No One But God
Notes
Transcript
Notes
Notes
It is a joy to be with you.
Bryan is preaching in Fargo.
Opener
Opener
In his book Feminine Faces, Clovis Chappel wrote that when the Roman city of Pompeii was being excavated, the body of a woman was found mummified by the volcanic ashes of Mount Vesuvius. Her position told a tragic story. Her feet pointed toward the city gate, but her outstretched arms and fingers were straining for something that lay behind her. The treasure for which she was grasping was a bag of pearls. Chappel said, “Though death was hard at her heels, and life was beckoning to her beyond the city gates, she could not shake off their spell...But it was not the eruption of Vesuvius that made her love pearls more than life. It only froze her in this attitude of greed.”
Clovis Chappel, Feminine Faces.
Main Text
Main Text
18 A ruler questioned Him, saying, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 19 And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone. 20 “You know the commandments, ‘Do not commit adultery, Do not murder, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother.’ ” 21 And he said, “All these things I have kept from my youth.” 22 When Jesus heard this, He said to him, “One thing you still lack; sell all that you possess and distribute it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” 23 But when he had heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. 24 And Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for those who are wealthy to enter the kingdom of God! 25 “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.” 26 They who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?” 27 But He said, “The things that are impossible with people are possible with God.” 28 Peter said, “Behold, we have left our own homes and followed You.” 29 And He said to them, “Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, 30 who will not receive many times as much at this time and in the age to come, eternal life.” 31 Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things which are written through the prophets about the Son of Man will be accomplished. 32 “For He will be handed over to the Gentiles, and will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon, 33 and after they have scourged Him, they will kill Him; and the third day He will rise again.” 34 But the disciples understood none of these things, and the meaning of this statement was hidden from them, and they did not comprehend the things that were said.
Point 1 | No One But God is GOOD
Point 1 | No One But God is GOOD
Notice in verse 18 Jesus says, “Why do you call me good. No one is good except God alone.”
This is a major theme in Luke: Only God is truly good.
Go is ultimately pure, righteouss, and GOOD. And man is not.
Think of Luke 16:15
15 And He said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of men, but God knows your hearts; for that which is highly esteemed among men is detestable in the sight of God.
b. He tells the Phariesees in Luke 11:42 that they disregard the justice and the love of God. In other words God is good and man is not.
Think of the story in the previous section of the Pharisee and the Tax collector. One tried to justify himself before God. One saw himself as good. And the sinner, the tax collector saw himself as bad but God as good.
This is a constant theme in Look. Only God is good.
What does Good mean in the Bible
What does Good mean in the Bible
Our word good probably isn’t doing this justice. Good sounds like “okay.” How was work today? “Good”. But “Good” here means so much more. It is an essential aspect of God.
1 Chron 16:34
34 O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; For His lovingkindness is everlasting.
The Gospel is called the “Good” News.
The Christian in Christ does what is good.
2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
Is Jesus God and is Jesus Good?
Is Jesus God and is Jesus Good?
Now you can’t have it both ways if Jesus statement is going to mean anything. Either Jesus is good and He is God or He is not good and He is not God. It is logically impossible, if Jesus statement is truthful, for Jesus to be God and not good or good and not God.
Then the question must be asked why does Jesus call the man on his questions. I have heard it before some say, “see Jesus isn’t God… he says God alone is good. He is implying he is not God.” Oh really? Are you sure about that?
First of all wouldn’t it be hard to preach “Good” News is the Savior Himself was not “Good”? I mean really? That would be the implication of this passage if you took it that route. If you are going to hold to Jesus is not God based on this passage you also have to hold to Jesus is not good. You might as well throw the whole Gospel of Luke out. This passage affirms Jesus is God. We will see that by the end. And if you understand what “goodness” has to do with “salvation” this will be crystal clear to you by the end.
Nevertheless this is an unusual phrase for someone to call a Rabbi. In fact there is not reference outside of this one, i believe until you get to the 400s AD where someone calls a Rabbi “Good”. They didn’t do this in Jesus day.
The man thought he was good
The man thought he was good
21 And he said, “All these things I have kept from my youth.”
And this actually discloses something about this man’s heart. The man thought he himself was GOOD! We know this from the text. He is essentially claming to have kept the entire law.
If Jesus can get him to put flattery aside and think about goodness and holiness not comparing yourself to your neighbor but comparing himself to God his eyes would be opened! How often do we do this?
I am not that bad?
Everyone is does it?
At least I didn’t x?
It could have been worse?
But what we should be doing is comparing the standard by which we live to the STANDARD God himself. This is incredibly healthy. This is actually Biblical judgement 101:
You will be judged by God standard no matter what. That is the Word of God.
You will have any man made standard you use, aka a false standard, measured back to you.
Those who are merciless will not receive mercy.
But notice the bedrock of the entire system is God Himself.
Christian perfectionism
Christian perfectionism
There is this notion out there of something called “Christian perfectionism”. Can the Christian get to a sanctified point in this life that he no longer sins. And this is a unhelpful and unbiblical extreme. Now don’t get me wrong. I spend most of my time telling Christians who struggle with sins you can walk in the Light by the grace of God, you can be set free from bondage by the blood of Jesus. That is the bigger problem in our day. We need greater faith in the great power and grace available in Christ. That being said there are those who get caught up in this unbiblical extreme. I ask them this:
How do you define sin? They might say missing the mark.
What is the mark? Because as soon as you say the mark is Jesus any Christian with even an ounce of humility would have to admit they fall short of that standard every hour of every day. The promise in Scripture that you can stand up under any temptation is not the same as saying you can handle what Jesus handled is it? Not at all.
A good Biblical definition of sin has to fundamentally include the idea of not loving God and not loving others. It goes far beyond a list of though shall nots. I met a guy one time who told me he didn’t believe in God and Jesus because he thought Christianity was too negative. It was all about telling you “no.” I said to him… well God certainly does tell us “no”. But the Jesus says the greatest commandment is not “though shall not commit adultery” nor “though shall not lie” but it is a positive: “though shall love The Lord your God.”
You can have perfection if you leave God out of the equation. But it will only be perfection based on a human standard. This is exactly what the Pharisees did at the beginning of this chapter and that is exactly what the Rich Young Ruler is doing here.
But as soon as you lift your eyes to God.... and God in the flesh was right in front of the man… you say what Isaiah said:
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
“Woe is me, for I am ruined!
Because I am a man of unclean lips,
or what Peter said in the new (Luke 5):
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 5
“Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man!”
This is a fundamental understanding of what the Gospel is friends. God is good and man is not. We are all sinners. We have all sinned. We have all fallen short of the glory of God. If you do not understand this you CANNOT be saved. You will die in your sins. You will perish away from the presence of the Lord, in judgment, forever and ever.
One of my favorite Bible Passages is
15 It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.
Friends this isn’t just Paul’s story in the Bible. Though it is. He is essentially going if God can save me He can save you! But this is a “trustworthy statement, deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the word to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.” Every Christian should be able to say this from their heart of hearts.
You might go but Steve surely I am not as bad as hitler or stallen or Osama bin laden or name your historic evil person. Maybe you aren’t. But you know the depths of your sin personally. You knew the temptation. You gave into it. You liked it. Only you can say of your own sin what king David could say of His, “against you Lord, and you Lord alone have I sinned.” You know your sin more intamentaly then you will ever know anyone elses. And as the song says, “I will never know how much it costs to see my sin upon that cross.”
The closer i grow to God. The greater I realize He is. At every turn and every phase of my life, even though I have grown in leaps in bounds, it as if I have only ever known the tip of the iceburg. because there is no end to God. And the more I know him the more i realize just how offensive my sins were and are against a God of inifinte worth.
The good news is we are not just great sinners against a great God. He is also a great savior.
In Luke 5:21 if you remember. The question was asked, “Who can forgive sins but God alone!”
Point 2 | No One But God SAVES
Point 2 | No One But God SAVES
Inherit
Inherit
Notice the Rich Young Rulers question:
“Good Teacher, what shall I do to INHERIT eternal life?” Now the word inherit does not mean merit. But it does… in the way the question is being asked and the world view behind denote some kind of being owed or deserving of something.
Lets step into his worldview for a minute. He is a wealthy Israelite who prides himself in keeping the Law. Remember the Promise given Abraham: Exodus 32:13
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 32
I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heavens, and all this land of which I have spoken I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’
In the Law (places like Leviticus 26) he tells them if they “walk in [His] statutes and keep [His] Commandments” they will be blessed and live securely in the land. This is the promised land. But if not mounting judgement will begin to stack against them until they are exiled from the land. In this worldview the idea of being worth heir to the promise makes sense. It makes sense why he would ask Jesus this question.
Of course Jesus had been asked this before in Luke 10:25 by a Lawyer
25 And a lawyer stood up and put Him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”
And Jesus gave a very similar answer. He cites the two greatest commandments, Love God with all you have and are, and love your neighbor as yourself. and He says, do this and you will live. At the end of the version of the rich young ruler in Matthew 19 Jesus actually drops the seconds greatest commandment on him as well “love your neighbor as yourself.”
Despite the man’s obtuse answer “I have kept these things from my youth.” Which is hilarious because in Matthew’s Gospel he is called a “Young man.” Jesus says their is one thing he lacks. In Matthew Gospel it says, “If you wish to be perfect.”
And as I have already mentioned they fall short of the heavenly standard. But the point isn’t just that they fall short it. the point is also that their means of getting it are also wrong.
Man NEEDS SAVING
Man NEEDS SAVING
Listen again to the solution for the man from our Lord: Luke 18:22
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 18
When Jesus heard this, He said to him, “One thing you still lack; sell all that you possess and distribute it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.”
Now if you look at the 10 commandments we can divide them up into 2 parts. The first 4 are directed to God and the last 6 are directed to man. In every account of this story… Matthew, Mark, and Luke Jesus focuses on the latter half, the ones directed toward man… love your neighbor. And he leaves 1 and only one commandment off that list. Which one is that? The last one. Though shall not covet. Or what Paul calls in the New Testament GREED. That is interesting isn’t it. And Jesus is trying to get the man to read between the lines here isn’t he. He is trying to get him to think.
And then Jesus hits him with it: One thing you lack. You are greedy. And I am not going to just call you to not be greedy. I am going to call you to the highest standard “sell all that you posses”. In other words Jesus is saying I am going to call you to MY STANDARD. Friends Jesus would die naked on a tree. Jesus is good. Jesus lives up to this. But He is also calling the man to REPENTANCE. Repent of your greed and “come follow me”. That is Jesus message.
This man’s salvation is only going to be found one place and it not looking to himself. He needs a heavenly solution. He needs Jesus.
The disciples themselves respond to Jesus’ hard teaching here saying: Luke 18:26-27
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 18
26 They who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?”
27 But He said, “The things that are impossible with people are possible with God.”
In other words only God can save! Pillar number one is “Only God is good”. Pillar number two “Is only God Saves”. This is a major theme if not the major theme throughout the Gospel of John. You will get to the watershed verse in Luke shortly:
10 “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”
Jesus said in Luke 9:56
56 for the Son of Man did not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.” And they went on to another village.
Zacharias prophesied God had raised up a “Horn of Salvation” in Luke 1.
Simeon in Luke 2 upon seeing the baby Jesus said, “my eyes have now seen your Salvation!”
Zacharias Son, John the Immerser, said in reference to Jesus:
6 And all flesh will see the salvation of God.’ ”
And of course next chapter he does exactly what He says is Possible with GOD in the next chapter. He saves the rich man saying to Zacheous:
9 And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham.
And of course it was Jesus who came to his house.
It it not just that your are not good and only God is. It is also that you are incompable of saving yourself. and infact their is no earthly solution that can save your soul. Quite frankly it is outside anyone’s pay grade.
The Supreme court does not have the authority and power to forgive sins.
The President of the United States as the command and chief of the strongest military the world has ever known does not have the POWER to rescue you from the domain of darkness.
Bill Gates and Jeff Bezoz can’t save their own marriages… their wealth and power will do nothing to make peace with God and set you free from the power of sin.
You need someone who is perfectly Good and infinately capable. Someone who can do what is impossible for man. You need God. and that is exactly what you get in the person of MESSIAH!
That is why the Apostle Peter could say in 2 Peter 2:1
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 1
To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ
our God and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Are you picking up what God’s word is putting down?
FAITH
FAITH
but their is one word you need to understand. It is the word “inherit”. You can inherit Eternal life. Wait a minute Steve. Wasn’t that the whole problem? the RYR thought he could inherit it? The problem was the wordview that was driving it.
Jesus says in verse 30
30 who will not receive many times as much at this time and in the age to come, eternal life.”
Receive… eternal life. In the parallel passage in Matthew 19:29 it says:
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 19
will receive many times as much, and will inherit eternal life.
You can and must inherit. But you are not going to inherit it by being born of the flesh, or the will of man. You must be born of God. You see what Jesus is going to do through the cross is He is going to purchase for Himself a people. He is going to adopt us through the blood of the cross. He is going to on that cross take your sin. Your mistakes. All the ways you have fallen short of that perfect standard which is God Himself. and He wasn’t jsut taking things away from you He was giving you Himself. He was declaring you righteous and He was becoming your righteousness. He was becoming your hope and your perfect peace. You have been raised up with HIM and SEATED with HIM in the heavenly palces the Bible says.
But there is one thing you must have to make you a joint hier of Jesus Christ. You must have faith. We have been saved by grace through faith. The grace is the work of the cross… that is the heavenly lifting and the faith is trusting in Him and the work He has done alone to save. God so loved the world that He sent His only unique Son… at the cross is where the work is done. But secured and given to whoever BELIEVES.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, 5 who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
and of course Paul in Galatians goes at length to show that those who have “faith in Christ Jesus” are “sons of God” and “Abraham decendants, heirs according to the promise.”
What am I saying. It is really simple:
Deny yourself and any earthly solution you would seak to use to justify yourself before God and follow Jesus. It is IN HIM, IN CHRIST, that SALVATION is found and only Him.
Point 3 | Riches can rob you of God’s Kingdom
Point 3 | Riches can rob you of God’s Kingdom
The principles we taked about today can apply to anyone, but you cannot ignore the consisten warning in the Gospel of Luke in regards to money. Jesus literally says in our passage today:
25 “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.”
There is no Gate called the “eye of the needle” where a cammel had to get on his knees and his load taken off in Jesus’ day. That’s not true. The statement is hyberbolic statement that is as absurd as it sounds. The disciples undertood exactly right:
26 They who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?”
And Jesus affirms it:
“The things that are impossible with people” he calls it. We should dwell on that. It is impossible to save a rich man… humanly speaking. And its not just kind of impossible. its camel through the eye of a needle impossible. If you love this world you will be enemy of God. If you serve wealth you can’t serve God. Every person hearing and looking at this today must wrestle with this text.
Is not the story of the prodigal son (Luke 15) a story of love of this present world over against love of the Father?
isn’t the story of the unrighteous steward a story of story up treasure on earth vs story up treasure in heaven Luke 16? “You can’t serve God and wealth” Jesus says climatically.
Isn’t the story of the rich man and Lazarus a story of the stubborn unrepentant heart of the wealthy. If we won’t listen to God’s word we won’t even listen if a rich person was to come back from the dead? We are looking at God’s word today… will we listen to it?
The Solution in this passage is clear. You must give up all to follow Jesus. Now Jesus gave the Rich Young Ruler a task to do this. I don’t think every Christian has to be monk that has taken a vow of poverty. I think he in particularly needed that call to action. And quite simply here is why. Zacheous one chapter later Zacheous says He will give half of his possessions to the poor and repay back anyone he has defrauded 4 fold. Notice he doesn’t sell all he posses yet Jesus says “Salvation has come to this house.” Now there was still action. Real fruit of repentance. The point is does Jesus have your heart. And are you living with all that you have in LOVE of God and neighbor. Are you putting God and others first. And I think alot of Christians make mistakes here because they don’t know how to examine their heart.
Many Christians just look inwardly and go well I love GOd and I love people. Boom. Done. See I am a good person. I don’t struggle with this. Their is a big problem with that. We are bad assessers of ourself. We think to highly of ourselves than we out. That was the RYR whole problem! He thought HE WAS GOOD and Jesus had just told Him know one is good by God. It is like me saying He is the answer to the test. The answer is A. What the answer “B”. That’s what the rich young ruler does hear.
But we can actually follow a Biblical model of assessment in regards to wealth:
Don’t trust your fealings. Jesus says in Luke 12:34 “where your treasure is there your heart will be also”. You see we often pursue a subjective assessment of ourselves (that is highly bias) when we should be starting with an objective standard. Where is my treasure? Take inventory. Where is my time, energy, and talent being spent? Serving God or on myself. Love God and loving others? Or living myself? When the IRS audits your taxes they don’t ask you “do you feel like you have given enough.” We would all just say yes and move on. They want to see bank statements and deposits. They are looking at things objectively. So must we!
If there is any area of our life that is then in violation of the Word of God in any way we need to repent, turn from that, and follow Jesus.
Two we need to ask God to search our heart. Because we could be doing right action but have wrong motive. So you can pray Psalm 139
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me and know my anxious thoughts;
then listen for the conviction of the Holy Spirit.
c. live in community.
But you see it is not enough to examine. and it is not enough to stop doing some wrong things. God wants us to LOVE HIM with all His heart, soul, mind and strength. With everything that we have. That means living generously.
28 He who steals must steal no longer; but rather he must labor, performing with his own hands what is good, so that he will have something to share with one who has need.
Notice it is not enough for the Christian to stop stealing, The grace of God is going to swing that pendulum in the other direction and make you generous. So you are no longer a taker but a provider and a giver.
and guys this is who God is! He is a GIVER! God sent His Son! He GAVE His SON. He has held nothing back from us. and if generousity is at the heart of the Gospel then it is at the heart of the Christian’s life in being a follower of Jesus.
Jim Eng, my wife’s father, preached at our church up in Fargo a few weeks back and he said most people think of resources a zero sum gain. If you have a pie there are only so many pieces and the more pieces that I give the more I lose. But Christian’s don’t operate on that paradigm. God has infinite supply. and anything we give in this life will be paid back to us in CHrist many times over more. Jesus makes that point in this passage.
17 One who is gracious to a poor man lends to the Lord, And He will repay him for his good deed.
He who gives to the poor lends to the Lord. This is amazing. God pays you interest on your generosity.
The Bible also says He who insults a poor man insults His maker. In other words how you treat the least in the world is How you treat God. They are image bearers.
Jesus, the Messiah, says how you treat the least of your fellow Christian is How you treat Him… in Mt 25.
Jesus said it is better to give than to receive. He died naked on a cross. We are to steward all that we have not with earthly craftiness but with heavenly craftiness. Full of faith in God that our lives are in the hands of our great God and Savior.
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Last thing I will say is this. Love is the KEY to generosity. In Luke 10:21 Jesus looks at the Rich Young Ruler and it says, right their in Scripture, “felt a love for him.”and then says, “one thing you lack.” Step inside Jesus shoes for a minute. The very greed this man was clutching to this very sin Jesus was going to die for upon that CROSS! He loved that man. And because He loved He came to seek and to save… and to save by dying on the cross for our sins.