SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/16/2023 8:35 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-6 “The
Response to Jesus”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
19:20-22
Message of the verses: “20 The young man said
to Him, "All these things I have kept; what am I still lacking?" 21 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." 22 But when the young man heard this statement, he
went away grieved; for he was one who owned much property.”
The truth is that this young ruler did not want
Jesus as his Savior or as his Lord, and the reason was that he was not willing
to give Him his sins to be forgiven or his life to be ruled by Him. So when he
heard Jesus’ statement, he went away grieved; for he was one who owned much
property. You remember how this man was
saying that he kept all of the commandments, but contrary to that, his own
self-assessment, he did not live up to any of God’s law, but he was especially
guilty in the area of materialism. I
have said things like this in other SD’s, and that is he did not own the
property, the property owned him.
He
went away grieved because, although he came to Jesus for eternal life, he then
left without it. This man did not desire
it above the possessions that he thought he owned in this present life. He wanted to gain salvation, but not as much
as he wanted to keep his property, and that was the wrong choice.
John
MacArthur writes “Zaccheus was also a wealth man. But when Jesus called him, ‘he hurried and
came down, and received Him gladly.’ Spontaneously
he volunteered to do essentially what Jesus commanded the rich young ruler to
do. ‘Half of my possessions I will give
to the poor’ Zaccheus said, ‘and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will
give back four times as much.’ Jesus told him, ‘Today salvation has come to
this house’ (Luke 19:5-9). Rather his
new-found generosity was evidence that he was truly saved. As implied in the next verse, Zaccheus was
saved because he confessed he was lost (v. 10).
“Although
every sin must be forsaken for Christ’s sake, there is often a certain sin or
group of sins that a person finds particularly difficult to give up. For that young man it was love of his wealth
and the prestige associated with it.
Willingness to give up his property would not have saved him, but it
would have revealed a heart that under the convicting work of the Holy Spirit
was ready for salvation.
“When
Jesus declared, ‘No one of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his
own possessions’ (Luke 14:33), He was not referring only to material
possessions. For some people the supreme
obstacle to salvation might be a career, an unsaved boyfriend or girlfriend, or
some cherished sin. Many people who are materially
destitute are just as far from the kingdom as the rich young ruler. Yet they must be willing to give up whatever
they do posses, even if all they have left is pride, if they would be saved.”
So
what does salvation involve? Salvation
involves a commitment to forsake sin and to follow Jesus Christ at all
costs. He will take disciples on no
other terms. Romans 10:9-10 come into
bare at this time in our study: “9 that
if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart
that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; 10 for with the heart a
person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses,
resulting in salvation.” The person who does
not do this will not be saved, and that is not good news, but good news is
those who will accept this. With that we
end our study on Matthew 19:20-22, something that I did not think so long.
3/16/2023 9:00 AM
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