Everyone Needs Jesus

There is an amazing resort located in Vietnam, which is a country in Asia. This resort is in the mountains near a beautiful shoreline right off the ocean. This resort has everything that you can imagine that you would like to do. Even if its just relaxing in a hot tub watching the sun set on a relaxing day. They provide the best food so you can have your dream breakfast, an excellent lunch and the best dinner you could imagine prepared for by some of the best chef’s in the world.

At this resort you also get daily massages and you are able to choose any activity for entertainment that you can think of each day. In addition to this you get a private butler to wait on you while you attend this resort. Now lets take a look at what it looks like.

Video

What did you guys think of that? Would you like to stay in a place like that for a bit to relax?

This resort cost about $1,000 per day per person. But lets say that someone offered for you and your family or you and your friends to be able to go to this resort for a week for free. However since this resort is so remote and exclusive the only way that you can get there is by taking a Helicopter. You cant drive in, and you cannot fly a plane in, but you can travel there only by helicopter.

How many of you would accept the offer and fly in on the Helicopter?

Today we are going to talk about our need for Christ and that the only way to have eternal life is by forsaking everything and following Jesus.

The Big Idea- We cannot obtain eternal life from our own efforts, we need Jesus.

Take Aways

All have sinned

Jesus paid the price so we could have eternal life.

Placing our faith in Jesus is the only way to receive eternal life.

Mark 10:17–18 NKJV

Now as He was going out on the road, one came running, knelt before Him, and asked Him, “Good Teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?” So Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God.

Here when Jesus is approached by someone running up to him that person called Him “Good Teacher” asking Jesus how he can obtain eternal life. Then Jesus lets him know that no one is good but One and he says that good One is God.

Here Jesus is not saying that He is not good, but he is teaching all others that No one else is good except God.

If only God is good the how is Jesus good?

Yes , Jesus is God. There is one God in three persons, the Father, the Son who is Jesus and 100% God and 100% man, and there is the Holy Spirit who dwells in believers today. These three are three persons of God but are one God.

Mark 10:19–21 NKJV

You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ ‘Do not steal,’ ‘Do not bear false witness,’ ‘Do not defraud,’ ‘Honor your father and your mother.’ ” And he answered and said to Him, “Teacher, all these things I have kept from my youth.” Then Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “One thing you lack: Go your way, sell whatever you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, take up the cross, and follow Me.”

Here the man said that he kept the commandments from his youth. But the man did not know or think that he had not kept the commandments.

Unfortunately the man loved his possessions more than Christ. Since Jesus is God this means that the man broke the first commandment. “you shall have no other Gods before me”, he made his possessions His God because he loved it more than the true God.

This is something that we will want to look at in our own lives. Is there anything in your life that you love more than God? Anything that you would choose instead of serving God? If there is something in your life that is more important than God then that is an Idol for you and you have made it an object of worship rather than God.

When Jesus responded to the answer that the man gave Him, Jesus knew the truth about the man. When Jesus responded, He responded with the truth and He did it in love because he truly loved the man.

Mark 10:22 NKJV

But he was sad at this word, and went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

Why do you all think that the man went away sad?

Well the man realized that he could not give up his possessions for Jesus. So instead of doing that he chose to hold on to his possessions keeping them in the place of where God should be in his life. He then realized that because of that he could not inherit eternal life.

Just like that was true of that man back then this principle is true of us today. If we are not willing to give up everything to follow Christ then we will not have eternal life.

Luke 14:26–27 NKJV

“If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.

When this passage is talking about hating your family and your life it is saying that you must love Christ more than all of those things in order to follow Him. He is not saying to treat your family poorly or to literally hate them.

To take up your cross is to die to yourself daily, which is to not do what your flesh wants or not to act on the sinful desires that we have apart from Christ. But instead to life for Jesus following Him and following what the Word of God tells us to do.

Back to our main text

Mark 10:23–24 NKJV

Then Jesus looked around and said to His disciples, “How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God!” And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus answered again and said to them, “Children, how hard it is for those who trust in riches to enter the kingdom of God!

How can someone trust in riches, and whats wrong with that?

Someone trusts in riches when they rely on it to take care of their every needs. They place their confidence in it and if they do not have riches then they are in despair. Because of this they live to gain riches and when they have them then they do not rely on God for anything because they think riches can achieve it.

In order to be followers of Christ we must realize that we need Him for salvation and we place our faith in Him alone. Meaning we rely on nothing or no one else but Christ.

Mark 10:25–27 NKJV

It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” And they were greatly astonished, saying among themselves, “Who then can be saved?” But Jesus looked at them and said, “With men it is impossible, but not with God; for with God all things are possible.”

Is it possible for anyone to enter the kingdom of God on their own strength?

Since no one is Good but God, no one can have eternal life on their own strength. Because in order to have eternal life one must be perfect and Holy. But there is no one that is perfect or that has lived a perfect life except for Jesus.

Romans 3:23 NKJV

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

So since all have sinned it is impossible for anyone to have eternal life apart from Christ.

Romans 3:24–26 NKJV

being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed, to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

What this is saying is that Jesus died on the cross for our sins so that we could have eternal life. Since we were all in sin and no one can go to heaven if they had sinned, Jesus paid the price of sin in the place of those who put their faith in Him. Because of this we can have eternal life. Everyone needs Jesus.

Take Aways

All have sinned

Jesus paid the price so we could have eternal life.

Placing our faith in Jesus is the only way to receive eternal life.