If you will, open your Bibles
with me today to Mark chapter 12. Mark chapter 12, and today we're
looking at verses 28 through 34. And one of the scribes came
And having heard them reasoning together and perceiving that
he had answered them well, ask him, which is the first commandment
of all? And Jesus answered him, the first
of all the commandments is, hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is
one Lord, and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart and with all thy soul, And with all thy mind, and with
all thy strength, this is the first commandment. And the second
is like, namely this, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There's none other commandment
greater than these. And the scribe said unto him,
well, master, thou hast said the truth. For there is one God,
and there is none other but he. And to love him with all the
heart and with all the understanding and with all the soul and with
all the strength and to love his neighbor as himself is more
than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. And when Jesus
saw that he answered discreetly, he said unto him, thou art not
far from the kingdom of God. And no man after that doth ask
him any question. Now for several weeks I've been
reminding us that we are looking at scriptures since we came to
chapter 11, Mark chapter 11, we are looking at scriptures
which record events in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ in the
week in which he was crucified. And we have seen on the third
day, that he was teaching in the temple. And as he was teaching,
he was questioned by Israel's religious leaders. And to this
point, where we are today, where we began our text this morning,
he has been asked two questions. And according to verse 13, the
purpose, the motive behind the questions that he has been asked
so far was to catch him in his words. The first question concerned
paying tribute to Rome. The second had to do with the
resurrection of the body, which they denied. Now today, we look
at a final question a final question that he was asked in the temple. And this question is, which is
the first commandment of all? In verse 28. And then we read
in verse 34, after our Lord answered this question, no man does ask
him any question. After he answered this question,
he was not asked another question that day in the temple. Now, I have three points that
I pray God will impress upon all of us here this morning.
That's my prayer, that God will impress these three things upon
each and every one of us. And I do not know of anything
more important that I could speak today, that I could bring to
us in these three things. The first point is the reality
of the man who asked this question. the reality of the man who asked
this question. It's so easy to read these passages
and forget that these were real men. This was a real man who
asked this question. A real man just like you and
just like me. He had a name. He was part of
a family. We don't know his name, of course,
but he was a real man. And this man His soul is somewhere
today. After over 2,000 years, this
man who asked this question, his soul is somewhere today. And there's only two places where
he might be. He may be in the father's house,
where the Lord Jesus Christ said, there are pleasures forevermore. And we would hope that that's
where he is. But the truth of the matter is
he may be in the place that the Lord Jesus Christ called the
everlasting fire, or the place prepared for the devil and his
angels, that is the lake of fire. Now we're not told. We're not
told which it is. But we know this, this morning,
just as sure as we know that we are here. We know we're here. We're someone. We have an existence. We're not just imagining that
we are real. We are real. And so was this
man. And this man is somewhere today. He's somewhere. He didn't cease
to exist. He died, I know that, and his
body's turned back to dust, no question. But he himself is somewhere
today. And there's only two places where
he may be. And I pray God would impress
that upon each and every one of us today. That we too have
a soul. And we too are going to die.
It's appointed unto men once to die, and after this to judgment. And at that time, our body will
turn back to the dust, but our soul will live on somewhere,
either with the Lord in eternal bliss or in hell with eternal
woe. Something else that we don't
know about this man is his purpose for asking this question. We were told the purpose of the
others who asked their questions. They were trying to catch the
Lord, trying to trick him up, bring a knot that they felt like
he could not untie, a question that he could not answer. that
would not give them ammunition to charge him, either to the
civil authorities or to the religious authorities. We don't know about
this man, what his purpose was in asking this question. We asked,
did he ask in sincerity? Did he ask in sincerity? A lot
of people ask questions of preachers and other people, and they're
not sincere. Very few people ask for information. Many times people ask a question
to let you know how much they already know or what they think
they know. We don't know what the purpose
was of his question. Matthew's account tells us this
about this man and his question. Matthew says he asked him a question
tempting him. And when you read that, it may
automatically bring a bad connotation to your mind, a bad thought to
your mind. And he asked him a question tempting
him. But that word, which is there
translated tempting him, is sometimes used in a good sense. And it
means testing. For instance, when the Apostle
James and his officials said, brethren, count it all joy when
you fall into divers temptations. Now certainly he's not talking
about temptations to sin. We shouldn't count that joy.
We should flee and run from temptations to sin. We pray, lead us not
into temptation, temptations to sin. But God's children do. experienced testings in this
world. The Lord tests His people. And
I know this is certainly true, that faith needs to be tested. It needs to be tested before
you set out into eternity. Faith needs to be proved. Is
it real? Is it counterfeit? Faith needs
to be trusted. So when our Lord is asked this
question, and Matthew tells us that he asked the question tempting
him, that doesn't necessarily mean he had a bad motive, as
far as I'm concerned. Because you see here in Mark,
by his response to the Lord's answer, and then his comment,
it seems that he may have asked in sincerity. And so we can hope
that he did. We are told that he was a scribe,
which means he was well associated with the law of God, that he
read the law, he translated or he interpreted the law, he taught
the law, he was well studied in the law, he transcribed the
law, he was a scribe. And so we ask this question,
or I do, would God's law, would God's law serve him Did it serve
him as a schoolmaster to bring him to Christ? You know, the
Apostle Paul in Galatians wrote, wherefore the law was our schoolmaster
to bring us unto Christ that we might be justified by faith. Did the law, as the Lord Jesus
Christ expounded the law to this man, did it serve him as a schoolmaster
to bring him to Christ? And I ask each and every one
of us today, has the law served you as it served me to bring
us to Christ that we might be justified by faith? It does some
people, by the grace of God, the law does serve some people
in this sense, but not everyone. Not everyone. I'm thinking of
the man who's called the rich young ruler. He came running
to the Lord Jesus Christ and the Lord recited certain commands
or several commands to him. And this young man said, all
these things have I kept from my youth up. And so all the law
did for that man was to bolster him in his self-righteousness. That's all the law accomplished
for that man. Thank God. By the grace of God,
sometimes the law serves to shut a man's mouth. You say, what? I'm just repeating what the Apostle
Paul said. Sometimes by the grace of God,
the law of God serves to shut a man's mouth. Not always, but
always. when God's grace and God's purpose
is to bring that man to Christ. This is what Paul wrote in Romans
chapter three in verse 19. He said, now we know that what
things soever the law saith to them that are under the law,
that every mouth may be stopped. Shut! You hear the word of God,
The law of God and it shuts your mouth. You stop excusing yourself
and justifying yourself and talk about the environment that has
caused you to be what you are and do what you've done. The
law by the grace of God shuts your mouth and you say, I'm guilty. and all the world may become
guilty before God. All the world. You know, sometimes
people say, well, the law, that was just for the Jews. Well,
yes, the covenant that God made with the nation of Israel at
Sinai was for the Jewish people, but there has always been a law,
the law of God, the law which was written upon Adam's heart
at his creation, And the law pronounces every
man in this world guilty, guilty. Now here's something we do know
about this man. The Lord told him, thou are not
far from the kingdom of God. You're not far from the kingdom
of God. When the Lord heard him answer. And this man's answer was that there's one God and there's
none other but he and to love him with all the heart and with
all the understanding and with all the soul and with all the
strength and to love his neighbor as himself is more. more than all the whole burnt
offerings, all the burnt offerings, all the sacrifices that the law
commanded. To love God is the great commandment. That was his question, which
is the great commandment. And the Lord told him then, thou
art not far from the kingdom of God. Now, when I read this,
Read these words, thou art not far from the kingdom of God.
This tells me he was outside. To be not far is to be outside
the kingdom of God. In other words, at this point
he did not believe it had not been revealed to him that Jesus,
the one he was asking, is the Christ, the very Son of God Almighty. You're not far from the kingdom
of God. He was outside though. And I
looked at this and I think about this and it reminded me of the
cities of refuge in the Old Testament. And we know the cities of refuge,
they were part of the types and shadows in the Old Testament
that pictured Christ. and the cities of refuge because
Christ is the sinner's refuge. He's my refuge. He's your refuge
today if you know him as your Lord and as your Savior. Those
cities of refuge were provided for the manslayer. He was not guilty of murder.
The scripture says, thou shalt not murder, but he was guilty
of manslaughter. He had accidentally taken the
life of someone else, not on purpose, not premeditated or
anything like that. And so God provided six cities
in the nation called cities of refuge, three on either side
of the River Jordan. And when a man accidentally,
as I said, caused the death of someone else, what was he to
do? He was to take off. He was to
take off. I mean, he was to flee. That's
the word. He's to flee. Why? Because there is a revenger
of blood. In other words, there's someone
kin to that person that you accidentally killed, and he has the right
to revenge that person's blood. And if he catches you outside
the city of refuge, he may kill you and be innocent. Flee! That was the command. Flee! Now,
it doesn't matter. Hear me now. It doesn't matter
how close a person came to a city of refuge. There were six of
them, and they were located in the land there, Palestine, where
You could easily get to one in one day, but you didn't fool
around. You ran. You were a sprinter. You were going for your life.
And it doesn't matter how close you came, as long as you were
outside, once you crossed the threshold and you entered into
the gates of that city, you were safe. You were safe and the revenge
of blood could not touch you. But if you were outside, you
say he's just a foot outside. Well, yes, he's a foot outside,
but he may be destroyed outside. This man was not foreign and
there's people in this congregation this morning. May you may be
in that same condition. You're not far from the kingdom
of God. You're not far, but to be not
far is not to be in the kingdom of God. To be close is not the answer, but to be in, in the kingdom
of God. Look with me in John chapter
three. John chapter three, beginning
with verse 16. The Lord Jesus spoke these words. He said, for God so loved the
world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God
sent not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that
the world through him might be saved. You see, when the Lord
Jesus Christ came into this world, the world was already condemned.
When we come into this world, we are condemned. Why? Because we're born sinners. We
come into this world with a sinful nature, which we have inherited
from our father, Adam. And we come into this world condemned. God did not send His Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ, into this world to condemn the world. The
world was already condemned. Well, then why did He send Him? To save, to save His people. Notice the next verse. He that
believeth on Him is not condemned. You see, a person who believes
on Him is inside the kingdom. He's inside the kingdom. This
man was not far, but he was outside. He that believeth on him is not
condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already, because
he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. Our Lord's command, and I love
that this is a command in the Sermon on the Mount, Our Lord
said, enter ye in at the straight gate. That's a command. That's a command. Enter ye in
at the straight gate. Christ is the straight gate. And Christ is the narrow way.
You say, how can he be the gate and the narrow way? Well, just
as he's the door into the sheepfold and also the shepherd. He's both. He's the narrow way
and he is the narrow gate. You say, how narrow is that gate? I'll tell you how narrow it is.
If you bring anything with you, you can't get it through the
gate. That's it. Anything but Christ. You bring
your church membership, you bring your baptism, you bring your
good works, you can't go through the gate. The gate is Christ,
and it's a narrow gate. On Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground, we just sang
it, is sinking sand. And he's the narrow way in which
we are to walk. So that's the first point I wanted
to impress and pray that the Lord would impress upon all of
us is to remember this man was a real person and he is somewhere
today. And when he asked this question,
he was outside the kingdom of God. Now, the second thing, the
second point is the strictness of God's holy law. The strictness
of God's holy law. This man asked, what's the great
commandment? And our Lord said, thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul
and with all thy mind and with all thy strength. This is the
first commandment. The second is like unto it, thou
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Now listen to me. It's possible to read that law
and to admire that law. It's possible to do that. It's
possible to memorize that law, and you can repeat it from memory.
Anytime you're asked, you can repeat those very words of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And it's possible to preach from
that law. A man like myself, he may stand
up and preach from this passage of scripture, from the law. A
man may paint these commandments upon the walls of his house.
He may hire someone and have a big sign painted and put it
out there in his front yard. We can do all of those things,
but the one thing that we cannot do that the law commands is to
perfectly obey it. We can do a lot with that law,
but the one thing we can't do, none of us, we cannot perfectly
obey that law. I read the story recently of
a missionary who was preaching in a marketplace in a foreign
land, and he was declaring the truth about man's guiltiness
before God, how he had broken the law of God and was guilty. And a Muslim in the crowd took
issue with him. And he took issue with what he
was teaching. And he said this, something like
this, if I can remember. He said, I don't agree with you.
He said, I work for a woman. I work for a lady. She's a Christian
lady. And she's not like you said.
She's certainly not guilty before God Almighty. She's a fine woman. And the missionary asked this
man, did she tell you she's not guilty? Did she tell you that,
that she's not guilty? And the man said, you know, that's
the strangest thing. I've stood outside her door when
she was praying, and I've heard her confess that she's a guilty
sinner, that she's a vile sinner. No, she didn't tell him that.
He observed her conduct, and she looked to him at least as
someone who couldn't possibly be guilty before God's law. But she didn't say that about
herself. She confessed, like Job. Behold,
I'm vile. Like the Apostle Paul, O wretched
man that I am. When you hear a person talking
about how good they are and how great they are, just be thankful
it's not you. Because obviously, they have
not been taught by the Spirit of God. Because this law is so strict,
my friends. There's a line of a hymn that,
I don't know if I've ever sung it, but I've heard this quoted
many times. A sinner is a sacred thing. The Holy Ghost hath made him
one. The Holy Ghost hath made him
one. A sinner, a sinner who needs
a savior. A sinner to whom God, the Holy
Spirit, has brought the weight of this strict, perfect, holy
law of God to bear on his conscience and for him to know that he's
guilty. He's guilty before God. I heard a pastor one time say that
he was a pastor of a church where they had a board of elders. become
a part of that church you had to go before this board of elders
and and he was a pastor and he would ask the questions and they
would examine the person and this lady a believing woman uh... an older woman and he was just
out of theological school he said his first pastor and and
she came in and And he had some questions there and they were
just flying over her head, you know, theological questions.
And she was confused. And he said, I realized finally
that I wasn't asking the right questions. And he said, I asked
her this question, are you a sinner? Oh, she said, you finally asked
an easy question. You finally asked an easy question. Yes. Yes, I'm a sinner, and I'm
so thankful that the Lord Jesus Christ came into this world to
save sinners. And that's why I love him, and
that's why I serve him, because he came to save sinners. You
see, the law had done its work in her heart. The law will not
be relaxed in any way that would dishonor God. To love God, now
think about it, to love God with all your heart, with all your
soul, with all your mind, with all your strength. Have you ever
done that? And it's not just doing it one
time, it's doing it continuously, it's doing it always. There never
been a time since you came into this world that you have not
loved God in such a way, and to love your neighbor as yourself."
And which one of us here this morning, when we read that, love
your neighbor as yourself, can really confess that we're not
thankful that hurricane is going east and not coming here? Well,
those are our neighbors over there, right? Those are our neighbors over
there. We love ourselves the most, don't we? We're thankful
that thing, God's sending it somewhere else. Now, I want you
to turn with me to Romans chapter eight. And while you're turning
there, I'm going to read a verse of scripture from Matthew five,
a verse that you're familiar with. Matthew five and verse
20. Our Lord said, for I say unto
you, that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness
of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no case enter into
the kingdom of heaven. We've got to have a righteousness
which exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees. Now, the third
point is may God impress us that perfect obedience to God's law. that our Lord told that man,
here's the greatest commandments, cited that law to him. That perfect
obedience that the law requires is the righteousness that God
requires for anyone to enter the kingdom of heaven. That's the righteousness. We've
got to have a righteousness which loves God with all our heart,
soul, mind, and strength and soul. We've got to have a righteousness
that loves our neighbor as ourself, if we are to enter into the kingdom
of heaven. Romans chapter 8, in the first
few verses here, the apostle says, there's therefore now no
condemnation. What we were condemned. You said,
preacher, the world was already condemned, that we come into
this world condemned. Yes, I did. And that's what the
scripture says. The apostle Paul here says, there's
therefore now no condemnation, but look to whom this applies,
to them which are in Christ Jesus. There's no condemnation now for
those that are in Christ Jesus. Of course not. Why? Why is that? Well, read on. For the law of
the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, the gospel, the wonderful
good news, the gospel, hath made me free from the law of sin and
death. The law that pointed out my sin
and that results in death. The Lord Jesus hath made me free
from the law of sin and death. for what the law could not do. What is it that the law could
not do? That it was weak through the flesh. That is, through our
weakness, we could not obey that law. We could not keep that law
perfectly. We could not provide that righteousness
that we must have if we are to enter the kingdom of heaven. God sending his own son in the
likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the
flesh. We couldn't do it. And God sent
his son, and it says he came in the likeness of sinful flesh.
He didn't have sinful flesh, but he looked like everyone else. Everyone else, we are sinful. But he was born of our bone and
flesh of our flesh, but without sin. He was a holy, harmless,
undefiled, separate from sinners, son of God, but in the likeness
of sinful flesh and for sin. Now he had no sin of his own.
You know that. And yet he was condemned. Not
only condemned, but judged. Not only judged, but put to death.
Whose sin? for sin, for the sin of his people,
which was transferred or imputed unto him, that the righteousness of the
law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the spirit. Now, walking after the spirit
is a result, it's not the cause. You say, well, if you walk after
the Spirit and do not fulfill the lust of your flesh, then
you will not be condemned. No. If you're in Christ Jesus,
you will walk after the Spirit. That's that new man, that spiritual
man that is created in you in righteousness and true holiness. Doesn't mean you'll walk perfectly,
that you will never commit any sin. We know that's not so. But
there's no condemnation for anyone who is in Christ Jesus. Why? Because the righteousness that
the law requires has been fulfilled in us or given unto us through
the person and work of God's dear son, Jesus Christ. I pray
God would bless this word. I pray that it make it clear
that no one here That's always my concern, that no one come
into this place and we're not making it just as clear as humanly
possible how a man might be right with God. I want to be in the kingdom of
God, don't you? I don't want to be just close.
I want to be in the kingdom of God. And there's one way in. And Christ is that way. And His
righteousness, His righteousness becomes my righteousness and
becomes your righteousness. It's unto all and upon all them
that believe, the Apostle Paul says in Romans 3. I trust the
Lord will bless the message.