Where is Your Heart?

Welcome to God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in Morning Sun, Iowa. Check us out online at www.sharonrpc.org. We pray that this message will be a blessing to you and that the Lord will use it to transform your faith and your life. Let's turn in your Bibles to Mark chapter 10. Mark chapter 10, and we'll begin at verse 17 this morning. Mark chapter 10, beginning at verse 17. Mark 10, verse 17. You're going to find that on page, I think, 893 of your QBibles.

Hear now God's perfect Word. Now as he was going out on the road, one came running, knelt before him and asked, Good teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? So Jesus said to him, Why do you call me good? No one is good but one. That is God. You know the commandment, do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and your mother.

And he answered and said to him, Teacher, all these things I have kept from my youth. Then Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, one thing you lack. Go your way, sell whatever you have, and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. And come, take up the cross and follow me." But he was sad at this word, and he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

Then Jesus looked around and said to His disciples, How hard is it for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God? And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus answered again and said to them, Children, how hard it is for those who trust in riches to enter the kingdom of God. 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 they were greatly astonished, saying among themselves, Who then can be saved? But Jesus looked at them and said, With men it is impossible, but not with God.

For with God all things are possible. Then Peter began to say to Him, See, we have left all and followed you. So Jesus answered and said, Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house, or brothers, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake and the gospels, who shall not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brothers, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions. and in the age to come, eternal life.

Prayer for Illumination

But many who are first will be last, and the last first. This ends the reading of God's word. Brothers and sisters, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word. It is living. It is active. It is sharper than any two-edged sword, so Father, we pray that You would please, by the power of Your Spirit, use it in our lives this morning. Father, we pray that You would please help us to not just read it, not even just to understand it, but that Your Holy Spirit would teach us how to apply it to our lives.

Sermon

In Jesus' name, Amen. Well, we continue to work through the book of Mark, and I was telling someone the other day, I said, you know, it seems like the Lord has just given me controversial sermon, after controversial sermon, after controversial sermon, after controversial sermon.

I said, I'm really excited about preaching this text, because I just get to offend everyone across the board. If there is something that the Western world knows well, it's wealth. If there's something we know that will ensnare our hearts well, it's the stuff of this life. Now I want to open this up talking to you about a...

Churches understood this in different ways and misapplied this passage in a number of different ways. There's a story of a Franciscan monk who at times, who at one time, that he had been caught with a coin in his pocket. And his discipline by his monastery, by his abbey, was to put that coin in his pocket and to crawl on his hands and knees through the street. And when he got to the pile in the middle of town, in one of the stalls that had all the manure, without his hands, he was to put that coin in the manure. Imagine the coin is in his mouth and he has to put it in the manure without his hands.

How will he get it there? And what will he smell? Is this text calling us to take vows of poverty and that all money is absolutely evil? Or is Jesus challenging this man where his heart is? This morning, I'm going to challenge you. Where is your heart? What is it that you love most? What is it that you find yourself tied to?

We start in verse 17, where Jesus, He's going out on the road, and there's this guy, he's a young guy, the other gospels tell us, he's a rich young ruler, he has power and authority behind him, and he's running to Jesus, he's really excited to go talk to Jesus. And as he comes to Jesus, he has a really good religious question. He starts off very honorably talking to Jesus.

Good teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? I want to be in the kingdom of God. I want to be in this kingdom of heaven. What do I need to do to live forever, good teacher? And it's right there that Jesus picks up on it. This is His entranceway. Why do you call me good? Why would you come and address me that way? You know there's only one good, and it's God Himself, right?

Jesus is not of the opinion that all mankind is naturally good. Jesus knows that He is a believer in the first tea of tulip, right? He believes in total depravity. He knows that all of us are sinners, but Jesus is getting at something here. To stand before God's presence means that you have to be good. that you have to be perfect, because he is a holy God. So he starts going down the list of the last six of the commandments, roughly. Let's look at that, verses 18 and 19. Jesus said to him, why do you call me good? No one is good but one, that is God. And then he goes on, verse 19.

You know, every Jewish person knows this, you know the commandments, Do not commit adultery. That's the sixth commandment. Do not murder. That's the seventh commandment. Do not steal. That's the eighth commandment. Do not bear a false witness. That's the ninth commandment. Do not defraud. Interestingly, not one of the ten commandments. Come back to that in a second. Honor your father and your mother. Fifth commandment. Jesus goes down the list of commandments, and he tells this man, you need to keep all of these commandments.

Notice he hasn't touched on the first four. He hasn't touched on God being his God alone, on not making graven images, on not taking the Lord's name in vain, and not keeping the Sabbath. He hasn't touched on those things yet, but he wants to get at what we call the second table of the law. And the young man answers him in verse 20, and he answered and said to him, All of these things I have kept from my youth. And then Jesus leans in. Why would Jesus have not said the 10th commandment? Or why had he not started with the first four commandments? Because this man has an idol in his heart.

He does an easy thing. He says, here are these things you're good at, right? You don't steal. You don't defraud. You honor your mother and father. You do these things generally in your life. And Jesus, who knows this man's heart, is able to show him these things you know. You know them and you keep them, but... But there's something that's lacking.

He says, in verse 21, looking at him, He loved him. Notice the motivation of Jesus' answer, what he's about to do. He doesn't want to, oh I gotcha! Right, Jesus isn't a jerk. But Jesus loves this man. One of the most loving things that Jesus can do for him is to point out where he is lacking. To point out what is the idol in his heart, what is keeping him from eternal life. And he says to him, one thing you lack.

Go your way. Sell whatever you have, give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. And come, take up the cross and follow me." But he was sad at this word and went away sorrowful. Why? For he had great possessions. Jesus points out here, he says, there's one thing you're missing. One thing that's keeping you from having this eternal life that you so desire, that you have run here to talk to me about. This one thing is that you have something else you love in this life. More than me. It's your stuff. It's your wealth, it's your prestige, it's your power, it's your position in this life.

He doesn't start with the first four commandments and he doesn't end with the tenth commandment, do not covet, because he's going to put it on the materialism of his heart. See, the Lord will not share his glory with any other. The Lord will not allow It's like, oh God, you have first place in my heart, but right next to that is my money, is my 401k, is the financial statement of my business.

No, it's God and God alone. It's God who claims imminent domain over our hearts. And so Jesus points this out here. He gets at the idol in this man's heart. He says, You love something more than you actually love eternal life. And you can imagine Jesus, the text tells us, he looks at him. Jesus, this young adult rabbi, looks at him in the eyes and he gives him this counsel. Is he going to take it? Now, we don't know the end of this story. We don't know what this man does later in his life. I hope he listened, but he goes away sad. He goes away distraught because he had great wealth. And I mean, if at this point it would be remiss of me if I'm just going to talk about a historical guy who has great possessions.

Brothers and sisters, you are one of the most wealthy people in the world. If you drove here in a car this morning, you are wealthier than the vast majority of the people in this world. If you ate breakfast this morning, you are wealthier than some of thy friends I talked to in India. If you have more than one set of clothes in your closet, you are wealthier than the vast score of people, of Christians who live in Africa.

We are a wealthy people and the question we need to ask ourselves in the West is, how much do we love our wealth? How much do we love our comfort? How much do we love our stuff? And I'm saying this here as somebody who feels this guilt all the time. There's this great challenge that I face when I talk to people. Someday I'm just going to scroll through the WhatsApp and just let you guys see the messages we get from other churches and from other Christians around the globe who ask us for money, who ask us for stuff. One, it's logistically impossible, but two, the needs are so vast that we would wipe out every single one of your bank accounts if we gave them all that they wanted.

But do we love our stuff? Do we love our stuff? Now there's a danger here. I think those Franciscans were wrong in making this man put the money in the dung pile with his lips. That's an ugly picture. There's almost this gnostic idea that can creep into the church that material things are somehow in and of themselves bad. That's not what Jesus is getting at. It's not that the physical world that God created and said it was very good is evil in and of itself, but our hearts, when we love this world, when we're not just in this world, but we're also of this world, is a problem. But Jesus tells him, follow me.

And I wonder how long of a pause that was. When he told him, Go sell everything you have, give it to the poor, and you'll have treasures in heaven. Take up the cross and follow me." I wonder how long that young man stood in front of Jesus, turning the wheels in his mind what this was going to cost him. He only knew that it was going to cost Jesus absolutely everything. He would have to forsake even what the Jewish Zionists, the nationalists of his day, the right-wingers of his time would want him to have a crown on his head and inherit Jerusalem. Jesus would say, even to Satan, no. No, it was Jesus who would show him how to pave this way.

The man turns his back on Jesus. It's one of the saddest disjunctions in the entire New Testament. But, he was sad at this word. And he goes away with grief in his heart. Right, he had run to Jesus and the day had been bright, it had been sunny, it had been wonderful. He was going to find out how to receive eternal life. And it's as if, as he turns his back on Jesus, His heart clouds over, his vision goes dark, and all he can see is something he could never possibly do.

So I have to ask, if you were that young man, if you were to stand in front of Jesus, and He said, all your spare clothes, you need to sell them. You know what, that nice car you have, I want you to go get a jalopy. I want you to go to the salvage yard and go buy something that barely putters along. And I want you to give it, because there's these poor people in town who need that money. Would you do it?

Now remember, this is Jesus, this is God Himself speaking to this man. I'm not calling you to do that this morning, but what I'm saying is, this is the radical cause He's telling this man. See, this is going to turn everything on its head. Jesus is literally going to take the people in the church and he's going to turn everything on their head.

Jesus looks at his disciples in verse 23 and he says, How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God. When they have this idea of the kingdom of God, You need to understand that they have Solomon in mind. They have the idea that this is going to be the days of wealth and plenty again. That gold is going to pour in, that their grain bins are going to be overflowing, that there's going to be ships trading and going to the far reaches of the world, bringing in gold from Ophir, that there's going to be kings and queens who are going to bring their stuff to the Messiah. In their minds it is, this is the time of health, wealth, and prosperity.

And Jesus says, if that's your idea, you're going to have a hard time getting into the kingdom of God. And His disciples are shocked. I mean, their jaws are on the floor with this. Verse 24, And His disciples were astonished at His words, but Jesus answered and said to them, Children how hard it is for those who trust notice what he says who what now who have Who trust in riches to enter the kingdom of God It said this is what this young ruler was trusting in I This was His assurance, this was His sign that God's favor was upon Him. And Jesus says, no, no, that's not it. That's not it at all. And this is where, as we keep going in verse 25, Jesus says, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Why?

Because when somebody continues to receive wealth, when someone continues to receive praises, when someone continues to grow in their status and in their power, it's easy to trust in that. It's easy to take security in the comfort of this life. And Jesus says, I'm gonna take the most ridiculous illustration possible. Some common commentators will come up with silly things to try to explain this away.

No, it's meant to be an absurd idea. You cannot get a camel to go through the eye of a needle. I can't even get a piece of thread to go through the eye of a needle half the time. And Jesus says, this is how hard it is It's impossible. It's not doable. But this is the cost of it.

In Rome, when Diocletian, the emperor, was killing Christians for their faith, it was going to cost them. And they knew it, they were willing to become poor, they were willing to lose everything for the Kingdom of God. In the 1950s and 60s, when Russia and the Soviet Union was reigning large, for people to remain Christians, it meant that they would renounce their homes, lose their families, and go to Siberia to work in the gulag. Even today, even today, if you were to be a Christian in China, It might mean that you lose everything.

It might mean that the government someday is going to come, knock on your landlord's house and say, hey, this guy, we don't like him living here. You need to cancel his lease. And they will pressure them. And then if that's not enough, if you continue to live in the same town, then they'll go to your boss and they'll say, this man or this woman shouldn't be employed by you. And if that's not enough, then they'll deport you. Or they'll send you to a re-education camp.

I remember hearing of a man named Mohammed who lived in Ethiopia and he came to Christ. And when he came to Christ, it meant that he was going to lose all of his business. It meant that he lost his working relationship with his business associates and his company tanked. Why? Because he wouldn't renounce Christ. Even today, I mean, I'm telling you, you need to get ready to count this cost. If you really want to follow Jesus, this is going to become more and more on your life.

Just before we moved here, we used to have great relationships with these vendors when we ran our business. And I remember this getting put right in front of our face as, you know, we had a website, we had great working relationships, this is wonderful, and then There were venues who would start getting a hold of us, and they were doing a test of all of their vendors to see, are you fully embracing LGBTQ clients? If not, we're canceling, we're taking you off of our preferred vendors list. If you're not on board with us, you're going to lose your business. We're going to make sure that you don't get the couples who are coming from our business, from our venue.

What will you do? What will you do? Will you count the cost? Jesus warned about this. In the illustration, when Jesus is talking about the various different soils, He warns us, He tells us that there is going to be seed and it's cast along the thorny soil. It's going to grow up quickly, but the weeds are going to try to choke it out. What are those weeds? The Gospel of Luke tells us that Jesus says it's the deceitfulness of wealth and the carelessness of life that will try to choke out that gospel seed.

Let me ask you, what are you living for? What are you working for? What is it that motivates you to wake up in the morning? Or maybe I should ask a different question. What is it that keeps you from actually reading your Bible? What is it that keeps you from praying?

Is it a concern for how you're going to feed your family or how you're going to make the next buck or how the farm or business is going to operate? Jesus says it's going to be hard. It's going to be hard for a rich man to enter in the kingdom of heaven because you have to count the cost. You have to count the cost.

And the disciples' reaction to this is, it goes from, you know, the disciples were astonished in verse 24 to now they're greatly astonished in verse 26. And they were greatly astonished, right? They can't get their jaws off the floor. They're so slack-jawed. They're so amazed. They're so just like bewildered that Jesus would say this. Why? Why are they so amazed by this? Then who can be saved? What's motivating this behind them? We often think of the disciples, and I want you to dispel this from your mind. I've heard this said time and time and time again.

These are just blue-collared fishermen. You know, they don't have any education, they're just work-with-their-hands type men. I'm going to challenge that a little bit. Because I have a feeling that James and John were to be the inheritor of Zebedee and Sons Fishing Company. that Peter, who had hired hands to help him fish, knew what it was like to run a business. They knew what it was like to try to build up their family, to earn their income, and they had heard Jesus say, come, follow me, and I will make you a fisher of men. And what did they do? They left their nets and they followed Him. This is what Mark had started us off in his gospel with. And so they ask him, who can be saved? And Jesus says, it's not possible. Verse 27 is, it's not possible. You cannot save yourself. It's not possible, Peter. You couldn't do that by yourself.

You cannot talk someone into the kingdom of God. You cannot reason with them to give up their livelihood, to give up their business, to give up their wealth, to give up their family. He just said, you're going to have to lose, or he's about to say, you're going to have to lose your father, your mother, your brother, your sister, your family. The word here where it says your land, this is agros. your farms, your family inheritance, you know that land that you planted, that your parents planted, that your grandpa planted, you're gonna have to give up your farms. It's not possible. It's not possible by you to do it yourself.

With men it is impossible, but not with God. For with God all things are possible. God can save. God can take someone's heart who has worked so hard for their money, for their possessions, for their land, for their family, for their position in life, for the places of power that they have, and He can change someone's heart to realize it's vanity. It's a vapor in the wind. I'm gonna die, someone else is going to inherit it, but I can live forever with God. I can live for something better, greater than myself in this life. Jesus is saying it is possible for God to change someone's heart that they wouldn't trust in their riches and in their position in this life. But that is only something God can do.

So I need to tell you that you might have family members. You might have family members that you think, I don't know how they're ever going to actually care about eternal life. I don't know how they're ever going to turn from chasing after this world and the deceitfulness of wealth and the things of this world. I don't know how that's ever going to happen.

Brothers and sisters, everything is possible with God. And so go to Him in prayer. Ask God to save your spouse. Ask God to care for your children. Ask God to save your co-worker. Plead with God because it is God who takes out hearts of stone and gives hearts of flesh. It is God who can thread the eye of a needle with a camel. With us, it's not possible. But God can do it. God can save.

That's why I think there's hope for this man. Because I think there was hope for Peter. I think there was hope for James. I think there was hope for John. I think there was hope for the disciples. But there was one disciple who would not listen to this. There is one disciple amongst them. It doesn't speak about him in the text here, does it? But there was one even amongst the 12. He was the treasurer of the group. He carried the money bag. He would help himself to it. And even the Jews would come to him and say, we'll give you 30 pieces of silver if you'll betray him. And he trusted in money more than he trusted in Jesus.

I need to ask you, you need to have an honest evaluation of your heart today. What do you love most? When the time comes, and it may come, God's been gracious to our country. We have not faced persecution like our brothers and sisters do in many other lands, but when the time comes, will you count the cost? And will Jesus Christ and eternal life be far greater? than your retirement, than your house, than your farmlands, than your family? Would you be willing to even die for Him?

Or is it just this? Is this all there is? Is this it? Right, what I'm asking you to realize, what I'm asking you and pleading with you to understand is that you must come to this crisis point in your own heart, in your own life to ask, do you actually believe Jesus' words? That even if you gave up everything in this life, Do you actually believe that there is a risen Savior Jesus Christ who has a kingdom in heaven, a mansion with many rooms, and he has prepared a place for you in his kingdom? Do you actually believe that?

Or is this all there is? Because it's going to direct your life. It's going to change. And it will change all of society too. So I'm going to tell you, sometimes I struggle with this. I struggle with this when I come into places when I know I need to tell someone about Jesus Christ and I know it could cost me reputation, friendships. When we were running our business, asking myself, is this going to cost me income? What will you do? What will you do? Do you count the cost? And is Jesus Christ worth it? He promises you're going to get a hundredfold, but it'll be a cross to bear in this life. Trust Him. Be encouraged that He does thread the eye of the needle.

Closing Prayer

I pray that today you question your heart and you resolve to love Him. more than all the riches this world could ever give you. Because he loved you so much that he gave up everything for you to be in his kingdom. Let's pray. Father, we do pray that your Holy Spirit work in our hearts. That we would be willing for your sake and the gospels to lose everything, that we might gain everything. Because Father, if we have you, we have what's good. Lord, we pray that you would please teach us to know what is most important. In Jesus' name we pray.

Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith in your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. We'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue, Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.