Cost, Reward, & Relationship
The Way to Jesus • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Open your Bibles with me, if you will, to Luke chapter 18
We are in the third week of our series called The Way to Jesus
Over 6 weeks, we are looking at six personal interactions that people had with Jesus and talking about what they can teach us about following Jesus.
First, Jesus taught a religious leader about what it means to be born again
Last week, Jesus met a Samaritan woman and showed us that Jesus can meet anyone anywhere to become their source of life.
This morning, we’re going to meet a man who is struggling with the cost of relationship with God.
Let’s read together from Luke, chapter 18, and as we do I invite you to stand with me in honor of the reading of God’s Word:
A ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
“Why do you call me good?” Jesus asked him. “No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments: Do not commit adultery; do not murder; do not steal; do not bear false witness; honor your father and mother.”
“I have kept all these from my youth,” he said.
When Jesus heard this, he told him, “You still lack one thing: Sell all you have and distribute it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
After he heard this, he became extremely sad, because he was very rich.
Seeing that he became sad, Jesus said, “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”
Those who heard this asked, “Then who can be saved?”
He replied, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”
Then Peter said, “Look, we have left what we had and followed you.”
Pray, Invite people to sit
As you are finding your seat this morning, let me ask you a question:
What is more valuable to you than your relationship with Jesus?
Let me put it another way: What would you be unwilling to give up for God?
Your career?
Your home? Your standard of living?
What if following Jesus meant letting go of family?
What if it meant giving up your wealth and your material possessions?
What is more valuable to you than your relationship with God?
This is the driving question behind our passage this morning.
Would it shock you to hear that this passage isn’t really about money?
Now, God cares about your money. The Bible is full of discussions about money
But what is really at issue here is the heart of a man.
In this passage, we encounter a man who is like a lot of us.
He is a man that has been blessed with a lot.
I am not a rich man by any stretch, but I can admit that God has given me a lot.
By comparison to the rest of the world, most of the people in our country are very wealthy
Our country holds about 12% of the world’s population and 40% of its wealth.
The man in our encounter is also someone that most of us would consider a good person
He tries to do good
He tries not to do wrong
But this rich man is concerned. He wants something he knows that money can’t buy.
He wants to punch his ticket for a trip to Heaven. This is almost the exact question he asks in verse 18:
A ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
How can I live forever? How can I enter God’s eternal Kingdom?
This is a fantastic question, if you are really looking for the answer
But what I want you to see here this morning is that this man wasn’t seeking answers; He was seeking affirmation.
He doesn’t recognize Jesus for who He is. That’s why Jesus responds with a rhetorical question in verse 19
“Why do you call me good?” Jesus asked him. “No one is good except God alone.
Notice, Jesus didn’t say He isn’t good. He said only God is good. He is drawing the man in.
And then, Jesus gives the man exactly what he is looking for, or at least that is what the man thinks.
You know the commandments: Do not commit adultery; do not murder; do not steal; do not bear false witness; honor your father and mother.”
Jesus gives the man 4 of the 10 commandments, pointing him to the Law
And in His answer, Jesus has set the stage to get to the heart of the matter
You see, the man hears Jesus’ response and he feels completely validated
“I have kept all these from my youth,” he said.
What did the man just say? He said what so many people think about their relationship with God.
It’s transactional: If I do ABC, XYZ will happen
It’s a list of tasks, of do’s and do not’s
To him, and to others like him, heaven is an earned reward for good behavior.
This guy is wanting to check off the eternal life box in his investment portfolio.
But the problem with this logic is that it looks at the Law without the heart of God, as though the two could be separated.
“Listen, Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.
When Jesus is asked in Matthew 22:37 what the greatest commandment is, this is what He says:
He said to him, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and most important command. The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.
Eternal life, the Kingdom of Heaven, salvation from sin, all of it is about a loving God more than anything else.
With God, it isn’t just about what you do or don’t do-it’s also about why you do what you do.
You can never be good enough
You can’t check off enough boxes
You have to give Him your heart.
Jesus tells this man eternal life comes through treasuring Jesus, the treasure of heaven.
And
Today, Jesus invites you to make Him your treasure and find eternal life.
And in the rest of our passage this morning, He is going to show us four essentials to treasuring Jesus,
And they start in verse 21. Let’s look together:
When Jesus heard this, he told him, “You still lack one thing: Sell all you have and distribute it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
The first key to making Jesus your treasure is this,
Invest in Jesus’ Kingdom, not your own.
Invest in Jesus’ Kingdom, not your own.
This man’s problem wasn’t His wealth; it was its place and purpose in his life
I told you this passage isn’t about money:
Money isn’t evil, our hearts are
Look at what Jesus said to do with the money.
He didn’t say throw it away or abandon it-That’s what we do with what is evil
Jesus tells the man to give the money to the poor. Why?
Because this purpose serves God, not self.
And you’ll notice, this giving to the poor isn’t a loss, it is an investment.
“You will have treasure in heaven.”
Money isn’t evil in itself. But it reveals the intentions of our hearts
But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves don’t break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
“The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. So if the light within you is darkness, how deep is that darkness!
“No one can serve two masters, since either he will hate one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.
What Jesus is saying in these verses underscores our understanding in our passage.
Your heart will follow what you invest in
So, if you look around at a shiny kingdom in this world and invest in it, that is what you will love
If you invest in God’s Kingdom, that is where your investment will grow and what you will love.
Skip down to verse 28 with me:
Then Peter said, “Look, we have left what we had and followed you.”
So he said to them, “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left a house, wife or brothers or sisters, parents or children because of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times more at this time, and eternal life in the age to come.”
Many men have looked at this verse and misunderstood it
It’s where we get what we call the prosperity Gospel
“I’ll give to God so that He will give me more.”
But that simply isn’t what Jesus is saying.
You need to give to Jesus your whole life, including your money and physical possessions.
He might call you to let go of them completely, He might not, but you need to give them to Him
It is true that you can’t outgive God, but let’s take a closer look at what Jesus is saying here
But He answered and said to them, “My mother and My brothers are these who hear the word of God and do it.”
Any family that you let go of for the sake of following Jesus cannot compare to the family of God you have in Jesus
We just read the command to store up treasure in Heaven where it will last forever. But lets take a look at a moment in the early church to better understand what Jesus is saying here.
And all those who had believed were together and had all things in common;
and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need.
Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart,
praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved.
Now, this passage is descriptive, not prescriptive
It isn’t saying that we need to all go sell all of our possessions, in fact, Acts 2 doesn’t say that is what happened then.
What it says is that the body gave generously, with those who had selling things and providing for those who had nothing.
It was continual investment in the Kingdom of God
It was the multiplication of blessing being a part of what God was doing to bless others
It was God using the body to provide, so that even though they had given up so much to follow Jesus, there was more than enough in God’s house for all
In other words, Jesus is saying that the return on your Kingdom investment is KINGDOM treasure
And earthly treasure simply can’t compare.
If you invest your treasure in the Kingdom of God, you will treasure Jesus
If you want to treasure Jesus, invest in His Kingdom and not your own.
Our second essential of treasuring Jesus also comes from verse 22.
Jesus tells the man “after you have traded the investments of your Kingdom for the investments of my Kingdom,
“Then follow me”
Stop trying to drive your own life and make your own way.
follow me
I am the way to the Kingdom of Heaven, I can give you the eternal life you seek
so follow me
In other words,
If you want to make Jesus your treasure,
Make Jesus the King that you follow.
Make Jesus the King that you follow.
A King is not something we really understand in our culture and context
A King is the boss of everything. He is the one that is in charge
Not only does the King make the rules, but He sets the agenda and lays our steps out in front of us
As I prepared for this morning, I was tempted to use the word Leader here
And Jesus is our leader. But here’s the problem: He is so much more than that
Jesus isn’t just in front, He’s the only one that knows the way
Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Jesus isn’t just a way to Heaven, He is THE way to Heaven
He isn’t just a leader, He is the only one
And His opinion on things is the only one that matters
When I was a college student, I was struggling with what this really means in my life when someone put it like this:
In your heart, there is a throne.
It is time for you to get up and let the KING OF GLORY sit down
You and I might have all kinds of ideas about life
You might have plans on how to spend your money, time, and talent
You probably have dreams and aspirations you are chasing
But, if you treasure Jesus, everything else that we say and do must fit within His directives.
Let’s Continue in our passage with verse 23
But when he had heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich.
And Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for those who are wealthy to enter the kingdom of God!
“For 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.”
The man’s reaction is a hard if not relatable reality, isn’t it?
It is hard to let go of nice things, especially money.
And the nicer that it is, the more money that you have, the harder it is to let go of.
More over, it flies in the face of what we’d like to believe
Having wealth is the sign of God’s blessing and your faithful obedience
If I do ABC, XYZ happen, remember?
But this points us to the third essential for making Jesus your treasure,
Let go of everything that isn’t Jesus.
Let go of everything that isn’t Jesus.
I’m not saying that you have to throw it away, but you can’t hold onto it.
God has moved my family a lot.
In our many moves, we have had many homes
Small homes that we barely fit in much less our things
Large homes that made it feel like we didn’t own very much outside of the home itself.
We’ve always told each other to hold whatever God gives us with loose hands because He might take it from us.
Do you know what I’ve discovered?
It’s harder to let go of the bigger, nicer home than it is the smaller, cramped one.
This doesn’t mean that material wealth can’t be or isn’t a blessing from God, but we need to be careful. Look at what Jesus said in verse 25
“It’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God”
Some scholars believe Jesus is talking here about a gate in Jerusalem that is so narrow a man barely fits through. For a Camel to pass through, it would have to a really skinny camel carrying nothing.
I think Jesus is actually talking about a Camel and a sewing needle, because this idiom is older than that gate in Jerusalem.
Passing a large animal through an inconceivably small whole seems impossible.
Money isn’t the problem, our hearts are. The reason it’s harder for a rich man to enter heaven is that he has a harder time letting go of what isn’t Jesus.
And whatever you invest in will have your heart.
A pastor friend of mine once told me about a couple in his church
they were faithful givers who tried to live on less so that they could give more.
The man asked the pastor to pray for his success at work and he did
The man became very successful and very wealthy
And the more he made, the less he gave until he wasn’t giving at all anymore
my pastor friend asked him why, and the man said
It got to be that even giving 10% was a lot of money. It was more than I felt comfortable giving away.
REMEMBER FRIENDS, there cannot be two kings in your heart
If Jesus is going to be your treasure, it means you have to value Him more than everything else!
Hold onto Jesus and nothing else! Anything else will steal your heart from Him.
Lets look at verse 26 quickly together:
They who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?”
But He said, “The things that are impossible with people are possible with God.”
The people’s response here reveals the attitude we’ve been talking about all morning.
They see this rich man who has kept the law
They associate his wealth with God’s blessing for his righteousness
When Jesus says that it is almost impossible for a rich man to get into heaven, what they hear is that even the blessed of God who keep the law can’t get eternal life.
What they are failing to see is the key: Who is the king of the man’s heart?
Is it Jesus, or is it Himself?
The answer to this question is everything for us , and each of us must answer it for ourselves because the final essential to treasuring Jesus is this,
Jesus must do in you what only Jesus can do.
Jesus must do in you what only Jesus can do.
You see, it doesn’t matter how many laws you obey to the best of your ability
It doesn’t matter how good you are
We still fall short. We still do things that are wrong
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
As long as you are king in your life, you will always seek what you want and that will never be enough.
This is why Jesus started His answer by telling the man that only God is good
And because God is what we are not, God can do what we cannot.
You can’t earn eternal life. Jesus has to give it to you.
It’s a gift, and it can only come through Him
And with it, comes His Kingship in your life
It seems kind of backwards that this is our last essential and not the first, until you realize that this is the entire point of what Jesus is telling the man and the crowd that is around Him:
The entire answer to the man’s question is Jesus
Jesus is the way to eternal life
When you accept His salvation and love Him with all that you are
You will realize that He is the King that you need and make Him your own.
You will invest In His Kingdom-the more you do the more you’ll want to
Your heart will follow your investment, and you will start to let go of the things that don’t matter because they aren’t eternal
Through it all, Jesus will change you to reflect who He is
You will be righteous not because of anything you are or have done, but because of everything He is and has accomplished for you
This morning, the invitation is clear
Maybe this morning, you are that man
Stop trying to earn your way to eternal life, and let Jesus give it to you
Make Him your King, and He will reshape you from the inside out
Let Him become your greatest treasure, and you’ll never be the same.
And for those this morning who have already said yes to Jesus’ gift of salvation
Have you let Him be your King? Is He the One that is calling the shots?
Are you investing your life in His Kingdom, or are you still clinging to your own?
Maybe this morning, He is calling you into a deeper relationship with Him than you even knew was possible
What are you unwilling to give to Jesus? Perhaps it’s time to invest it in His Kingdom.
The worship Team is going to come
We’re going to pray
I invite you to respond in two ways this morning
Come find me so that we can talk about what God is doing in you
reach out through the connections center so that we can connect later this week.
PRAY
