In this enlightening episode, delve into the profound conversation between Jesus and the rich young ruler, as Charles Stanley explores the enduring struggle of believing that good deeds alone can secure eternal life. Through the narrative of the young man’s desperate quest for eternal life, listeners are confronted with the pervasive deception that misleads many into believing that righteousness can be earned through human effort and material sacrifice.
Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Wednesday, November 19th. Today, you’ll be introduced to a man who thought he could get into heaven by being good. But Jesus reminded him and us that though our behavior may look good, it’s never good enough.
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Well, this message today is about a very good man who came to Jesus and asked him for something that he needed, that he felt like he needed desperately. And yet when the Lord told him, he said, now this is how you can have this. The Bible says that he decided that really wasn’t what he wanted that badly. And so he walked away. The title of this message is Good But Not Good Enough. And this is the kind of passage that a person, average person will read this and they’ll say, well, that’s an interesting story, but that doesn’t apply to me because I just don’t have the same kind of circumstances that that person has. Not realizing that probably the basic reason most people will meet God unprepared is for the same reason this young man made the mistake that he made. So I want you to turn, if you will, to Matthew chapter 19. And I want us to begin reading in the 16th verse. And behold, one came to him and said, “‘Teacher, what good things shall I do that I may obtain eternal life?’ And he said to him, “‘Why are you asking me?’ about what is good there is only one who is good but if you wish to enter into life keep the commandments he said to him which ones and jesus said you shall not commit 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 things i have kept what am i still lacking Jesus said to him, if you wish to be complete, go and sell your possessions and give to the poor and you shall have treasure in heaven and come follow me. But when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieved for he was one who owned much property. And Jesus said to his disciples, Truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. And again I say to 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. And when the disciples heard this, they were astonished and said, Then who can be saved? And looking upon them, Jesus said to them, With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible. Now, what we have to ask is what is the question that he asked and what’s the nature of this question? Well, when he came to Jesus, he said, teacher, a good teacher, what must I do to obtain eternal life? What he was in essence is saying was this. He was saying, what else can I do other than all the other good things that I have done to obtain eternal life? And the emphasis here that I want you to notice is so, which is so very important. What good things shall I do? Now, when he’s talking about eternal life, what was he referring to? That is, while eternal life is forever and ever and ever, it is also a quality of life. So what kind of quality is it? Well, somebody says, well, it’s a religious life, or it’s a life of doing good, it’s a life of righteousness. No, it’s more than that. Eternal life, listen, is the life of God. When you receive the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, here’s what happens. When you receive Christ as your Savior by faith, believing that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, who went to Calvary and died for your sins, and you accept Him as your personal Savior, you receive at that moment the very life of God. Because the Scripture says in Romans, if you have not the Spirit of God, you’re none of His. So when we talk about salvation, we’re not talking about something you just believe. Salvation is God coming to live on the inside of you in the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit who is one of the persons of the Godhead. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit who make up the Godhead which is one. So every believer is indwelt by God. So that it’s very clear that eternal life is a gift of God which comes as a result of our placing our trust in the person of Jesus Christ. So the great question is this. What? must I, and what can I do to obtain eternal life? The second question, the second thing is, what is this great deception? Well, this young man is like so many people. He’s asking this question. It’s the wrong question, but he’s asking the best he knows. What can I do to obtain eternal life? And the thing that’s so important about this passage of Scripture is not whether this man was rich or not, but what is it that he’s experiencing here? He’s experiencing the same deception. He sees eternal life as a result of something that he can do. There must be one more thing he can do in life, something he can do in life in order to obtain eternal life. And so here’s the great deception. The great deception is this. that man can perform in such a fashion in some way as to do something in order that God will see what he’s done, approve of him, and give him eternal life. That is, the great deception is I can perform in a certain way and God will accept me on the basis of my performance. That is life’s greatest deception. That is exactly the way most people approach God. They approach Him with the idea that if I do something right or do enough right, and if I get rid of the wrong things in my life, then surely God will accept me on the basis of my conduct and my performance. That is a natural, normal way that they come to God. And so… What we have to ask is, what’s wrong with that? I want to show you what’s wrong with that. First of all, what’s wrong with it is this. It bypasses, it ignores the basic problem that we all have. The basic problem is this, that all of us came into this world with a sinful nature, been away from God. And the Bible says that all of us have sinned against God. He says all of us have sinned against God and come short of being what God wants us to be, doing the thing God wants us to do, and fulfilling the purpose that God wants us to fulfill. Sin is a debt that we owe. Sin is against Almighty God. And so we say, well… You know, if I could straighten out a few things in my life, surely God’s going to accept me. Well, let me ask you a question. Suppose you owned a store in a small town. Let’s say you own a big department store in a small town. So I come in and I say, well, you know, could I buy something on credit? Sure, I trust you. You’re the pastor, no problem. Well, so I run up about $5,000. This guy keeps trusting me and trusting me, and it’s up to $5,000. So one day I walk in, big smile on my face. I said, boy, you’re going to love my coming in today. Well, got a little frown on his face. I said, starting today, I’m paying cash. From this day on, absolutely cash. Don’t worry about a thing. Every time you see me coming, know I got greenbacks in my hand. I’m coming with money in my hand. Well, that would be fine. Let me ask you a question. Would my beginning to pay cash erase my debt? If you owned the store, it wouldn’t, right? Absolutely would not. You’d say, well, you know, paying cash is fine, but what about $5,000 you owe me? So here’s what’s happening. When a fellow says, well, listen, I’m going to change my life. I’m going to cut out the bad things. I’m going to start going to church. In fact, I’m probably going to give a little money. I’m going to start reading the Bible. I’m going to start praying. I’m going to start being a better friend to people, a better neighbor, going to work harder. I’m going to start being the kind of person I believe God wants me to be. Well, the problem with that is what about all those years of sin? My friend, your good works cannot erase the sin in your life. You see, good works does not eliminate sin. The only thing that can take care of sin is death. You say, but no, wait a minute. I thought Jesus offered life. He does. The only thing that can take care of sin is death. That’s why the Bible says without the shedding of blood, the blood of Jesus, there is no forgiveness of sin. Now, think about this. If a person by their good works, and the Bible says he cannot, for by grace he is saved through faith, that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works less than a man should boast. That’s Ephesians 2, 8, 9. In Titus 3, 5, he says, not by works of righteousness, which we’ve done, but according to his mercy, he saved us. If I could begin to be good and do good and start trying to keep the commandments and straighten out some things in my life. Then what I would say, well, God’s going to accept me on the basis of that. Then what I’m saying is I can be made acceptable by God and ignore the crucifixion, ignore the cross. It is the crucifixion of Jesus that makes it possible for you and me to be forgiven of our sin. There isn’t anything that has ever happened on the face of this earth, never will happen, never can happen, that can deal with our sin problem but the cross of Jesus Christ. The issue here is this man is suffering from the great deception. He believes that somehow there is something else. What else must I do besides all the other things I have done and made me so good in order to be accepted in the eyes of God? And the answer to that question is absolutely nothing. The great deception. And the tragedy is most people believe that is the basis of their acceptance, performance. The great deception is this, believing that somehow I can perform in such a fashion that I will be made acceptable in the eyes of God based on my performance. The great deception. Then you say, well, what is the great solution? Well, here is indeed the great solution. Well, there are three misconceptions that you and I could come to in this passage. And the first one is just this. And that is, is a person saved? Cannot a person be saved by keeping the Ten Commandments? Because it sounds like it when Jesus said here, he said, well, if you wish to enter into life, what you do is you keep the commandments. Well, there’s not a… Listen, one of the misconceptions is that a person is saved by keeping the Ten Commandments. Let me ask you a question. How many of you have kept them all? Because nowhere in the Bible does it say that you and I are saved by keeping the Ten Commandments. In fact, we can’t. In fact, that’s not even why they were given. The Ten Commandments were not given in order to get us saved. The Ten Commandments were given to us to reveal our sinfulness. We can’t keep them. Secondly, the Ten Commandments were given to us as, listen, a moral law by which society can exist. Now you think about it. When you eliminate the whole moral law of God, what you’ve said, here’s a society that’s going to exist, no accountability to God. Now, what we don’t realize is this. When we think that way, when you have no accountability to God, then you begin to do what? You begin to mistreat each other. And so a society that doesn’t want God and refuses to recognize our accountability to God does what? Devours one another. Wasn’t given for salvation. Given to show us. And listen, how do we know how sinful and wicked and vile we are? You take the Ten Commandments with the newspaper headlines and the television radio headlines and put them down side by side and you will conclude we are a nation of evil people. Does that mean everybody’s evil? No. Many multitudes, millions of godly people in this nation, no question about it. But our society, that is the world system operating in our nation and every other nation, is a world system that operates minus God. The Ten Commandments are objectionable to them because what? Because it limits their evil conduct. And so what we’ve decided to do, we’re going to raise a generation of children. And what we’ve said is, forget the Ten Commandments. You don’t have to live by these moral laws. Now we’ve got problems that we cannot solve. And you can throw billions of dollars to moral problems and they will not be solved because you cannot ignore God and have any kind of a decent society. Well, the issue here is not keeping the Ten Commandments for salvation. That’s one of the misconceptions. A second misconception is this, and that is that sacrificing everything you have and giving it away will make you a Christian. Well, listen to what Jesus said to him. Now, you say, well, is that not what it says? But watch this. The young man said to him, all these things I have kept, what am I still lacking? Jesus said to him, if you wish to be complete, if you really want eternal life, you go and sell your possessions and give to the poor and you shall have treasure in heaven and come follow me. Well, now that sounds like that you get eternal life by doing what? Sacrificing everything that you have and turning it over to someone who doesn’t have anything. The idea of laying down everything I have and giving it to the poor will get me say there’s a contradiction of the whole issue of what grace is about, that God saves us on the basis of his love for us and his forgiveness of the cross, not our good works, as good as that may be. You can’t get saved by sacrifices. What did Jesus say? Here’s the reason. He’s bringing this young man to the point of the realization of what his problem is. And the key issue in his life was that his wealth now possessed him and he was attached to it in such a fashion that he wouldn’t lay it down, give it away in order to receive the one thing he said in life he was lacking. Well, misconception number one, you can be saved by keeping the Ten Commandments. You cannot. Misconception number two, you can be saved by sacrificing everything you have and giving it to the poor. It’s good works. You cannot. Then the third misconception is a wealthy man can’t be saved. That’s not what Jesus is saying. No doubt he is saying, look, he says it is hard for a rich man to be saved. And then he illustrates it this way. Now, you’ve heard all kinds of interpretations about this eye of the needle. You’ve heard this interpretation. What that means is this. It means that in those days, the cities were walled. They had a main gate where all the traffic and all the business went through. And those gates were closed at night for protection. But for those people who were outside the gate, there was another very, very small gate. that a person could get through after the gate was locked at night. And usually it was the kind of gate so small that you’d have to sort of bend over a little bit to get through. Or you may have heard it this way, that that small gate was small enough for a camel and its owner to get through if you took all the baggage off the camel and he could just sort of get on his knees and weasel his way through. Well, what that says is, if that’s the right interpretation, Jesus says it’s hard for a rich man to be saved, but he can weasel his way through if he manipulates his life enough. That’s not what it means. Then what did Jesus mean? He meant exactly what he said, that it is impossible for a rich man to get into the kingdom of God when he is depending upon his wealth and his power to make him acceptable in the eyes of God. So when he said in this verse, he says, if you’ll notice in verse 26, with men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible. What is impossible? It is impossible for a person to get to heaven depending on anything they possess or anything that they are apart from a relationship to God. So just saying, well, you know, if you get off enough of this… baggage you’ll be able to weasel your way through. That’s not what it means. And that’s crystal clear. He says, and looking upon them, he said, with men, this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible. What’s the great solution? Here’s the great solution. The great question is what can I do to inherit eternal life? The great deception is somehow be sufficient to work hard enough that God will accept me. The great solution is Faith in Jesus Christ is the only means of acceptance in the eyes of God. What’s the great tragedy? Here it is all wrapped up in one verse. Look at this. Verse 22 says, but when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieved for he was one who owned much property. The Bible says that he walked away having come to Jesus and said, there’s one thing lacking in my life. What is it? I want eternal life. What is it? Jesus said, put your trust in me and not your possessions. Put all that aside and come follow me. You see, the reason Jesus said that to him is because he knew that was his problem. That is not the way to get saved. What’s the great tragedy? Here’s the great tragedy. That this young man made this decision in his life. It is the tragic decision that so many people make in life. He tried to hold on to what he could not keep and rejected what he could not lose. He tried to hold on to what he could not keep and rejected what he could not lose. He asked for eternal life and he said, this is it. He turned it down for material wealth. Let me ask you a question. If you’ve never trusted Jesus Christ as your Savior, now be honest, if you’ve never trusted Jesus as your Savior, there is something between you and God. There’s something you won’t lay down, something you won’t turn away from, something you won’t give up. It may be your doubt. It may be some activity. It could be pride. Nobody is going to tell me what to do. I’m going to be my own man. I’m going to be my own woman. Nobody is going to tell me what to do. It could be your pride. It could be your wealth. But there is something. You see, anybody who rejects the gospel, anyone who rejects Jesus, there is a reason for it. Would you be honest enough to ask yourself this question? What is the real reason that I won’t receive eternal life? You say, well, I just don’t believe all that. The great question is, how do I have eternal life? The great deception is, I can do it without God. The great solution is that Jesus is the only way. And the great tragedy is that you, may having heard the truth, would turn away and lose your opportunity for eternal life.
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Thank you for listening to Good But Not Good Enough. For more inspirational messages like this one, visit our 24-7 online station. And if you’d like to know more about Charles Stanley or InTouch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.
