love me, and those that seek me early
shall find me. Rich is an honor with me. Now, what do you want? The riches and honor of this
world or the riches and honor that come of God? What do you really want? Durable
riches. Jesus Christ and what He gives
to sinners when He saves them is durable riches and righteousness. Listen, my fruit is better than
gold. My fruit better than gold, than
fine gold, and my revenue than choice silver. He says over in
verse 35, whoso finds me finds life and shall obtain favor of
the Lord. Our Lord is exposing the covetousness
of this man's heart, and he's exposing this man's God. His money, his position is his
God. That's his God. If you will be perfect, sell
all that you have, give it to the poor, and come follow me."
I heard Henry say one time when he was preaching for me, he said,
he probably wouldn't have had to sell it. He just had to have
been willing to. But he wasn't willing to. Just
like Abraham. Remember when he took Isaac and
bound him to the altar? He drew that knife back, he was
going to kill him. And God said, Abraham, Abraham.
And he stopped him. and he took him off that altar,
and he put that ram on that altar, and he slew that ram. This man
wasn't even willing, not even for a second, to let go of these
earthly possessions. Where is he now? He didn't take
them with him. Listen, you're not taking one
penny with you. Everybody that goes to the grave, goes to the
grave penniless, as far as the material things of this life.
penniless. That rich man that lifted up
his eyes in hell, the moment he died, he became penniless. So what the Lord does here, He
reveals who this man's God really is and what He really loves.
He's going to expose the real love of His heart. His material gain and possession
That was his God and that was his love. The scripture says,
listen, where your treasure is, your heart is. Where your treasure
is, that's where your heart is. And that young man heard that
saying. And that's not what he wanted to hear. That's not what
he expected. He thought he was going to give another commandment
or say, well, this commandment here, this one really has life
eternal attached to it. So if you keep it, he said, go
sell all you have. Oh, I wasn't expecting that.
I tell you this, the Lord will meet everyone whom he saves. He will meet them, as Rolf Barner
said this, he will meet them at their point of rebellion.
He'll meet them right where they're having a problem. Right where
they have that problem, that's where God will meet them. That's
what he'll deal with, to bring them to himself, if he brings
them to himself. But this man, that's not what
he wanted to hear. He didn't think that it would cost him
his life His reputation. He wanted to add to what he had,
not subtract. He's like, this is not good business. He looked at his earthly possessions,
he looked at his money, he looked at his position as a ruler, and
none of that was worth giving up for the Lord Jesus Christ.
None of it. What must I do to have eternal
life? He's thinking about when He dies,
He's going to go to heaven, He's going to get to live forever
in heaven. He's not thinking that eternal life is standing
in front of Him. Eternal life was talking to Him.
And the Lord said, if you want eternal life, follow Me. Follow
Me. Paul said this, I count all things
as loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ
my Lord. In the same Philippians chapter
3 there he says, I have suffered the loss of all things and do
count them but done that I may win Christ to be found in him. There's nothing wrong at all
with riches. Because the Lord says later over
in Mark, those who trust in riches. Having riches is not evil or
sinful. There is no sin in money no more
than a sin in a bottle. Sin is in here. And in here is
why I do what I do with what I have. If sin were in money, You wouldn't
want to be carrying it in your pocket because you don't know
what that dollar you got in your pocket bought last week. I mean, it
might have bought somebody's life. Might have paid for somebody
to be taken out or something. There's a lot of things that
money can be bought with, or that have bought. You know, it's
hard to tell the dollars I got in my pocket, what that dollar,
what those dollars have bought over the years. But there's no
sin in that. Sin's in the heart. Sins, you
know, we can't bottle sin. How many people leave the gospel
when they realize what it costs? They're like, well, I didn't
want to give this up or that up, and that's why they don't
want to come. But not realizing this, you're really not giving
anything up. It's all gain. That's what Paul said. It's all
gain. It's all gain. There's no loss to it. Now, our Lord says to the disciples,
in verse 23 and 24, because this rich young ruler walked away,
he walked away sorrowful because he had great riches, he had a
lot of possessions. He walked away sorrowful because
he didn't expect that. It's evident what had his heart.
It's evident what had hold of him. And our Lord, I can just
see as He's walking away, sorrowful. And it's over in Mark, I think
it is, Mark or Luke, it says, and the Lord loved him. He had
compassion, He told him the truth. And He turns to His disciples
and He says, how hardly shall they that have riches, or in
Mark it says, how hardly shall they that trust in their riches
enter into the kingdom of God. Riches and fame has drowned more
than poverty has. It's drowned more than poverty
has. They give you a false sense, a distorted view of yourself. I'm smart, I'm important, I am,
I am, I am. There's only one I am, that's
God. There's only one I am. That's God Almighty. The rest
of us are a bunch of was's and used to be's. I realize as I
get older, I used to do this, I used to do that, I was this,
I was that. And all that's exaggerated. Guarantee
we exaggerate. Ask a man how tall he is. I guarantee
he'll say two or three inches taller than he is. And a woman
will always be 10 or 15 pounds lighter than she is. We exaggerate. Don't we? We exaggerate. God is the only I Am and He never
exaggerates. Whatever He says, it is what
it is. And the disciples asked, because
they were amazed, they were like shocked, they were like, are
you serious? If a rich man cannot enter the
Kingdom of Heaven, how can a poor man ever enter into it? Boy,
there's a lesson here. There's a lesson here. Everybody's impressed with the
rich, but God's not, because He said, I'm the one who made
them rich, and I'll make them poor. I'll lift them up, I'll
bring them down. Who can be saved if a rich man
can't be saved? And the Lord says, with men,
in verse 26, with men, this is impossible. Salvation is impossible
with men, no matter how rich a man or a woman is. It's impossible. But with God, all things are
possible. All things are possible. With men, eternal life is impossible. We cannot give ourselves life.
Did you give yourself life? When you were born into this
world, did you do that? What did you have to do with
it? Absolutely nothing. 1000% passive. I had nothing to do with being
born into this life, being born into the family I was born into.
I had nothing to do with it. And that's exactly the way it
is in salvation. It's all of God. It's all of God. The hearing ear and the seeing
eye, the Scripture says, is of God. To see Jesus Christ by faith
and to hear His voice is the work of God. With man, it's impossible. With
God, all things are possible. God can save the richest man,
because you know, I'm not sure if it's the next chapter, but let me look here a second. He
saves a man named Zacchaeus, maybe over in Mark or Luke in
this incident. But when he says it's impossible,
then the very thing he does next is he saves a rich man, Zacchaeus,
to just prove that all things are possible. All things are
possible. Justification. With men is impossible. I cannot put away my sins, I
cannot put away my guilt, but with God, possible. Justified
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Cleared of all charges. Cleared
of all charges. Sanctification, be made holy. Can you make yourself holy? Can a clean thing, Scripture
says, come out of an unclean thing? Can you make that happen? Sanctification with us is impossible. With God, possible. You are made
in Christ the righteousness of God. In Christ you are created, it
says, in righteousness and true holiness. The new birth. With men, impossible,
just like your natural birth. With you, impossible. But the
new birth with God is possible. As Peter said, being born again
with incorruptible seed by the will of God. To please God, to live such a
life that pleases God, impossible. But with God, Through the work of God, through
faith in Christ, you know it's possible to please God. It says
without faith it's impossible to please God. Well, the opposite
of that is, with faith it's possible to please God. That pleases God,
to believe Him. It pleases God for you to believe
Him. To be raised from the grave and be seated in glory with men
is impossible. I've never seen anyone raise
themselves out of the grave or from the dead. But with God,
it's possible. It's possible. It says over in
the scriptures there, who shall raise our vile bodies? Someday
we all have to die. We all have to die. But we're
not going to stay in that grave. This body right here is not going
to stay in the grave. Your body is not going to stay
in the grave. God's going to raise it up. You believe that? You really believe that? You
believe God's going to really raise you out of that grave? With God, it's possible. With
God, all things are possible, even to save a wretch like me.
That's possible. No matter what my case is, it's
very possible for God to save me. In Christ, it's possible. And Peter says here, and I'll
close. And Peter answered and said to
him, behold, we've forsaken all. He's thinking about himself again.
You've got to love Peter because he asks the questions that I'd
like to ask. And he just keeps me from embarrassing myself. He said, we've left all, we've
forsaken all, we've followed you, what are we going to have?
What are we going to have? And the Lord said to him, Verily
I say to you, that you which have followed me in the regeneration,
when the Son of Man will sit in the throne of His glory, you're
going to sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of
Israel, and everyone that has forsaken houses, brothers, sisters,
father, mother, wife, children, lands, for my name's sake, they're
going to receive a hundredfold. And like I said over and over,
it says in this life and in eternal life, you're going
to receive eternal life. And in this life, you're going to receive, as I
said, you've got brothers and sisters all over this world.
I've stayed in homes all over this world. I got places I can
stay all over this world. I can go to Mexico and I can
make a phone call and I got a place to stay. I can go to California,
I got a place to stay. I can go to Alaska. There's a
group up there in West... I forget the name of it now. But I can call them and I got
a place to stay. Just one place after another. Thousands of brothers and sisters.
Thousands of them. But many that are first shall
be last. They thought he was going to be first, didn't they?
They thought that rich man, that rich young man, he'd be first.
They were probably standing there feeling inferior. Ever felt like that? Somebody
walk in, you know, they're successful and rich, and you start to feel
a little inferior? If you know God, I'm serious,
you and I should not feel ourselves to be above anyone, but we're
not below anyone either. I don't feel myself being inferior
to anybody, although I'm not above anyone. I'm not above anyone. That's just like fear. If you
learn to fear God, you don't fear anybody else. If you fear
God, what do you have to fear? If you fear me and you'll fear
everything else, you'll be afraid of everything coming and going.
You'd be afraid of every disease. You'd be afraid to shake hands
with somebody. I'd get sick. Doctor told me once, and I had
asthma, and I had bronchitis real bad. And he said, you shake
hands a lot? I said, yeah, of course. You stand at the back
door, you shake hands with everybody. I went out the door. He said,
you need to keep some of this stuff that kills germs there.
I said, well, I couldn't get it from a better people. Couldn't
get it from a better people. I'm not afraid of that. I'm not
afraid of that. I'm not afraid. If you make me
sick, I couldn't get it from better people. You know what
I mean. I'm going to shut up. All right,
I'm done.