I invite you to turn in your
Bibles this morning to the book of Matthew chapter 19. The Gospel of Matthew chapter
19. I'd like to read beginning with verse 16 and read down through
verse 26. Verse 16 of Matthew 19, And behold,
one came and said unto him, Good master, what good thing shall
I do that I may have eternal life? And he said unto him, Why
callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that
is God. But if thou wilt enter into life,
keep the commandments. He saith unto him, Which Jesus
said, Thou shalt do no murder, thou shalt not commit adultery,
thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness, honour
thy father and thy mother, and thou shalt love thy neighbour
as thyself. The young man saith unto him,
All these things have I kept from my youth up, what lack I
yet? Jesus said unto him, If thou
wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the
poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come and follow
me. But when the young man heard
that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
Then said Jesus unto his disciples, Verily I say unto you, that a
rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven. And again,
I say unto you, it is easier for a camel to go through the
eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom
of God. When his disciples heard it,
they were exceedingly amazed, saying, Who then can be saved? But Jesus beheld them and said
unto them, With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible. Now then, this morning I read
to you out of Matthew's Gospel, chapter 19, and there's some
tremendous lessons that we have here in this chapter. I have took notice of the fact
that one came and said unto the Master, said to the Master, what
good things shall I do that I may have eternal life? The question
is given here to our Lord Jesus. Now, all of you are aware that
our Lord enters into this conversation with this rich young ruler, and
I want to try to get a little ahead of myself at the beginning. I want to talk just a little
bit about the fact that our Lord Jesus Christ, being the great
teacher that he was, being a master indeed when it comes to expounding
the truth of his father and the truth had been given to the Lord
Jesus and he was all wise he had not the Spirit of God by
measure but he was full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom And yet,
as he spoke to this man, this man went away lost. This man
went away without eternal life. This man went away without being
blessed by the Lord, without having been given faith. This
man went away to go off into eternal perdition. Now he'd been
preached to by the greatest of preachers, but it was as we might
say from the human standpoint, it was not successful. The preaching
of our Lord did not turn this man from his idolatry and turn
him into the way of life. And so the first thing that I'd
like to talk a little bit about this morning is the fact that
it's only the purpose and will of our God that determines the
salvation of the outcome of any service This determines the salvation
of those that hear the Word. It's the will of God that determines
what happens. When the message is preached,
whether our Lord is preaching, or whether John Mitchell's preaching,
or Henry Mahan, or whoever it is that's preaching, our Lord
and His purpose determines what happens when the Word is faithfully
declared. The scripture says His word will
not return unto Him void. It will accomplish that whereunto
it's sent. And you know I'm sure that people
for the most part inside and outside of our churches have
the wrong idea altogether about preaching. They have the wrong
idea about it. You see, their thought is that
I am trying when I get up to preach or that our Lord when
He conversed with the rich young ruler or whoever it was that
he ministered to, their thought is that we're trying to get people
to stop one thing and to get them to do something else. uh... we want them to change outwardly
now there's no question that this is what we would like to
do that we would like to i would like to do that if i could if
i could this morning i'd get you down and put a funnel in
your ear and pull the truth of god right into your head if i
thought that would do any good you can't do that i can't do
that i can't get the truth inside of you Only the Holy Spirit can
affectually do that. Now I know that our Lord never
tried to do anything. Our Lord did exactly what He
purposed to do. Our Lord did exactly what He
wanted to do. But when I get up to preach,
well, I'm not trying to get you to stop one thing and start another
thing, but I would like, I would, and if I could, I would persuade
you to leave off. leave off all and come and follow
the Lord Jesus Christ. I would persuade you to trust
in the finished work of Christ our Lord. I would persuade you
to do that. But my business is not to do what only God can do. You know, we talked about that
some last week in regard to Lazarus. And my business is not to do
that which only God can do by His supernatural power. Let me
assure you this morning that everybody here that is lost just
like this man that we read about here in Matthew chapter 19. Every
man that is lost, every soul that is lost and on their way
to hell, on their way to eternal judgment, they do not believe
in Christ, they're going to stay on that road just like this man
did. They're going to stay on that
road if they can. They're going to stay going in
the same direction that they're going. Now if it depends on you
to turn yourself about, if it depends on me, if it depends
on anybody else here, then you're going to stay on the road to
hell. This man was preached to by the Lord Jesus Christ. And
you would think that if this man had a lick of sense, if he
had any ability whatsoever to do, then he would have done what
our Lord told him to do. Those words that came forth from
the lips of the Son of God, surely he would have done them. Now
it doesn't make any difference to me who your preacher is. He's
not going to turn you. He doesn't have that ability.
Now you may in your own self feel that if you just could listen,
oh it's just a matter of I don't quite understand and if I could
get the right person to preach to me or if I could just hear
Billy Graham enough or If I could hear some of the other outstanding
evangelists, if I could just hear some of the old preachers,
or somebody that is very skilled in presenting the gospel, well,
you know, then I would be turned from my sin. But you know the
scripture says that even if one rose from the dead, you wouldn't
be persuaded. You wouldn't turn if one rose
from the dead. You know our Lord Jesus, He was
raised from the dead. He didn't impress anybody that
we find as far as the scripture is concerned. Now my friend,
you only have one hope and that is that God in sovereign mercy,
that God has purpose, that God has willed and will look down
upon you from heaven and stop you on your road to hell, that
God will say, I'm arresting you, and I'm calling you, effectually
and irresistibly, I'm giving you this solemn call, and you're
coming to me. I'm bringing you unto myself. Now my friend, listen, it's the
only hope you have. I cannot do it, and nobody else
can. God only can do it. Romans 9
and 16 says, so it's not of him that willeth, nor of him that
runneth, but it's God that shows mercy. It's God that does it. It's God that must do it. In
Jeremiah chapter 31, hold your finger here in Matthew 19 and
turn to Jeremiah chapter 31 and look at verse 18 and verse 19. And here in this 18th verse we
read, I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus, Thou
hast chastised me, and I was chastised as a bullock unaccustomed
to the yoke. And then further he says, now
here's Ephraim. He bemoans himself. He said,
the Lord has chastised me. I've been chastened, and I was
chastened like an animal, like a bull that was unaccustomed
to the yoke, that the yoke had been put on. I was chastened. I was whipped like he was, trying
to get him to go in the right direction. And then he said,
He said, turn thou me. He said, I'm a rebel, and I'm
not able to go in the direction I ought to go in, even though
you've chastened me. I'm not able to go in that direction.
And so I hear him, I hear him bemoaning himself, and saying,
turn thou me, and I shall be turned. For thou art the Lord
my God. You turn me, and then I will
be turned. And then he goes on in verse
19, and surely after that I was turned, I repented, and after
that I was instructed. Now, beloved, we see clearly
then that the cry of the elect, the cry of those that would become
believers, is unto the Lord their God saying, turn thou me, and
I will be turned. I will be turned when you turn
me. but I will not be turned because I'm not able to turn
myself in the way. Now beloved, many, many times
God does bring on affliction and God does bring men down and
He does chasten men that He intends to save and sometimes God brings
a man according to the Psalm 107, brings him right to the
brink of the grave in order to turn him about and bring him
unto Himself. A man can't turn himself. He
doesn't have the ability to kill off the demons and to cast them
out of him. And God must bring him right
to the very edge of the grave. and turn him himself into the
way. God must do this. And, beloved,
we must understand that I do not entertain any idea at all
that I can change your mind. Your mind is set toward sin.
It's set toward hell. It's set toward rebellion. It's
set toward your own way. It's set to follow the demons
that are in you. And you're not going to be turned
unless God turns you. All the logic and all of the
arguments All of the illustrations, human reasoning, and we can even
dig up lost scrolls, even the dead sea scrolls. But we'll never
convince you or anyone else that this Bible is the Word of God
and this message is the truth until the Holy Spirit of God
does it Himself. We'll never convince you. We'll
never be able. Say, I know I ought to believe
the book. Well, you ought to believe it, but you won't until
the Spirit of God enables you. I'll tell you something else,
that every Pharisee, every Pharisee there is in this world that is
wrapped in the robe of self-righteousness and human merit, everybody that
is trusting their own works and their goodness and righteousness
to approve them before God, you're going to stay, you're going to
stay in those garments. Those garments which you yourself
have weaved, you've got your own tailor, and he's made you
a set of garments, and you're going to keep on wearing them,
and you're going to take comfort in them, and those rags, and
you're going to show them off, if you can, to whoever you can,
and boast of what you have done, just like this rich young ruler
did here in this part. Well, I've kept all of them from
my youth up. What do you think I've been doing
all my life? I've been doing right, and I've
been doing the things that I ought to do all my life. I've been
doing them. Well, how many people have you
ever heard that bragged about their rags, their clothes, their
garments that they have woven themselves or that their personal
tailor has made for themselves? Well, all the arguments that
we can use and it doesn't do any good really to argue scripture. I believe in preaching the word
of God and proclaiming the word of God but arguing won't do any
good. It won't do any good. You don't
need to argue with a blind man about the colors in the rainbow
because he's not going to believe what you've got to say about
the colors in the rainbow and you're blind and you're deaf
and you're dead in sin. And it'll take God to wake you
up. Now Saul of Tarsus is a good
example of what I'm talking about. He was wrapped up in his religion,
his tradition, his righteousness, his Phariseeism, and he'd been
in that all of his life. And he was in that way until
God Almighty unhorsed him and arrested him and smote him and
revealed Christ to him in the way. And that's how old Saul
of Tarsus got into the way. That's how he became a Christian,
is that God intervened. God crossed his path. God purposed
that he would save him, and he did save him. Now another thing,
everybody here that believes that salvation is by free will
is going to just keep on believing. You're just going to keep on
believing. Everybody here this morning that believes that salvation
is an act of the human will That a man can will himself out of
death into life. That a man can get up and do
whatever he must do in order to have eternal life. He's just
going to keep right on believing that until God convinces you
otherwise. Until God convinces you otherwise.
I was talking, there's a preacher called me the other night from
out east and he was telling me about a conference that they
had. in Indiana. And this big conference there,
they had a lot of people attend it, and this conference, the
subject matter was predestination and election. And the people
they got to preach were people that didn't know a thing on earth
about what they were talking about. There wasn't anybody there
that believed what the Bible teaches about the doctrine of
election or believed anything about predestination. They all
was there to refute it and talk about how silly it was and how
foolish it was. Nobody was there that would establish
the truth and stand on it and preach it even if they were to
tear them out of the pulpit and throw them out the front door.
Nobody there like that. Everybody that was there was
ignorant. They were ignorant of the Word of God. They were
ignorant of the Bible. They were ignorant of the truth
of Holy Scripture. Now, beloved, ignorance, we need
to fight that like we would a rattlesnake. Ignorance. Now, I know that some
of you here, most all of you here, believe what I'm telling
you when I'm telling you salvation is of the Lord. When I'm telling
you that Jesus Christ is the author and the finisher of the
faith, you believe me. When I tell you that salvation
is by the will of God and damnation is by a man's will, you believe
me. I know you do. And you believe
that God before the foundation of the world chose the people
and loved those people in Christ and gave them His Son and His
Son died for them and saved them by His atoning death. You believe
that. But there's a lot of ignorant
people in this world. A lot of ignorant people. Ignorant
of the Bible. There's some people that equate
spirituality with ignorance. And they say, well, you know,
God puts a premium on ignorance. God does not put any premium
on ignorance. And I know there's a lot of preachers.
I've heard some of them in days gone by get up and say, well,
I don't know nothing about doctrine. I don't know nothing about this
and that and something else. God, help me. All I can do is
just love Jesus. All I do is just love Jesus.
Now, my friend, that sounds mighty good, but that's ignorance gone
to seed, is what that is. When a preacher gets up and tells
you he don't know anything about what the Bible teaches, that
man hasn't got any business in the pulpit. What are we talking
about? Well, we're talking about the
fact that God has left us a Bible in this world, and he's given
us some things to preach, and men ought to hear it. But men
are ignorant of what the Word of God says. Now, you're here
this morning, and I recognize that those preachers that preached
out there in that conference, I recognize the one I talked
to you about just now, the guy that can say he know nothing
about this and nothing about that, that all these fellas,
they'll never really be turned from their way until God Almighty
does something in them. God must do something. Who makes
us to differ? Well, only God can make us to
differ. And the Lord is able to do that. But I'm telling you,
don't look at yourself this morning and say, well, I'm just an ignorant
preacher of the Bible. Do something about it, if you
can. And I think everybody that takes
up the book, begins to read it, meditate upon it. I think if
you're here this morning and you're a young person, and you're
serious about coming to know more about the Bible, I'm talking
to you young people, you listen to what I'm telling you. Write
down a scripture on a piece of paper, put it in your pocket,
pull it out, and memorize it over a week's time. Learn what
the Word of God says. Memorize the scripture. Make
it a part of your life. You don't have to grow up ignorant
of the Bible. You must study this book. This
is the most important book that you ever had in your hand. You
don't have one that's more important in your home. This is the most
important book in this world. And God forbid that you should
grow up and not know anything about the doctrines of this book. I'm telling you this ignorance
It's unexcusable as far as men is concerned, and you're going
to be held accountable, and the people that preach to you are
going to be held accountable for your ignorance. But still,
I'm here to tell you this morning that nobody is going to believe
the truth about this book until God reveals it to them. God must
reveal it to them. So if you memorize the scripture
until you can quote it and quote it and quote it, Only God can
give you the understanding of it. Only God can give you the
understanding. Make it flesh, give you the understanding
of it. One thing to have the letter
of it, another thing to have the spiritual meaning of it.
And God only can give you that. Now my purpose here this morning
And of course this is brought out so many places in the Bible.
Let me show you a couple. Turn with me quickly. Hold your
fingers still in Matthew and turn with me to the ninth chapter
of the book of Romans. I want you to see this. In Romans
chapter 9 and verse 29. Now I'm telling you that we're
left up to God to do something about sinners that are dead in
sin, blind, deaf, hardened sinners They are not able to do anything
for themselves and were left up to God to intervene. And here
in the 29th verse of Romans 9, it says, and as Isaiah said before,
except the Lord of Sabbath had left us a seed, we had been as
Sodom and been made like unto Gomorrah. You know, what this
is telling us is, beloved, that we would have never had an Abraham,
that we would have never had a Noah, we would have never had
a David, we would have never had an Isaac, we would have never
had a Simeon, we would have never had an Apostle Paul, we would
have never had any That's in the remnant. The elect is the
remnant. We would have never had any of
them. We would have been like Sodom and Gomorrah, the prophet
Isaiah said, if it had not been for the Lord leaving us a seed. If it hadn't been for God intervening,
there wouldn't have been anybody. We'd all been like the Sodomites
and those of the city of Gomorrah. We'd all been like them. None
of us would have been any different. We'd all been. steeped in our
rebellion and lust and sin until we would have been as corrupt
as them if God hadn't intervened. Is that right? Well, that's exactly
what he's talking about. And then turn with me to the
Gospel of John chapter 6. The Gospel of John chapter 6,
and look at it here. I'm not telling you something
that the Bible doesn't teach. I'm telling you we're shut up.
to God intervening, to God doing something for men. And we must
believe that, and pray that way, and talk that way in our meetings. In John chapter 6, in verse 35,
and let me just read a few verses here to you. In John 6, 35, and
Jesus said, unto them, I am the bread of life. He that cometh
to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall
never thirst. But I said unto you, that ye
also have seen me, and believed not. All that the Father giveth
me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I will in no
wise cast out. For I came down from heaven,
not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.
And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all
which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise
it up again at the last day. And this is the will of him that
sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son, and believeth
on him, may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up
to the last day." Now notice carefully, notice carefully,
the Jews then murmured at him. The Jews then began to murmur
at Christ, because he said, I am the bread which came down from
heaven. And they said, this is what those
Jews were saying in their murmurings, is not this Jesus, the son of
Joseph, whose father and mother we know, how is it that he saith,
I came down from heaven? Now I want you to listen to what
Jesus told these murmuring Pharisees, these murmuring Jews. Jesus therefore
answered and said unto them murmur not among yourselves don't murmur
among yourselves verse 44 and this is the reason this is the
reason why you should not murmur among yourselves no man can come
to me except the father which has sent me draw him No man can
come, no man. You can listen until you're blue
in the face. You can hear all I got to say.
You're not going to believe on me and you're not coming to me.
You're not going to come to me that you might have life and
you're not coming to me. You're not coming to me as one
of my children would come to me, as one of my elect would
be drawn to me. You're not going to do it unless
the Father intervenes. And lest the father come, he
says, except the father which has sent me, draw him. Affectually draw him. And then Jesus said, I'll take
it from there. I'll raise him up at the last
day. I'll raise him from the grave in the last day. The father
draws him to me. Now look at verse 45. It is written
in the prophets, and they shall be all taught of God. Everybody
that is going to get to the son will be taught of God to Christ. Every man therefore that has
heard and learned of the Father cometh unto me, cometh unto me. So you have verses 35 through
45 to support the very thing that I'm telling you this morning.
Jesus has told these Jews, he said, Folks, you can listen all
you want, you can complain and murmur that you don't have it
straight, and you can't figure it out. But there ain't no need
of you murmuring, because you're not going to come except my Father
which sent me draw you unto me. Now then, beloved, what are we
here for this morning? Well, I believe that God chooses,
through the preaching of the gospel, to draw men and women
unto Himself. I believe that God uses the Word,
as it sowed the seed of the Word of God, the incorruptible seed
of the Word of God, to call men and women out of sin unto Himself. I believe in preaching the gospel,
and I want to just preach the gospel to you this morning, out
of these verses here in Matthew chapter 19. So now if you're
not in Matthew 19 then you turn back there and I wanna give you
here four questions that comes up that is asked in this conversation
that Jesus had with this rich young ruler. Now if there's somebody,
Dennis, if you would, would you go back there and turn that furnace
down? That thing, this is hot in here.
It's very warm up here anyway. So if you would turn it down,
please. These verses that we read here out of Matthew chapter
19, they contain a conversation that took place between Jesus
and the rich young ruler. This man is a self-righteous
Pharisee and he went away, as we said earlier, without eternal
life. This is a sad sad story, but
it's a very instructive story and within this story there are
four questions that are raised. Now the answers to these four
questions need to be understood by all because they are very,
very instructive. And so if you have a soul to
save, you listen as I give you these questions and try to answer
them very briefly. I'll not keep you very long.
We'll just go through these in a hurry, but I want you to get
them this morning. And maybe, just maybe, as we
answer these questions, maybe the Lord might be pleased to
say something to somebody here in this room now number one question
is found here in verse 16 when this rich young ruler came and
said what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life
now on the very surface this question may appear to be a very
noble question and that any thoughtful person ought to ask what good
thing could I do to inherit eternal life but it is a question that
I think that betrays a very proud and a very self-righteous heart.
This man presumed that he was sufficient. Now listen to me
carefully, because I don't have the time to go back over these
things, so you listen carefully. This man presumed that he was
sufficient in himself to meet whatever demands God himself
might put upon him. Good master, what good thing
could I do to inherit eternal life? In essence, He was saying,
Master, you tell me what God requires and I will do it. All you need to do is tell me
what a holy God, what a thrice holy God, what a God such as
the God of the Bible, the God of Abraham and Isaac, the God
and Father even of the Lord Jesus Christ, what does He demand?
And I will do it. Well, that reminds me of what
happened back in the book of Exodus chapter 19 and verse 8,
where when the Lord spoke to Moses and the people said, at
the time of the giving of the law, and all the people, it says
in that verse, answered together and said, all that the Lord has
spoken we will do. Everything that the Lord has
spoken, Moses, on the tablets of stone, we will do. Well, you know that before Moses
got back down with those tablets, he had already committed idolatry,
and you remember the story, I don't have to tell you about it, but
you know that their saying that they would do all that the Lord
commanded did not equal doing it. Saying and doing is two different
things. And so this man, when he said,
I'll just do whatever you tell me, what God requires, what he
demands, And I'll do it. I'll do it. Now this man was
without question ignorant of God's righteousness and thought
he could establish righteousness for himself. Romans 10 and 3,
remember where Paul talked about the people he ministered to and
said they're zealous as all get out, but they're ignorant of
God's righteousness. Now God's righteousness is Jesus
Christ. God's righteousness is Jesus
Christ. The Bible calls him the Lord
Our Righteousness. That's his name. Christ is God's
righteousness. If you would be as righteous
as God, you must be in Christ. God's righteousness is a person,
Jesus Christ. Now then, he thought he could
establish his own. Well, Paul said, these people
are going about to establish their own righteousness, and
they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God.
Now then, your doing is following. What can sinful man, what can
he do? Can he produce righteousness?
Galatians 3 and 10 says, for as many are of the works of the
law under the curse, for it is written, cursed is everyone that
continueth, not in all things that are written in the book
of the law to do them, but that any man is just before God in
the sight of God by the law, it is evident that no man is
just, because the Bible says the just shall live by faith.
And the law is not a faith. But they that live by the law
must do the law. Now this man thought that he
was doing the law, that he kept the law from his use up, but
he was ignorant of the spiritual and internal demands of the law. And we'll see that very clearly
in just a little while. He was an ignorant man. He was
religious as he could be and moral above you and I probably. But he was ignorant of God's
righteousness. Just tell me what God demands
and I'll do it. Well, you and I know that it's
sinful for a man and it's folly for a man to say that. God demands
two things from all men that no mere man can ever produce.
Now you remember what I'm saying. God demands two things from all
men that no man can produce. Number one is righteousness.
God demands you be as righteous as He is. Nobody's going to heaven
that's not as righteous as God is. Now I tell you, before God,
I'm not here this morning just playing with words. I'm here
this morning representing the God of the Bible. I'm here to
tell you the truth. that you're not going to heaven
unless you're as righteous as God is. Now give it up. You say, well I'm working on
it. You're working on it, you've
already polluted it, and you've already corrupted it. You're
a lost sinner dead in sin and you have no ability. to produce
righteousness. You're a fallen soul and you
cannot produce righteousness. God must give it to you. And
he said this is my son and he is my righteousness. Believe
on him and trust him and I'll justify you. I'll make you as
righteous as I am if you just trust my son and believe on him.
You'll be as righteous as I am. Now that's what the Bible teaches.
That's the way you get to be just before God, and righteous
before God. God demands righteousness, you
can't produce it. And another thing, he demands
is satisfaction for all of your sins. And you can't, what are
you gonna do? Somebody said, well I'm turning
over a new leaf, that's what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna quit
my sinful ways, you go right ahead, but what about yesterday?
What about last year? What about all through your life
up to this time? Even if you were successful,
You would still, still owe a debt to God that you couldn't pay.
Satisfaction. God said I gotta have satisfaction
for sin. He said the soul of a sinner
must die. That's what He said. He said
that the wages of sin is death. But the gift of God, my gift
to sinners that believe on me is eternal life. And so God demands
that. In other words, He demands obedience,
and He demands atonement. And you can't provide either
one of them, you can't make either one of them. Now Christ brought
in everlasting righteousness, and Christ made atonement for
the sins of His people when He died as our substitute. So this
man said, what good thing must I do? And he couldn't do anything,
but our Lord gave him the law. And said, you just keep that
law. You just keep that law, both internally and externally.
You remember that he said, you keep the commandments. And then
he said, you love your neighbors yourself. Well, he was getting
on with something here. You see, the law said, love the
Lord your God with all of your heart, all of your mind, all
of your soul, and all of your strength, and your neighbors
yourself. Well, we'll find out here in
a minute. Question number two. Jesus said, you know this man
came and said, good master? And Jesus said, why callest thou
me good? Jesus was listening. He knew
this man's heart. He said, why'd you call me good?
That's in verse 17. And after raising this question,
our Lord explained to him that there is none good but one that
is God. In other words, why'd you ask
me this? Did you ask me this because you believe I'm God?
Or did you ask me this because you believe I'm a rabbi or teacher
you call everybody that teaches religion good? So the question
is, why do you call me good? Well, let us never forget that
no man is good in God's eyes in a state of nature. Everybody
that is outside of Christ, they're not good in God's sight. They
are not. They're sinners. And they're
rebels. They were born in sin. And no man can make himself.
Now this is something very important for you to see. No man. And you
listen to me now. Now listen to me. Chris can take
care of that. Listen. No man can make himself
good by doing good. No man can make himself good
in the sight of God by doing good. Now, that puts people out
of business. They say, well, you know, I think
if a guy does good, then he would be good. But the trouble of it
is, the Bible says there is none that doeth good, no, not one.
Romans 3 10 through 12, you can read it there, very clearly said.
And Proverbs 20 and verse 4 says most men will proclaim everyone
his own goodness But a faithful man, who can find? Who can find? In Ecclesiastes 7.20, there's
not a just man on the earth that doeth good and sinneth not. In
Jeremiah 13 and 23, can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard
his spots? Then may you also do good that
are accustomed to do evil. You can't do it. An Ethiopian
can't change the color of his skin, can he? Leopard can't change
his spots. And so you that are accustomed
to do evil, you cannot do good so as that God, now your neighbor
might approve of it. Your neighbor say, oh that's
good, that's wonderful. Your mama might say, that's good
young man, that's good. But I'm talking about in the
sight of Almighty God. I'm talking about the God that's
going to try you in the judgment. I'm talking about the God that
sees everything. I'm talking about the God to
whom all things are naked and open. That's what I'm talking
about, in His sight. God that knows your heart. He
knows your mind. He knows your thoughts. Now then,
the only man in the world since the fall of Adam, who was good
and did good, is the God-man, Christ Jesus. Are you having
trouble with that? I don't have a bit of trouble with that. The
reason I don't have any trouble with that is because He's my
refuge, He's my substitute. He's my substitute! I'm in Him. And he did good, and he is good. And his nature was not polluted
like mine. He didn't have, there was no
pollution in his blood. And his goodness is of infinite
merit for his people. Now, like I say, this is what
I'm all about. Talking about somebody who is
somebody. Talking about somebody who's
got some ability. Somebody who can provide what
is demanded of me. God himself cannot refuse the
goodness of Christ. Because he is God, this good
man, the God-man is an effectual and all-sufficient Savior. He
is. Because he is good, God and his
merit is of infinite worth. Now then, that brings me to the
third question. I must hurry. What lack I yet? This is in verse
20. The man said, well, I've kept
all this from my youth up. What lack I yet? What is it that
I lack? Well, you may be like this rich
young ruler, very moral, but one thing this man lacks. And
Jesus told him what he liked. Now you know the first part of
the law says, the commandment says, thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all of your heart, all your mind, and all your soul.
Now this man was a rich man. And this man, being rich as he
was, our Lord put the finger on him. He said, if thou wilt
be perfect, in verse 21, you go and sell what you have. Give
it to the poor. In other words, what you must
do now, you say that you have kept the law and that you're
not an idolater and that this money don't mean nothing to you,
it means nothing, then you just go sell it and give it to the
poor. Sell everything you've got and give it to the poor.
Our Lord knew. You know the Bible says that
covetousness is what? Idolatry is what it is. Now this
man had broken the first commandment. He broke the first commandment.
He was in love with money and what that money could purchase,
what it could provide for him in this world. He was in love
with that to the point he would sacrifice his own soul for that
goods, for those goods. He would not sell it. He would
not give it to the poor. He wouldn't do it. So God said,
or the Lord Jesus said, well, this is what you've got to do
if you're going to be perfect. You said you kept the law. Now
you prove that your heart is in this thing. You prove that
not only you have not committed adultery, but that you have no
lust in your heart. Prove that! And not only that,
but you also prove that all the other internal, like for an example,
love your neighbors yourself, this man did not love his neighbors
himself, he could not love his neighbor as himself, and he wouldn't
love... He wouldn't. He wouldn't say,
well that stuff don't mean nothing to me. I mean, this is going
to stand between me and the Lord Jesus Christ. This is going to
stand between me and God. Let it go. The quicker I get
it out of my hands, the better off I am. Now listen to me, listen
to me. If there is anything, if there is anything that you
have There's one thing that is needful and necessary, and that's
faith in Christ, a faith that surrenders all and obeys Christ,
and a faith that will enable you to let go of this world and
all that is in it, and say, Lord, it's in your hands. Do with it
whatever you will. Lord, it's in your hand. If you
instruct me to do with it what you told this rich young ruler,
then I'll do it. There is nothing, Lord, I love
more than you. There isn't anything that I love. There is no person and there
is nothing that I love more than you. And when it comes down to
it, when it comes down to it, I love God more than anything
else. Now listen to me, like I said earlier, it's one thing
to say it and another thing to do it. And God may lay hold of
you one of these days and say now, wait a minute, do you love
that thing more than you do me? Do you love it more than you
do me? Well, that was this man's problem. And he went away lost. He couldn't let go of it. He
could not let go of it. He said, no, he went away sorrowful
for he had great possessions. He had great possession. He just
couldn't turn a loose. Now brother, sister, this religion business
is serious business. There's a flaw in every one of
our natures. There is some big flaws in our
natures. And once in a while, once in
a while, we get a hold of something. We grab something. We get something
in this world. We get a hold of it. And I'll
tell you what, we're not awful careful. That thing will be a
God to us, and we'll be guilty of idolatry. We want that thing.
We love it. We want it. And we would do whatever
we gotta do to keep it, or to get it, possess it, keep it.
And I'll tell you what, when it comes to the things of God,
you dare not profess to be a Christian, a believer, and not say, God,
His will, His way, His truth, is first in my life. And if God grants and blesses
and gives and provides and puts it into my hands and it doesn't
violate that principle, then that's fine. Then that's fine. But one thing thou lackest. And
you see the Lord knew his heart. Alright, the fourth thing, and
I've really got to move here, and that is in verse 25, The
disciples heard all this, and they were amazed. Our Lord was
saying, why it's easier for a camel to go through an eye of a needle
than for a fellow like this to give up them riches. It's easier for
a rich man. A rich man can hardly enter into
the kingdom of God. And the disciples said, what
do you mean? Why, they were amazed and said, who then can be saved? If this is the way it is, Who
then can be saved? And our Lord beheld them, he
looked on them, and he said to them, with men this is impossible.
With men it is impossible, but with God all things are possible.
Salvation is up to man or depends upon man. No one will ever be
saved, rich or poor. Nobody. That's what our Lord
said. Nobody could be saved, but since
salvation is of the Lord, salvation is not only possible, but it's
absolutely certain for God's elect. Now wouldn't you get that
out of this verse? But with God all things are possible. God can and does save men. God does save men and women. He does come and He does wean
hearts away from this world. And He does give men and women
a love and a principle of love in their hearts that causes them
to say, well Lord we bow our knee to your will, we surrender
ourselves entirely to your purpose and good will. And we give up
ourselves into your hands. But since salvation is of the
Lord, salvation is possible and absolutely certain for God's
elect. Every chosen, redeemed, and called sinner shall be saved.
All hell cannot prevent it. Trust Christ if you can, and
if you do, the Lord will and has saved you by His marvelous
grace. God has intervened. If you're
able to trust Christ, if you're able to believe on Him. Now there's
a verse of scripture there in John 20, I'm going to read that
and I'm done. Or John 6, and I'm finished. That's verse 47 of John 6. I say if you trust Christ, then
God has saved you. Salvation is possible with God.
He can save you. Verse 47, Verily, verily, I say
unto you, those words mean they're truly, truly what they mean.
I say unto you, he that believeth on me hath everlasting life. He that believeth on me hath
present possession everlasting life. If you're able to trust
able to trust Him. I hope you will. You'll trust
Him. You'll trust Him. May God be
pleased to use this message this morning for His glory. I don't
know how clear it is coming from this side. I don't know how clear
it is. There's some people that, you
know, I'm sure they have a lot of trouble understanding. Most
of you have heard me enough to where you can understand what
I'm talking about. Some others may have trouble
first time or two, or three, or four, or five, or six, or
whatever. But anyway, I hope the Lord has made this clear
to you this morning. We're shut up to Him, shut up
to Christ, shut up to God to do something. So you keep praying
for your friends and relatives that God will enable you to roll
the stone away and be of help, whatever help you can be. And
that Christ will call them like he did Lazarus, out of the grave
unto himself. Christ will do that out of their
spiritual death. Father, in the name of our Lord,
we thank you for this privilege today and I do hope that you
will intervene and may the word that has been preached, your
very word, the scriptures that have been used here today, may
they stick in the hearts of your people and may they be used and
anyone here today that is out of side of Christ, may they be
enabled to trust Him according to your will and purpose of old
time. We pray it in Jesus name, Amen.