Pastor Barry's  "Chapter & Verse"  Day 230

August 17;   Matthew 19:21;   19/260(II);   ‘Issues of the Heart’

Matthew 19:21 Jesus said to him, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me." 

 A very wealthy young man came to the Lord Jesus and asked what he needed to do to have eternal life?  The Lord Jesus told him to keep the commandments and he told Jesus that he had kept the commandments since his youth.  Everyone sins and keeping the Law is the erroneous way religion believes you go to heaven.  The Law was given to bring us to the reality that we all sin.  Jesus must have seen that this young man was sincere.  Mark 10:21 tells us that Jesus loved him.  The Lord wanted to locate this man’s heart so that He could share eternal truths about eternal life with him.  Jesus teaches that if the man wants to be ‘perfect,’ which means lacking nothing that is necessary, he should give all of his wealth away to the poor.  Please know that Jesus had no intention of telling him to literally do that.  Jesus just wanted to locate this man’s heart, if indeed he was willing to do this in order to have eternal life.  Had the young man been willing, Jesus would have told him what he really had to do to have eternal life.  Sadly, it never came to that, because the man was not willing to give up his great possessions (v22), even if that  was the actual way to go to heaven.  Is there anything in your life that you are not willing to give up in order to have an eternal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ?  You must be honest with yourself and seriously consider what in this world could ever compare with eternal security.  Knowing that one day, when you leave this world, you will be with Jesus, the One who loves you with a love beyond comprehension.  Nothing this world offers is worth losing that.