so last night at about 8 30 i was getting reading through my sermon text and i was like okay i set it down and my son picks it up and he looks at it and he's like i think i've i just heard this text and i'm like really and he's like dad i think pastor gordon preached this last sunday morning and I was no way no way so I got online and went to the website and and sure enough I listened to it and he reads this text but he reads a lot more of Matthew and so he he really focuses on the parable afterwards and we're going to focus tonight on just six verses from Matthew 19 about the rich young ruler. So if you would turn with me to Matthew 19, verses 16 to 22. Matthew 19, 16 to 22. These are God's very words. And behold, a man came up to him saying, Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life? And he said to him, Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments. He said to him, Which ones? And Jesus said, You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and mother, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. The young man said to him, All these I have kept, what do I still lack? Jesus said to him, If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess, and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me. When the young man heard this, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. And there ends the reading of God's Word. So a question we should think about tonight is can we earn or pay our way to eternal life? Can we do enough good or enough deeds to earn God's favor and enter eternal life? And if you were here last Sunday morning listening to Pastor Gordon's sermon, you'd say, of course not. It's by grace that you enter eternal life. Grace alone. But if you leave these walls and you go out, a lot of people in the world, and unfortunately a lot of people in other churches, believe that you can. They think you can go the extra mile with good works and secure a place in heaven. And I believe we all know people like that. if you know somebody like that, and maybe deep down inside, that person is you. You think you can go the extra mile to earn more favor with God. I want you to hear a story tonight about a young man who came to Jesus. This story had a big impact on the disciples. It's in three of the four Gospels. The Holy Spirit really wants us to know this story. All three say He was rich. Matthew tells us that He was young. Luke tells us that He was a ruler. The text doesn't give us any hints that He's not sincere with this question. We've seen in other places in the Gospels where people try to trick or trap Jesus with their questions. Pharisees and Sadducees trying to trick Jesus into saying something wrong. Not this young man. At one point in Mark's telling of the story, we read that Jesus loved him. This rich young ruler doesn't come to be healed. There's nothing wrong with one of his kids. He's not demon-possessed. We see stories like that all throughout the Gospels. No, this man inquires about his soul and where he will spend eternity. Every human being, though most won't admit it, thinks about where they will spend eternity. What will happen when they die? When they lay in bed at night and they think, what's going to happen when I die? Everyone thinks about it. You know, we've all heard the saying, there's no atheists in foxholes. That's true for everybody. Everybody. There's no atheists when it comes down to that dying moment. But in the end, our young man walks away from Christ. Unsafe on the road to hell. And the saddest part is, we never hear about him coming back. You see, this section of the text deals with wealth. But really, deep down, what it's dealing with is a broken human heart. The human heart, beloved, is terribly broken and needs to be replaced. Because so many people today think that good works were on their way to heaven. Christ tells us that we need to be perfect. And that's something we just cannot do. Someone else has to be perfect for us. So let's jump into our text and see how Jesus handles the question that so many people have. Verse 16. And behold, a man came up to him, saying, Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life? And he said to him, Why do you ask me about what is good? There's only one who is good. This young man has a specific question in mind. A very important question. Maybe he wants to do a great act of charity. Maybe he wants to build a synagogue. so big that He could put His name on it for everyone to see. But Jesus is telling him, I think you've asked the wrong question. And He does that with us as well. Every time we bring a question, He always seems like, well, we asked the wrong question. Our eyes are always on earthly things and not on heavenly things. Jesus wants us to think about this question in a different way. And Jesus dealt with this all the time in his ministry. People asking the wrong question. People asking earthly questions when they should be asking spiritual questions. Think of Jesus and Nicodemus. Think of their conversation. Jesus tells them, you need to be born again. And he thinks earthly, not heavenly. Think of the Sadducees trying to always trick Jesus about the law, about whose wife is this lady going to be, or whose wife, to the seven brothers that she married, trying to trap Jesus. Think of the Herodians giving Jesus a coin. Do we pay taxes to Caesar or not? They're always trying to trap Jesus. But Jesus always has to put them in their place to tell them to ask the right question. And just with our young man in our text, Jesus wants to get him thinking. He wants him to be on the right path. So when he asks this question, Teacher, what good deed must I do? Jesus gently nudges him in the right direction with a question of his own. Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. Jesus is nudging him to think about not what is good, but who is good. About the who. There's this idea that man is good enough, that he could do good things, that there's good in him enough to make the world a better place. And sure, through common grace, man does great things with medicine, cures for cancer. But ultimately, we know that even our best deeds, Scripture tells us, are like filthy rags to our Lord. One thing we always need to remember, beloved, is that only God is absolutely good. If you want to enter eternal life, you need to be like God. that's a scary thought, isn't it? Jesus tells him if you would enter eternal life keep the commandments and you're like, wait a second what did Jesus just tell him to do? did he really just tell this young man to keep the commandments? he told him to do the law How many evangelical churches out there would tell this young man the same thing? Someone who is eager to come into heaven, to enter eternal life. Would they give him the law? That doesn't seem right, does it? It just seems absurd. Why would he give him the law? It's crazy how different Jesus' approach is from what most churches in North America, here in America today, would think. This man is young and sincere. He has a heartfelt desire to enter the kingdom. Most churches today would give him like a three or four step process, tell him to make a personal commitment to Christ and send him on his way with assurance of faith. Oh, yeah, you're going to heaven. You signed the card. Jesus didn't even come close to that, did he? Why? Why did he not do that? Because Jesus knows our hearts. Jesus knew this man's heart. Jesus wanted this man to know. He needed to think about his question differently. This seems puzzling to us today, doesn't it? But we need to remember that the law shows us God's holy character. We need to remember that our God is holy, holy, holy. It's something that we're always measured up against. and sadly it's something we could never live up to what makes the gospel good news think about it that someone who's lived the perfect life for us Jesus kept the law Jesus had perfect obedience and the righteousness of that obedience is placed on us which gets us into heaven. And when we get to verse 18 of our text, after the rich young ruler hears Jesus mention the commandments, he probably got a little sparkle in his eye. He says, which ones? Jesus says, you shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and mother, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. And I always wonder why Jesus went to the second table of the law here and not the first. He went to the part of the law that deals horizontally with our neighbor and not vertically with God. If he just would have said, love the Lord your God, he'd have been like, whoa, okay, maybe I can't do that perfectly. It would open his eyes. But no, he wants this man to think. He wants this man to really understand what he's trying to say to him. Jesus even sums up the second table. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. He brings in Leviticus. And as we can see by the young man's answer, in his mind, he's like, no problem. I got this. He really thought He was doing it. I would say many in His day, many of the Pharisees thought the same thing. You know, we actually have an example in Scripture of a Pharisee, a former Pharisee, saying the same thing. I want to read it to you. Circumcised on the eighth day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, As to the law of Pharisee. As to zeal, a persecutor of the church. And listen to this. As to righteousness under the law, blameless. Woo! Wow. We all know who that was, right? That was the Apostle Paul. Before he met the risen Savior on the road to Damascus. Showing us that people in this time Jesus was dealing with really thought that they did the law. enough to make themselves get into heaven. It was a common idea. Jesus dealt with us all the time. And what is our young man's answer? All these I've kept. What do I still lack? And I love how R.C. Sproul, when he was going through this text, what he says, he says, I would have lost my patience with that young man right there. I would have said, what? You haven't kept these commandments since you got out of bed this morning. Good old R.C. Think of what Jesus could have said to this young man. Jesus could have sat him down right there and said, you know what, young man, slow down. You might not have been there a while back when I gave this Sermon on the Mount. When I talked about the deeper meaning of the law. That if you get angry or hate your brother, you've actually murdered him. Or if you look at a woman lustfully, you've actually committed adultery. Jesus didn't say those things to him, did he? He didn't come down and rebuke this young man out of his sandals. He didn't scare him away. Like I said earlier, we read in Mark's account of this story that right after he said that, Jesus says, Jesus thought, he loved this young man. He looked at him and loved him. Jesus knew that no one could live up to the law. He knew it was only him that could complete such a task. This young man was a lost sheep in need of a shepherd. One pastor called this young man that he had sincere self-righteousness. I believe this young man truly was trying to find out what he still lacked. If the law wasn't good enough, Jesus, what do I still need? And now Jesus gets right to the point. He says to him, if you would be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come and follow me. The key to this whole section of text comes to one word. Perfect. Perfect. If you would be perfect, go. Sell what you possess and give it to the poor. You know, Matthew only uses this word one other time in his entire Gospel. One other time. And it has to do with the same thing that this rich man's dealing with. I want to read it to you. You have heard it said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For He makes the sun rise on the evil and the good and He sends rain on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? You therefore must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. Jesus laid down the gauntlet on this young man. Jesus knew exactly where this young man's heart was at. This man loved his money. more than anything or anyone. And Jesus does this throughout all the Gospels. People will come to Him. And He loves them. But what's He do? He shows them where their heart is broken so they'll repent. Think of the woman at the well. Jesus is going from Jerusalem back up to Galilee. And He stops halfway because He gets thirsty and tired. And he meets a woman at the well. And Jesus starts talking about living water. And she knows there's something different with this man. Maybe he's the Messiah. Jesus says to her, go, call your husband and come here. The woman answered, I have no husband. Jesus said to her, you are right in saying you have no husband. For you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you said is true. He's not doing that to shame this woman into repentance. He wants to show her where her heart is and that it needs to be replaced. She needs a new one. And for our rich young ruler, it's wealth that is stopping him from following Jesus. So verse 22. When the young man heard this, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. That's probably one of the saddest verses in all of Scripture. When this young man heard this, He went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. You just want to yell out, stop! Please stop, don't go! Jesus is the only way! Beloved, we all break God's law. We all have something in our lives that we cling to more than we should. The problem is, is that one thing, one thing could keep us from going to eternal life. That one thing could keep us out of heaven. No matter how many good works you do, no matter how great you think you are, one thing. You can never do enough to pay the debt that you have. And this just isn't in the New Testament. This is all over Scripture. This is all the way back in the beginning, in the law. Moses writes of this in Leviticus 18. The Lord spoke to Moses saying, Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, I am the Lord your God. You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt where you lived, And you shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan to which I am bringing you. You shall not walk in their statutes. You shall follow my rules and keep my statutes and walk in them. I am the Lord your God. You shall therefore keep my statutes and my rules. If a person does them, he shall live by them. I am the Lord. Did you catch that? If a person does them, he shall live by them. Now going through this sermon, what's the problem? We can't do it. We can do them. And if we can't do them, that means we don't get to live. We get to die. And we're not talking about earthly life right now. We're talking about eternal life and eternal death. The Apostle Paul tells us the same thing. Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law and do them. James, the brother of Jesus, writes in his letter, For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point becomes guilty of all of it. Today, our problem is we don't think about God's righteous standard anymore. most people think they can get to heaven on good works, good deeds, how good they are. Think about it. If you ask the person in the grocery store or on the street, what's the famous question you ask them? If you died today and you got to the gates of heaven and God asked you, why should I let you into my heaven? Most people would say that their good works outweigh the bad. sadly this is leading so many people to hell it is friends, neighbors, co-workers if they believe this they are on the broad path to destruction we have to know that John Calvin wrote first we have to recognize our sinfulness and know that we are condemned by God's law rather than justified by it Second, we have to repudiate anything that keeps us from following Jesus. For some, that's money, like our rich young ruler. For others, it may be something else. You know, beloved, if this young man, instead of turning away, stopped. Turned to Jesus and said, you know what? I can't do it. Can you help me? That second this young man wanted to enter the kingdom. That second. He would have been given a new heart. It's not our works that were saved by Christ. It's his works. Matthew 16. Then Jesus told his disciples, If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and yet forfeits his soul? It's only by faith alone, in Christ alone, can we be saved. It was Christ who earned eternal life. Not your good works, not my good works. Remember at the beginning of the sermon when I asked what questions should he have asked Jesus? Not the one that he asked and got kind of nudged the right way. He asked what good deeds must I do? The good deed that he needed to do was the law, he found out. The question he should have asked was, what must I do to be saved? If he truly knew at that very moment God's wrath was sitting on him, he would have asked the right question. What must I do to be saved? In the end, though, he walked away. He walked away. But the good news is, we don't have to. We don't have to walk away. You're sitting there right now, and you know there's something wrong. You know you think you're earning it. You're trying your hardest. You're striving to make God happy with you. Stop. Stop. You can't do it. You just can't. Ask the Lord. He freely gives. Seek the Lord and you will find. Knock, beloved, and the door will be opened. And if you're sitting there and you've been saved your whole life, catechized in the church, you've known this, this is old hat maybe, don't let people walk away and never come back. Keep praying for them. Keep telling them the gospel. I'm so glad that I heard the gospel weekly when I was a pagan, when I was a heathen and didn't know anything, yet I was sitting in church. People prayed for me. People prayed that I'd return and go to church and listen to the gospel weekly. I'm so glad that someone took the time for that. We can't get to heaven on our own, beloved. We need Christ. It's all by grace. Remember that. Remember the lost. They sure do need your prayers. They sure need to know that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, and nobody comes to the Father but by Him. Let us pray. Father God, the only way we could come to you is through your Son. Help us never to think we could do it on our own. Help us to know that it's by Jesus' perfect light and his shed blood on the cross that we could come before you. Help us to tell others about this. Let us not keep this a secret. The whole world needs to know. Help us be bold in telling everyone the gospel. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.