In Mark 10:17-31, Jesus has an interaction with a young man who is rich and a ruler.  He asks Jesus what he needs to do to inherit eternal life.  This is an excellent question.  He asks the question that each of us needs to ask Jesus.  Jesus tells the young man that he needs to keep God’s commandments, which at that time were encompassed in the Law of Moses.  Today, the specifics would be different, but the underlying answer would be the same: we need to keep God’s commandments.

He Was Faithful

Based on the young man’s response, he seems to have been keeping the Law of Moses(Mark 10:20).  I’m sure he was not perfecting keeping it, but if he was also offering the correct sacrifices, he was following the Law as much as anyone else(except, Jesus, of course).  Jesus looked at him and loved him(this is worth looking into, but for today, we are going to looking at just one specific thing.

That ONE Thing

Jesus responded to the young man, telling him he lacked ONE thing.  Jesus told him to go and sell everything and give it to the poor, then follow Him.  The young man was sad and left Jesus.  We are told he had much wealth(Mark 10:22).

It’s really easy to look at this and think that rich people need to sell everything and give everything to the poor.  However, this is missing Jesus’ point.  Note:  Jesus never tells anyone else to give everything to the poor.

Loving “Stuff” More Than God

Jesus looked at this individual and apparently saw that “stuff” was a problem for him.  That could be materialism.  It could be greed.  It could be covetousness.  It could be putting his faith in “things” and specifically money, to take care of him instead of trusting in God to take care of him.  But whatever the exact issue was that Jesus saw in this young man’s heart, Jesus challenged him to put God first in his life, even ahead of that one other thing that the young man was putting his faith in.

Application for Us

If you read this interaction and think to yourself, “Well, I’m not rich, so I’m good here,” you are missing Jesus’ point.  For this young man, his issue was something related to his riches, but it won’t be that way for everyone.  It may be that way for some, but other people will have other issues .  The question that each of us has to address is, “If I asked Jesus what I need to do to inherit eternal life, what would He bring up to me?”  Only you know the answer to that question, and if you think there isn’t one, you probably need to examine your own life a little more closely.  It won’t be fun because it will be something that you think is really important, even more important than God.  We might not want to think anything in our lives is more important than God, and hopefully there isn’t anything, but for most of us, there is.  We need to be honest enough with ourselves to look . . .  carefully.  Let’s do that.