Today, the Lord willing, I shall continue our exposition on the long series on regeneration, renewal and perfection, and if the Lord permits, we shall try to conclude this series. I wonder if I could request the ushers to ask the people in the next room, if possible, to quiet them down, if they may not realize we have a service. And we turn today, once more, to this passage in Matthew chapter 19, beginning at verse 16, concerning the rich young ruler.
Now this passage is one of the most difficult passages to cope with exegetically, and from the expository point of view. And I find this passage a great challenge, precisely because it is such a difficult passage, to get to the heart of what the Lord Jesus is saying to us. The problem with such a passage is often that we superficially seem to have grasped what is said, but in actual fact we have not begun to scratch the surface. And this is so frequent in our understanding of scripture, that our understanding is so painfully superficial.
Now some months ago I began to expound this passage, posing the question: does the Lord Jesus preach a different gospel from that of the Apostle Paul? Because the preaching of the Lord Jesus seems to demand total response, total commitment, whereas the teaching of the Apostle Paul seems to make salvation exceedingly easy, according to some, basically by some profession of faith will suffice. And we ask the question, are we looking at two different gospels, or does the Apostle Paul and the Lord Jesus preach the same gospel? Our conclusion, of course, is that there is no doubt whatsoever that they preach the same gospel. But we did not get to the heart of the matter. And I aim, if the Lord permits, to try to get to the heart of the matter.
Why is this passage so important? Basically because it answers the most important question that anyone could ask. The question that this rich young ruler poses here is this: "Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?" What must I do to have eternal life? Now the great danger is that you might be too sure that you know the answer, and think, oh, I know the answer to this. This is simple. The rich young ruler was just too ignorant and too naive, not as well taught as I am. And here, we may be the greater fool than he.
Let us refresh our minds on what the passage is saying. There is a rich young man that comes to the Lord Jesus and asks the question, what do I have to do to inherit eternal life? And the Lord Jesus says, in verse 17, "Why do you ask me about what is good? One there is who is good, and if you would enter into life, keep the commandments." Here, those who are taught in four-line theology are already beginning to run into problems. Inherit life through keeping the commandments? We think we understand. We think the Lord should have given some different answer to this. This doesn't sound like faith. Well, this isn't faith speaking. It is the Lord speaking.
And then he goes on. The Lord Jesus said, and the rich young ruler said to the Lord Jesus, "Which commandment?" And Jesus said, "Well, you know the commandments: You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, honor your father and mother, love your neighbor as yourself." The young man said to him, "All these I have observed. What do I still lack?" Jesus said to him, "If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give 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 Jesus said to his disciples, "Truly, I say to you, it will be hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, I tell you, 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."
Now notice: entering the kingdom of heaven, entering the kingdom of God, inheriting eternal life — it is all about salvation. You can say that the whole teaching of the Lord Jesus about salvation is here squeezed into a nutshell. I wonder if you know what his answer is to the question. What is his answer? How do we inherit eternal life? Are you very sure you know?
Now, let us try for a moment to forget all the theology we think we know, and attend carefully to what the Lord Jesus is saying. And listen afresh to his words as though we have never heard them before, if we are going to let him speak. Because so often we listen to the gospel but we block out the message with what we think we already know. Let's try to approach this again.
The Lord Jesus is saying, in answer to the question, what must I do to inherit eternal life? He says, "You know the commandments. If you would enter life, keep the commandments." And don't immediately say, no, no, no, we are not saved by keeping the commandments. Jesus said that we are. You want to argue with him, you argue with him, don't argue with me. He said, "If you want to enter life, keep the commandments." Whether it suits your theology or not is not the point.
You see, this is what I meant. We block out the words of the Lord Jesus by immediately saying no, he didn't mean that. Or if he didn't mean it, he shouldn't have said it, should he? He said to the rich young ruler, "You want to enter life, keep the commandments." No one can argue with that. It stands here in black and white. It requires no interpretation. It stands there.
This is very similar to something a little bit earlier on in another incident that happened earlier on in Luke chapter 10. You know that the parallel passage of Matthew 19 is in Luke chapter 18. But in Luke chapter 10, let's look at the same question asked and the same answer given, just so that you don't think that he gives two different answers on two different occasions. The Lord Jesus gives the same answer to the same question. The question is exactly the same; the answer is also the same. Just in case you think that there was a misprint in your Bible here.
Look at Luke chapter 10 and verse 25. "And behold, a lawyer stood up and put him to the test, saying, 'Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?'" You see the same question again. What shall I do to inherit eternal life? And the answer comes back the same. The Lord Jesus said to him, "What is written in the law? How do you read?" And he answered and said, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself." And Jesus said to him, "Your answer is wrong." Hmm? Not in my Bible it doesn't say that. The Lord Jesus said to him, "You have answered right." That is the right answer. Now all you have to do is do this. You've got the knowledge. Now translate it into action. "Do this and you shall live."
Isn't that exactly the same answer as he says to the rich young ruler? Keep the commandments. Do it, and you shall live. Knowing it doesn't save you. Do it. Now that's not my teaching. Every word is here from the Lord. Don't say I brought this up. I invented this. Now again I say, I don't mind what your theology is, but you best peel your ears so that you hear what Jesus is saying. Jesus is saying this, not me.
Now as we go back to Matthew 19 or Luke 18, it doesn't matter which, we see that the Lord's answer is unequivocal. In Luke 10 he goes on to speak about the good Samaritan, the parable of the good Samaritan, in answer to the lawyer's question, "Well, you asked me to love my neighbor as myself. Who is my neighbor?" The Lord Jesus said, "I'll tell you. Here is an illustration. Here is a parable. You tell me who is the neighbor."
Now this is very important because we are going to have to try to follow the Lord's thinking very carefully here. First in Matthew 19, let's notice the Lord Jesus is saying to him, "You know the commandments," and then he gives a whole set of examples from the commandments when the rich young ruler says, "Which commandment?" The point is not which commandment. All the commandments are involved. And he goes on to say, "You shall not kill, you shall not steal," and all these commandments are being given, and it's all summed up, "And you shall love your neighbor as yourself."
Now notice the first point is this: the Lord Jesus quotes only the second part of the Ten Commandments in Matthew 19, not the first part. The second part has to do with the neighbor. You know the Ten Commandments, I trust. And what are the Ten Commandments? You can refresh your memory in Exodus chapter 20. And even looking at the second half of the Ten Commandments, you will see that they are all negatives: don't kill, don't steal, don't bear false witness, don't covet, don't take. And the first part is all negatives too: don't take the name of the Lord in vain, don't make any images. It's all don'ts with one exception. "Honor your father and your mother" is the only positive commandment in there, which can also be put in a negative form. It can be put in the form: don't dishonor your parents.
If we take the Ten Commandments as they stand, it is very easy to keep. You simply don't have to do anything. And the remarkable thing is that under the law you are not saved by works; you are saved by no works. You don't do anything in order to be saved, because it is not this and it is not that. So actually you might say, in a way, if you handcuffed yourself to a chair for all your life, you are not going to break any commandments, at least as stated in the Ten Commandments. How do you break any commandment? Because you wouldn't be able to murder and you wouldn't be able to steal and you wouldn't be able to do any of these things simply because you are not able to do anything.
Now you can see why the rich young man feels that indeed he kept the commandments simply by doing nothing. It is strange. I am thinking how we say that we are saved by works under the law when in fact the law appears to require no works at all. Just look at the Ten Commandments again. They are all negatives with one exception, and even that one can be translated into a negative.
What am I getting at? I am getting at the fact that the Lord Jesus is saying, "In a sense you are right that you have kept the commandments." I don't suspect you are lying, because the rich young ruler said, "All these I have kept indeed from my youth." And you say he must be lying. No, no, no. In a sense, outwardly, you can keep all these commandments simply by doing nothing, by no works at all. But the Lord Jesus said, "You have not understood the law as it was meant to be understood. The spirit of the law is what I am talking about. The spirit of the law is this: you shall love God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself." Who turns the Ten Commandments inside out and produces something exceedingly positive.
Now that is the first step in understanding the Lord's reply: that it is the spirit of the commandments, not in the Ten Commandments but expressed in the two great commandments to love God and the neighbor. Now the question then is, when the Lord Jesus says, "You are right, keep the commandments and you will live," we begin to understand he is not talking merely about keeping the ten negative commandments. He is talking about the two positive commandments. If you can love God with all your heart and you can love the neighbor as yourself, you will live. The Lord Jesus does not withdraw his words. That stands. Can you love God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself? If you can, Jesus says to you, you will live. You will inherit eternal life. Those are his words. You will. He has repeated twice, on two different places, that this is so, and let no one say anything to the contrary.
Now what has this got to do with our message on regeneration, renewal and perfection? It has everything to do with it. Because here the Lord Jesus goes on to say this: "If you would be perfect." That's what he says here in verse 21. "If you would be perfect." Now here we are beginning to come towards the heart of the matter. Wherein lies the perfection? The perfection lies not in the negative of doing nothing, of not killing, not stealing, not saying bad words, not doing anything. The perfection lies precisely in this: to love God with your whole being and your neighbor as yourself.
He is saying to the rich young ruler, "I concede to you that you are not lying when you say you have kept them. I perceive what you mean by that is that you have not broken them. That's all you have done. You have not broken them." And consciously, there are a lot of people who have not consciously broken any of those commandments. There might be even non-Christians who can rightly claim that they have never consciously broken those Ten Commandments. Maybe if you are a non-Christian you may sit there and say, well, I haven't broken those commandments to my knowledge either. I haven't made any false images, I haven't made any idols, I haven't taken God's name in vain, I haven't stolen. And there are moral people too, and on that definition they will all be saved.
But the Lord is saying that is not enough. What is perfection? Perfection is to love God with all one's heart, one's soul, mind and strength, and with one's neighbor as oneself. That is perfection. Put in another way, perfection is God's absolute demand. Now what has that got to do with salvation? It has everything to do with salvation. No one is going to be saved who thinks he can bypass God's absolute demand. In Jesus' teaching, you cannot. You cannot get away from God's absolute demand. God makes an absolute demand upon you, every one of you, and not one of you will escape his absolute demand. Not one. He, as God the Creator, he is the one who has created you, has the right to make that demand, and he does indeed make that demand. He demands, as God, your God, your Creator, that you will give him the response that is his due. And that is the basis of it. No one can bypass it.
Now if you think therefore that perfection is something extra beyond salvation, you have not yet understood the teaching of the Lord. This is what we are getting at here, just as the rich young ruler had failed to understand, though he began to see the unsatisfactoriness of his position. He knew something is lacking. "What do I lack?" I know something is lacking. How about you? Do you know something is lacking? I hope that you are not worse off than the rich young ruler.
There are some people here who are lacking something vital and they don't even know it. The rich young ruler knew that something was lacking. "I have checked all the commandments, but something is lacking." Do you have that feeling? The feeling that your relationship to God is just not there? You try to pray and you are not getting through? You find that there is no power in your spiritual life? You find that there is no direction in your spiritual life? You find that your spiritual life is exceedingly feeble? You find the good you want to do you cannot do; the evil that you don't want to do, you find yourself doing. Now you really find something is lacking, don't you?
I find so many people come to me for counseling and they say, yes, I was baptized and I tried very hard, but something is lacking. Well, that's the feeling of the rich young ruler precisely. I've been a good man. I tithe to the church. I go to the temple to pray. I am keeping the commandments as best I know how, but something, Teacher, something is lacking. You see, you know your own spiritual condition. The rich young man knew something was missing in his life. Now if you don't know that something is missing and something really is missing, then you are much to be pitied. He is better off than you.
And it is in answer to him that the Lord Jesus says, "Well, I'll tell you what's lacking. What has been lacking in your life up to now is the total response to God. I grant you that you have made some response to God in terms of the Ten Commandments, but you have not made a total response to God because you have not loved him with your whole being." This is what we have constantly called total commitment, and I have warned again and again that no man can live a satisfactory spiritual life without total commitment. It does not work out. It's a matter of spiritual experience. You cannot live victoriously in the Christian life with a partially committed Christian faith. You cannot. There is no way you are going to make it.
And that is the same answer. Perfection, in other words, is God's total demand upon us. Now a total demand requires a total response. An absolute demand requires an absolute response. There is no way to get around this at all in the gospel.
Now Paul puts the matter in exactly the same way. He too presents God's demand as absolute. Let's not make any mistake about it. Paul does not preach any different gospel, unless we have twisted his gospel to suit our end. In Romans chapter 1, he begins with that same point. He is saying that man, though he knew God to be the Creator, as he says in chapter 1, verse 21 of Romans, did not honor God as God, did not give him the response due to God. Instead he just went on his own way, disregarding God, refusing to love God in a manner that is worthy of God. You see, Paul goes right back to the creation, and it is on the basis of creation that God makes this demand on every single person in this world: the absolute demand.
And I wonder what kind of a response you have made to God up to this day. Too often the gospel is preached today as though the only thing that God ever demands is that you be so kind as to believe in Jesus. We sent his son into the world; have pity upon him, receive him kindly, and it will go well with you. What is this? God is almost saying, well, I don't mind how many coins you throw in my direction, but throw something in my direction and you will be saved. I have no demands, little demands, nothing much. You see, I'm a God who is very kind and modest, and so if you can spare a few moments of your time on a weekend, let us say an hour or so, and come to church and honor my name a little bit, and if on top of that great sacrifice of coming to church for one hour you could also remember to drop a few coins into my offering box, well, I am a very gracious God and I will reckon this all in your favor, and this kind of faith will suffice for your salvation.
Who are we talking about? I haven't seen this God in the Bible. I don't know where they found this kind of a God. The God I know is Creator of heaven and earth, and He, as I read it in Acts, commands all men to repent. He commands it because He is the King. As the psalmist says, He is enthroned above. He sits above the circle of the earth, and you and I are going to answer to Him. If God is not an absolute God, I ask you, on what basis can He, at the judgment, decide your fate as to whether you go to heaven or to hell? On what basis has He the right to make that decision? On no other basis than that He is God. He will assign you whether it be to heaven or to hell, and you can plead your case if you have a case before Him on that day. As Paul says, when He shall stand in His presence and give account. Why do I have to give account to Him? Why do you have to give account to God? You say, "I don't even believe in Him!" It doesn't matter in the least. That's exactly what you are going to give an account to Him about. He is God, whether you believe Him or not. He is your Creator, whether you believe it or not. Your mother will be your mother whether you believe in her or not, and your father will be your father whether you haven't seen him from birth, you don't believe he even existed because you never saw him. Doesn't make any difference. He will still be your father.
The God that I know of in the Bible is sovereign. He is the King, and every person must answer to Him. And His demand upon you is not an hour on a Sunday and a few coins in the offering box. He demands everything of you. "You shall love the Lord your God," He says to you. "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your strength, and your neighbor." He is not pleading with you. He is not begging you. He is telling you. That's what He expects, and if you are not going to meet it, you stand in His presence on that day and answer to Him. That is the majesty and authority of the God of the Bible. And this rich young ruler had to be reminded of this all over again.
Now we are beginning to come to the heart of the teaching of the Lord Jesus. He is the King, and His words are with the authority of the King. Even in compassion He speaks with absolute authority. He had compassion on this young man. He looked at this rich young man because of his sincere and gentle attitude, and he loved him. But because he loved him didn't mean that he reduced one iota the demand that was made upon him.
Now until we get this point clear, brothers and sisters, we don't begin to understand the teaching of the Lord. And unless you get this point clear, you can't preach the gospel outside. The evangelist is begging some person to come to the Lord? No way. We beg only as fellow sinners, but when we speak on His behalf, we beg no man. When I speak on my behalf, I beg of you, be reconciled to God, as Paul says, because we know what awaits the sinner who does not repent. We know what happens at the judgment. Repent! Turn to the Lord! But I repeat again, God doesn't beg. He is the King.
Now you see, when we want to understand the Lord's teaching, we have to approach this along the correct path. Now let us press on here to see what happens next. The next thing the Lord Jesus says: "If you would be perfect." Assuming now we are ready to respond to the absolute demand, we ask then, what is the absolute demand? And the Lord Jesus says to the rich young ruler, "Now go and sell what you have and give to the poor, and then you come back." Those are the words of the King again. Here is a rich young ruler, a man of some authority in Israel, and the Lord Jesus is giving him an order. "Now, if you want to inherit eternal life, listen to my orders. You go from here, just go away from me, go back home, sell your possessions, give to the poor, and afterwards come back and talk to me again. Then you will be ready to follow me."
Now immediately we are used to the clamor of voices coming up in this woeful spiritual situation that we have today, trying to make all kinds of excuses that all this doesn't apply to us, that only applies to the rich young ruler. Let's not be so foolish. Do you think there is one gospel for the rich and one gospel for the poor? Do you find that in the Bible? Do you find one gospel for the Jew and one gospel for the Gentile? I read in the Bible there is only one gospel, and the rich and the poor, the Gentile and the Jew, are all saved in exactly the same way. When did — oh really, so there are two gospels? What is the gospel for the poor then, will you kindly tell me? Or can it be that the gospel of the Lord Jesus is for the rich and the gospel of Paul is for the poor? Are we going to make another distinction again? We're going to invent another gospel?
We are forever trying to run from the edge of the spiritual sword that is penetrating into our hearts, discerning our minds and our intentions, our motives, and we flee from that sword. You flee at the risk of your life. You do well to submit to that sword if ever you hope to enter the kingdom.
But what is the heart of the matter? What is the Lord Jesus saying to the rich young ruler? Is he saying that he can earn eternal life by selling his possessions? Is that what he wants to say? In which case, as we have seen before, that if a man is a millionaire he can buy eternal life for a million dollars, which after all is not too expensive. And if you only have two dollars in the bank, then you get eternal life for two dollars, so long as you give up everything you have. Then once again there is the danger that we be caught in the superficial external. Remember we said, the spirit of the law speaks to the spirit of the man. What is the Lord saying there? Look carefully again at these words.
Four things. The first is: go, sell, give, come. What is the key in all of this? Why is he to go? He is to go in order to sell. Why does he sell? In order to give. Why does he give? In order to come. Do you not see that the key of all this, the key idea is give? Why? Because the coming to Jesus is in order to give again, as we shall see in a moment. Giving is at the heart of this whole thing. Why? Do you have spiritual perception to see what is the essence of human nature? Human nature always wants to get, get, get, acquire, hoard up, get it.
# Perfection: Absolute Demand Requires Absolute Response (Part 2)
And the Lord Jesus is going to produce a transformation. Such a transformation in man as will change his whole way of thinking from getting to giving. Ah, now we are beginning to see what the Lord is driving at. The point is not about selling things as such. Because you can say, how fortunate I am. I don't have much to sell. It's so easy for me to save. I mean, if I sold my total possessions I would get $20. It's sure a great bargain to get into the kingdom of God for $20. God is not that superficial, my friend. He wants a complete change of mentality. And there is only one gospel for the rich and one gospel for the poor. It's the same gospel. And everyone will have to change, poor and rich alike. Change from what? Change from the attitude of taking, clutching, grabbing, getting, to giving and giving and giving.
Now when you perceive this, you see that the teaching of the Lord Jesus involves a fundamental change of the human heart. Look at your own character. Let's not be self-righteous about this. You know in your heart of hearts that you are a grabbing, clutching person. If you are not a regenerate person, that's the way we are. We are all like this. We reckon everything by profit or loss. Was my evening well spent? Depends on how much I got. If I didn't get much, my evening was badly spent. Did you ever reckon your evening well spent because you gave everything away?
We reckon in our household whether it's nice to be in that household or not depends on how much I get out of it. Whether in the apartment that I live with all those people, they give me a lot of encouragement. They give me a lot of comfort. They give me all the things that I hope to have in an apartment from all my roommates. And if I get all I want, I say, oh, wonderful household. Very nice household. But if people want things from me, and I have to encourage this one, and I have to help that one, and I have to financially support the other guy, and this guy is wearing out my patience, and that one is driving me around the bend, I say, this is a terrible household. I haven't — everyone said, oh, this is a wonderful place to be. It's wearing me out. I just love this place. Right? No. No.
I come to a meeting, to a Bible study. And the Bible study leader drones on and on, and I am bored half to death. And I try to yawn and I keep my jaws together, and I do all kinds of funny things so that nobody sees that I'm yawning. And I go away and I say, oh, what a Bible study. I got nothing. Absolutely nothing out of it. You see, we evaluate the value of that Bible study by what we got out of it, and we got nothing. It's terrible. It never crossed our mind that maybe we were there to give something. Isn't it? "I got nothing, but I gave. It was my privilege to give." Ah, so tiring. I came here to be refreshed and people drained me. You see.
So let's not be self-righteous. This is the way we think. Always get, get, get, get. And I see this among Christian workers too. They come and all the time they are reckoning: what can I get from this Bible study, from this session, from this time of fellowship? It's all get, get, get. And these are regenerate people. And you say, it doesn't take complete transformation to turn a getting person into a giving person. Let me tell you, it takes the marvel of a transformation.
Examine yourself. You think you are regenerate? Look at your attitude again. If somebody gives you a hundred dollars, oh, praise the Lord. Hallelujah. God is so good to me. And somebody is in need. I have to give him a hundred dollars. "Why me, Lord? There are other people who are richer than me. They can give it to him. It's not fair. That guy earns a lot more than I do. Me? No, no, no, no." We never thought, "Ah, what a privilege. I have the chance to give a hundred bucks." This guy is insane. Nobody in a sane mind thinks like that. Of course he's not sane. He's spiritual. Whoever said a spiritual man was sane by the standards of this world? He's a fool by the standards of this world. And none of us want to be reckoned as fools.
Now we are beginning to get to the heart of the teaching of the Lord Jesus. Now we understand there has to be a transformation. And what a transformation. The psychology of the carnal man, of the flesh, is to hoard, hoard, hoard, until what he hoards will choke him to death.
Some years ago, the logic of this grabbing attitude was illustrated by two brothers who were called the Kaliya brothers. Very wealthy bachelors. You see, they were so stingy they didn't want to get married, because, I mean, a wife is very expensive to maintain. So unless you have a wife with a big income, I mean, you don't want to get married. I mean, no way. And in those days, 20, 30 years ago, I mean, not too many career women were around, and wives are rather expensive to keep. So these two wealthy bachelors were called the Kaliya brothers, who were quite a famous story in their time. Maybe, I don't know, some of you who are slightly ahead of our generation, if I can put myself in the younger generation for the moment, they remember this account.
And the Kaliya brothers inherited a great mansion. But they were so thrifty, or stingy, whichever word you prefer, that literally they would not throw away a newspaper, or a magazine, or an empty bottle. Can you imagine that? And their great mansion was gradually cluttered up with newspapers, magazines, bottles, and even cans, biscuit tins, whatever, until the whole place was cluttered up from the floor to the ceiling. Now this is taking this business of getting to the logical absurdity.
And you know what happened? They filled room after room of their mansion with all this garbage that they wouldn't throw away, because they thought that there's value in all of this. And they would not even install a telephone, because they didn't want to talk to anybody anyway, and they had nothing to do with anybody. So they didn't want to pay the few dollars of rental on the telephone. So cut that expense too. And one day they got sick, apparently suffering from food poisoning or something of this sort. And the result was that when they got very sick, and they not having any telephone, found it necessary to call a doctor. I suppose that expense had to be tolerated if they were going to live long enough to store up more magazines and bottles in their mansion.
Well, in order to call the doctor, they had to get their way to the front door. And by this time the place was so cluttered, as the story tells us, according to the papers, that they had difficulty finding their way to the door. And eventually, as they tried to dig their way through all this garbage to the front door, they ran out of energy and strength, collapsed and died on top of all the garbage. Sometime later, because they were not heard of, the police came to the house looking for them and found them heaped together on top of all the garbage. Dead.
Now it's difficult to comprehend this, isn't it? And we congratulate ourselves that maybe we are getting people, but not through such absurdity. But alas, that is miserliness, hoarding, grabbing, taken to its logical absurdity, if you like.
Our time is nearly gone, and we must conclude. And I hope that by now all of this is becoming very clear and easy to understand. I hope we are beginning to get to the heart of what the Lord is saying here. But we must go on to this final point: precisely because the demand is absolute, the response has to be absolute. And you will notice that the rich young ruler turns away disappointed. I wonder if today you will turn away disappointed. You hoped for a bargain, a spiritual bargain, and you ran into an absolute demand.
There are no bargains in the gospel. The gospel is a costly, costly gospel. Costly to God — it cost Him His Son. Costly to us — it will cost us our all. "If any man would be my disciple," the Lord Jesus says, "let him pick up his cross, deny himself, suffer the loss of everything." You see?
Let's refresh our memory again. The Lord Jesus said to the rich young man, "I'm going to ask of you four things in this total demand. I'm going to tell you to go. You might never come back, but go anyway. When you have gone, sell. When you have sold, give. And then come back to me, because by that time you will give away not only your possessions. Since you have already given that away, now you are going to give away your life also." That is the kind of gospel that Jesus preaches. "Come back to me and follow me."
You know where I am going? Luke 18. We see this very thing being told to the rich young ruler. In Luke 18:22, he says, "Come back and follow me." And only a few verses later, in verse 31 of Luke 18, the following verses, he tells him where he is going to follow him to. "Come and follow me." Follow me where? In Luke 18:31, just a few verses down, he says to his disciples, "I am going to Jerusalem, and there I am going to be put to death for the salvation of the world." After you have given away your possessions — you think, oh, now I am fine, I am ready to get to heaven. The Lord said, you haven't finished yet. Now you come with me. "Come with you? Where to?" "To Jerusalem." "What am I doing in Jerusalem?" "That is where I am going to die, and you are coming with me." "You already took everything I got. Now you are going to want my life too?" Oh yes. That is the gospel. That is the way it is.
Now I hope that you realize that this radical demand is precisely what turned the rich young ruler off. And it may turn some of you off. And the Lord Jesus will not come down one iota to suit you or me or the rich young ruler or anyone else. No way. That is the way it is going to be. The absolute demand — perfection — which is what the absolute demand expresses, that stands. And if you think now that perfection has nothing to do with salvation, then you still haven't understood this passage. Perfection represents God's absolute demand to you and to me, and not until we meet it are we going to be saved.
Now it is sad that the rich young ruler didn't say, "Lord, your demand is too high for me. Too costly. I of myself can't meet that demand. I really can't. But you give me the grace, you give me the strength. By your grace, your strength —" No. Instead, the good that he had hoped to do, he didn't do. Instead he turned away.
You know, we have a lot of Christians in the world today. A lot. We can count Christians in the hundreds of millions. Roman Catholics alone, I don't know how many, 800 million. Roman Catholics, Protestants, maybe another 800 million Protestants. We have Christianized the industrial world. Every industrial nation today is Christian. Apart from the Soviet Union, which also has a Christian tradition, Orthodox Christianity. We have hundreds of millions of Christians, we think. Let me tell you this: if we are going to cut the price of Christianity, we will have hundreds of millions more, because everybody is in on a bargain. If we can have eternal life for a cut price, why not give it a try? It doesn't cost that much to go to church once in a year, maybe on Christmas Day or Easter. And we have Christianized the world by smashing the price of Christianity. And I wonder who authorized us to do so. Today Europe is Christian. North America is some sort of Christian. Everything is Christian today. And this is Christianity?
Let me tell you this: that type of Christianity, I find no authority for it in the scriptures. We have removed a total demand and produced a cheapened version of Christianity by which we can convert the world. Now Jesus, let me tell you for your interest's sake, is not interested in converting the world. Surprising as it may be. He is not interested in that. He is interested only in speaking the truth. And we, in His name, have cheapened the gospel to make it more saleable, so that more people will buy it, and more people will call themselves Christians. And these are not Christians that God even wants to recognize.
The absolute demand must stand. Only when there is an absolute demand does it force us to come to grace. Now you are asked the question: what have I said so far that has anything to do with grace and faith? It has everything to do with grace and faith. As I said, what Jesus is teaching here is the transformation of the inner person, from a grabbing, clutching, greedy person, to a transformed, regenerate person who thinks of nothing but to give. That is transformation in the most remarkable way.
And that is why the Lord goes on to say, when the disciples said, "If the rich young man, a decent guy, cannot be saved, then who is going to be saved?" The Lord Jesus' answer is, remember what? "With man it is not possible, but with God all things are possible." What does the answer mean? It means this regeneration, this transformation, can only be brought forth by the power of God. It is the grace of God that will accomplish this. And as Paul says, "It is of faith that it might be by grace." The Lord Jesus is not talking salvation by law. He is not talking salvation by works. But by means of the law, he shows that a person cannot fulfill the law except by the transforming power of God in the Spirit.
And that of course is exactly what Apostle Paul is saying in Romans chapter 8, verse 4. He is telling us that Jesus died and gave us the Holy Spirit so that we can fulfill the requirements of the law. Why should Paul speak about fulfilling the requirements of the law? The law is non-essential? Oh, it is not non-essential. It is essential. It is essential to fulfill the requirements of the law, the spiritual law. But we cannot do it by ourselves. It is God, through His Spirit, by His grace, through faith, that accomplishes all this.
If we teach a cheapened version of salvation, we teach also a cheapened version of grace, and we teach also a cheapened version of faith. It takes no great logician to see that. By refusing to bring the gospel down to less than perfection, by making the absolute demand, we drive every man to the grace of God. We have no alternative but to say to God, "Lord, I cannot keep those requirements. I need your grace. Fill me with your Spirit, because without your Spirit I can never meet your requirements." And thus it is by faith that we are cast totally and always upon the grace of God.
I hope you profoundly grasp this message, that you can understand the marvel of the Lord's teaching of the gospel, and that on that day you and I will stand in His presence, saved by grace. The problem with the rich young ruler was that he refused to burn his bridges behind him. He wanted to keep his link to the world open. He was afraid of a radical response because he was afraid that he would have nowhere to back off to when things began to get tough. If he gave everything away, who is going to support him in his old age? Who is going to pay the fees for his children's schooling? How is he going to live a relatively comfortable life in case he got sick? He has no money to pay for his medical bill. How is he going to pay for his children's schooling? It is surely the height of imprudence to do things like this.
You see, it is not possible to do these things without faith. And if you try to give everything away and sell all you have without faith, I say to you, don't even begin to think about it. And if you are not prepared to change your whole lifestyle and let God transform you, don't even think about selling all you have. These are not external things to be done. It is very dangerous to carry out the Lord's teaching externally but not internally. Because even if you rushed out and sold all you have, by two days later you might regret very much what you did. Oh no. Don't begin to think about it. Only when there is a total change within, then you can act wisely upon such matters. The Lord Jesus is not asking for external performance but a change of heart.
Whether you be rich or poor, are you willing to change? Are you willing to let God change your whole thinking, the renewal of your mind that Paul speaks about? Are you willing from this day forth to live a life that is just to give, give, give? Christians are still saying to me, "I've got a problem. I am inward looking. I am constantly inward looking." If you are an inward looking type, you are a very miserable Christian. You know why you are inward looking? Learn what the Lord is teaching here. Learn to give. Give and delight. "It is more blessed to give than to receive" is the Lord's teaching, as Paul quotes it in Acts 20 and verse 35.
The whole of the Lord's teaching, which I won't have time to expound now, talks about giving. Just look at his teaching and you will see it. In Luke chapter 6, verse 38: "Give and it shall be given to you, pressed down, running over." He condemned the rich man, the rich fool, as he calls him, who, like these Kaliya brothers, stored up, stored up, stored up, built larger and larger granaries to store up his riches. And he says, "You fool. Tonight your life will be required of you. And what will you have?" He had not learned to give.
If you can learn this life of giving, you will enter into a life of power and of joy spiritually. But you see, you cannot have that mentality unless you are willing to burn your bridges behind you. But you see, the carnal mind always wants to have a safe retreat. And if you want to play it safe, if you want to save your life, in other words, as the Lord Jesus puts it, you will lose it. "He that loses his life, he that gives it away, shall gain it unto eternal life." The Lord's teaching is so hard to take, isn't it? But he that will save his life will lose it.
Learn, brothers and sisters. Learn to stop being inward looking. Learn to say, "God, by your grace, I can't do it. But by your grace, I will learn constantly to go out and give and give." When you have nothing more to give, God will give you more to give, much to your surprise, and you will turn into a channel of outflowing giving, the giving of life and of mercy from God to others. It is something that has to be tested to see whether it is real.
Many people say to me, "I don't know God. God doesn't seem real to me." He will never be real to you because you don't live according to His word. And there are few Christians who live according to His word. They all want to keep the road open behind them, the bridges all ready for them to retreat. "I will give it a try. If it doesn't work, I retreat." There is no trial. It is total commitment. There is no backing up. But if you are prepared to walk this road, God will then become real to you. I have never yet met a man who has applied this teaching into his life and then found that God is not real. God is so real. God is so true. But how many people you know in the church who find God real? No. Not many. Why? Because like everybody else, they keep their safe retreat behind them, and when the going gets tough, they withdraw back into the safety of the world. This kind of Christian is not total.
So let's conclude. Let's sum up. The conclusion then, as we saw, is that what God requires in salvation is perfection. Perfection is God's total demand upon us and our total response to Him. This is what we call total commitment. And what does total commitment mean? Let's get the meaning of this very clear, unless we think we are totally committed when we are not. Total commitment means, in having made that response to God, the response is that of giving. We give all and keep on giving, giving, giving. And this we can only do by faith, through grace.
When the Lord has transformed our inner being, then we become Christ-like. "Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus." What was his mind? Giving. He gave himself. And when you walk in this path, God will be so real to you that you will say, "It is amazing. It is marvelous that God has granted me this privilege to know the living God." If you have walked this path and God is not real to you, will you come and look for me and tell me that I am a liar? And I will well deserve any abuse you can heap upon me. But you will be so filled with amazement and wonder that you will say to me, "Why didn't you tell me all this a lot earlier? A pity I never heard all this earlier."
The question depends on these words, as the Lord says to the rich young ruler: "If you would be perfect." The rich young ruler's answer was no. The price of perfection is too high for me. What is your answer to the question? Are you willing to be perfect? Let us pray.