One Thing You Lack

Anyone watching the Olympics?

Am I right in saying Australia have eight golds?

Okay, how many?

12, 11, when I wrote this, I wrote 8, and on Friday we did have 8, so that's my defense.

But the Olympics is cool, but it's hard to keep up with, isn't it?

We've been watching on 9 now, and it's overwhelming, the number of different sports that are happening at one time.

You've got the shooting, then the bowling, then the soccer, then every single sport, and we tune in to one for a second, have no clue what shooting means and why they have to follow these rules.

Skip to the next one, have no clue what that means.

And I kind of feel guilty doing that, because when you tune in to one channel, for the people in that world, that is it.

Like they are competing for gold at the Olympics.

This is what their entire life has been building up to.

And here we are sitting on the TV, nah, boring, next, next, next.

But that's what it takes to win Olympic gold, to give everything you have, your entire life oriented towards this one purpose, to win the golden prize.

Well, our passage tonight opens with this question, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

Eternal life, the quest for the holy grail, the prize above all else, the ultimate treasure, it's the one thing that we're all longing for.

The question is, what does it take to win that prize?

What does it take to inherit eternal life?

That's what we're going to look at tonight, so let me pray as we come to the message.

Father, we thank you for your word.

We pray that you would speak to us, all of us in the different places that we're at in life, that we would feel your comfort, your teaching, your correction and your rebuke, that we might be trained in righteousness.

I pray that you'd help me get out of the way of what you want to do amongst us tonight, in jesus' name, amen.

So we're in sermon number 37 of our Gospel of New Beginnings series, which is insane.

I've never been in a series this long before.

And just before we jump into the scripture, a little bit of housekeeping.

Previously we had 14 messages left, meaning 14 weeks, which was pretty much going to take us to the end of the year.

But in thinking and praying about it the past couple weeks, we have decided to condense that down to three weeks.

So we have six sermons left in the Gospel of Mark, kind of picking up the most important bits of the rest of the Gospel of Mark.

Different sermons morning and night.

So we had one of the six this morning.

John, I preached on the transfiguration.

Tonight is two of six, and now we have two more weeks.

And I think the benefit of that is we can look at some other really exciting stuff at the end of this year.

Last week, if you were here, we had Church in the Foyer, which was also a bit different, and we looked at the cross-shaped life.

jesus said, if you want to follow me, you must take up your cross and carry it and deny yourself.

And now we come tonight to verse 17 that Sam read for us.

As jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him.

Good teacher, he asked, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

Now, we don't know much about this man.

There's no backstory given.

We don't know where he's come from or what's motivating him or where he's going, but what we do know, I think, is quite significant.

Verse 17, it says, the man did three things.

He ran, knelt, and asked.

So we don't know much about him, but we know that he ran, knelt, and asked.

And I imagine if he's falling on his knees before jesus, he's probably panting because he's just been running.

He falls panting on his knees before jesus, desperate, it seems, to ask this one question, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

What must I do?

And then verse 18, why do you call me good?

jesus answered, no one's good except God alone.

You know the commandments, you shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not defraud, honor your father and mother.

It's quite a classic answer.

In fact, if you had have asked any teacher of the law in the first century, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

That's probably what they would say.

Read the Bible, honor your father and mother, do the commandments, it's all there.

And that's what jesus says.

He's quoting Exodus chapter 20, which is where we get our 10 commandments from.

jesus says, you know the commandments.

You know the answer to that question.

Verse 20, teacher, the man declared, all these I have kept since I was a boy.

So he knows.

He knows the answer to the question.

In fact, it says he has been keeping the law his entire life.

He's been asking that question, what must I do to inherit eternal life since he was a child?

He's been following the law, trying to win that prize.

Just like an Olympic athlete, if you want to win the 100 meter sprint, you better give your entire life to that pursuit.

He has given everything.

Since he was a boy, he has followed the law, trying to inherit eternal life.

The problem is, when it comes to this prize, you can't know if you've got it until it's too late, right?

At some point, they, in the Olympics, they cross the line.

And if you look left and right, and no one is in front of you, you've won the gold medal.

You know you've won the prize.

But this man that comes to jesus has this existential anxiety, because with eternal life, you can't know that you're going to have it until it's too late, and you couldn't get it even if you wanted it.

Hence the desperation.

Hence the fact that he runs to jesus and falls on his knees and says, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

And I think when he says, I've done all the law, since I was a boy, I've kept the law.

What is kind of implicit is tell me if I haven't done enough.

If there's another command I need to follow, if I need to keep doing more, I'll pray more, I'll give more, I'll work harder, I'll do whatever it takes to secure for myself eternal life.

He's existentially anxious, striving to try and earn the prize.

does that relate to you?

Do you relate to that at all?

This striving, whatever the prize is, maybe it's eternal life or some Olympic gold medal, striving, everything in you, just wanting to do more and more and more and more in order that you may grasp that thing finally.

But maybe you relate like the man that it's never enough.

He's been asking that question his whole life and he never actually reaches.

Well, jesus in verse 21 says, jesus looked at him and loved him.

One thing you lack, he said.

In the Greek, which is the way that the New testament was originally written, it's got this beautiful kind of repetition of three words, three things that jesus does.

jesus looked at him, loved him, and said to him.

The English kind of obscures that slightly, but it says, firstly, jesus looked.

And the word for look is not like a passing glance, but it's like a, it's an intently, I mean, there was a connection right there.

It is an intense look.

jesus looks at the man and he sees him for who he is.

He sees his heart.

And then having looked, jesus loved.

He loved the man that he saw.

He saw what was driving him.

And then out of love, jesus says, those words, one thing you lack.

The rich man, well, he's not, we don't know he's rich yet.

The man says, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

I've kept all the command since I was a boy.

One thing you lack, jesus says.

I think if I was the man hearing that, I'd say, yes, so there is one thing.

One more command.

What is it?

What have I missed?

One of the 620-something commands in the Old testament.

Which one have I missed?

One thing.

Tell me.

I'll do it.

And then, can I finally be sure that I have eternal life?

He's asking, what is this one thing?

Verse 21, jesus looked at him and loved him.

One thing you lack, he said, go sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.

And then, come follow me.

That's one thing.

That's four things.

I mean, can jesus count?

It's four things.

Go, sell, give, come.

It's four imperatives.

And jesus says it is one thing.

Verse 22, at this the man's face fell.

He went away sad because he had great wealth.

Notice he doesn't say, jesus, that's four things.

You said one.

Give me one thing, please.

Go, sell, give, come.

Just pick one of those four.

He knows that when jesus says one thing you like, he means it.

The man knows that even though there are four kind of aspects to the thing which jesus says, to him, it is one thing.

And the one thing is to let go of his wealth.

And if he were to let go, then it would be to go, sell, give, and come.

And it says he went away sad.

Because he had a lot of wealth.

Have you ever found jesus' words disheartening?

A bit depressing.

I have.

Last week, we looked at, jesus said, if you want to follow me, you must take up your cross, lay down your life unto death.

Now, tonight, jesus says, if you want to follow me, go sell everything you have and give it to the poor.

Then come follow.

We can feel quite disheartened when we read the words that jesus says.

And so I feel, this is me, and it might relate to you, I feel partly like I do a cost-benefit analysis.

In the benefits column of following jesus, eternal life, peace, joy, purpose, relationship with the Father, and in the cost column, picking up a cross daily, giving away everything you have to the poor.

Even, I think, more relevantly, maybe, today for us is following jesus' controversial opinions on the stuff that we deal with in life.

jesus has a spicy take on sexuality that doesn't really fit with what the world says, on finances, on personal holiness, on what we do with our bodies and with each other's bodies.

That's part of the cost that it has, that jesus tells us what it means to follow him.

There's a cost and a benefit, and sometimes we would love the benefit, but the cost is too much.

And so, maybe, like the man, we go away sad, thinking, gee, eternal life would have been great, but it's not worth it.

That's one option.

Option two is we wrestle with the cost benefit and the trickiness, and what psychologists would call cognitive dissonance rises, which is where your brain is trying to hold on to multiple ideas that just conflict with each other.

And then we looked at this in October last year in our Kings and Characters series.

There's a point when cognitive dissonance rises where you just take the deal, and the deal is self-deception, and you say, I'm following jesus, fine.

Hence, I can get the eternal life.

Those are the two options.

We go away sad, or we take the deal, and we blur our vision, but jesus says, if you want to follow me, he said to the rich man, sell everything you have, and then come follow.

Verse 23, jesus looked around and said to his disciples, how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.

The disciples were amazed at his words, but jesus said again, children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God.

It's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.

Over the years, there's been a lot of interpretive consternation around those words.

A lot of people have tried to soften what jesus meant.

And there's pretty much two options that for 2,000 years people have said.

The first one is, it's actually not a camel, it's the camel gate.

There was a gate in Jerusalem called the camel gate, and it was quite a low gate.

And so, if you think about it, if the camel were not to breathe and was to squeeze, the camel could actually get through the gate.

Meaning, it's not impossible, but it's really tricky, but rich people can still get into the Kingdom of Heaven if they squeeze.

The second interpretation is that it's not a camel, but it's actually a bit of a mistake in the translation, it's a rope.

It's close to the Aramaic word for rope, and so a rope going through the eye of the needle, that's tough, but possible.

I think both these options fail to hold the weight of what jesus is saying.

I think we look at the disciples, the reaction that they have, and we know what jesus meant.

The disciples say in verse 26, it says, the disciples were even more amazed and said to each other, who then can be saved?

Clearly, they understand this is not a figment of parable almost, a metaphor that is possible but difficult.

It means what it means, a camel going through the eye of a needle.

That's what jesus is saying.

That's what the disciples' reaction tells us.

Verse 27, jesus looked at them and said, with man this is impossible, but not with God.

All things are possible with God.

How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.

Now, if you're like me, you're probably saying, gee, we'd hate to be rich right now.

Good thing I'm not one of those rich people.

This one goes straight over my head.

If you think that, I would encourage you this week to go to givingwhatwecan.org, givingwhatwecan.org.

You can put in your income and how many people are in your family, and it will plot you on the graph of the world's wealth.

I'm almost certain you will be in the top 5% or maybe 2% of the richest people on the planet right now.

Just living in Hornsby, we are already right up there compared to the majority of the world.

So these words, we can't just duck, they fall on us.

jesus said, how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God, and that falls on us.

We are the rich ones, and so we feel this challenge.

And I'm not going to try and lift that burden, because that's what jesus says.

And you take that and you pray about that as I do.

How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.

Peter spoke up, verse 28.

Peter always speaks up.

We've left everything to follow you, Peter says.

He's always the voice of the people, always articulates exactly what the people are thinking.

jesus says, how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.

And Peter's standing there at the front of the pack of twelve, looking around, and they've got dirty rags and broken shoes.

They have nothing.

They've left everything.

And so Peter's like, okay, so what does that mean for us?

How much good are we gonna inherit?

We're not those rich ones.

Peter says, we've left everything to follow you.

And jesus replies in verse 29, truly I tell you, no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields for me in the Gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age.

homes, brothers, sisters, mother, mothers, children and fields along with persecutions and in the age to come eternal life.

But many who are first will be last in the last first.

To me, that is the second of the really tough things jesus has said tonight.

The first was when he said, it's really hard.

It's impossible for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.

Like that's heavy.

And now the second thing is this thing.

jesus says, no one will fail to receive a hundred times as much of what they let, of what they leave if they follow jesus.

And so I'm struck by the fact that if we feel the weight of jesus challenging words about money, we ought to equally feel the weight of the promise of provision that he says here.

You gotta be even handed with the words of jesus.

No one will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this age of what they left behind.

This is not, I don't think, a prosperity gospel.

Because there's three words tucked in the passage, along with persecutions.

It's not just health and wealth and riding off into the sunset with everything you need, never facing another difficult day.

jesus says, there's provision from the father and there's persecution.

It's not the prosperity gospel, but neither is it, I think, the poverty gospel, which says that we have to be poor.

We can't own material possessions, because there's provision as well.

The father will provide for what we need.

I think it's not the prosperity gospel, nor the poverty gospel, but it's the upside down kingdom gospel.

The gospel of Luke especially, emphasizes this theme that in the kingdom of God, the world is upended upside down.

Those who are poor are the ones who have everything, and the rich are the ones who have nothing.

It's like Paul says in ephesians 1, praise be to the God and Father of our Lord jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.

That's now.

blessed now if you follow jesus with every spiritual blessing.

Now that's spiritual, but jesus says, no one who leaves to follow him will fail to receive in this age, a hundred times as much.

So we hold that.

We hold those words of jesus.

In the upside down kingdom, that blessing comes through self-giving in this present age.

That's a blessing today, jesus said.

And in the last, one of the last words in the sentence, in the age to come, eternal life.

Which brings us back to the question that we started with.

The man said, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

Well, here's the answer.

By the end of the story, jesus has answered the question.

Leave home, brothers, sisters, mother, father, children, fields for jesus and the Gospel.

What must you do to inherit eternal life?

Leave all those things.

And you will inherit eternal life.

But, okay, what does that mean?

Are we called to fly to Israel and follow a itinerant first century Jewish rabbi with a band of 11 other guys walking around first century palestine?

No.

What are we leaving?

What does jesus mean?

What must, what one thing must we do to inherit eternal life?

The ultimate prize, the holy grail.

What must we do?

I think this is how you answer this question.

When jesus looks at you and loves you and says to you one thing you lack, what is he referring to?

What must you do to inherit eternal life?

You answer that question.

When jesus looks at you, loves you, and says to you one thing you lack, what one thing is he referring to in your life?

The man heard those words from jesus.

He discovered it wasn't one command that he had missed.

It wasn't one more thing he had to add on top.

More prayer, more giving, more righteousness.

The one thing jesus asked of the rich man was to let go of everything else in order that he might pursue the one thing, which is jesus, the kingdom, eternal life.

To let go of everything else to pursue one thing.

When jesus looks at you, he loves you and says to you, what one thing do you lack?

What is he referring to?

What are you holding on to?

What are you most hesitant to let go of?

One of my favorite films is Indiana jones and the Last Crusade.

Anyone seen it?

It's going to be more helpful for the next two minutes if you have seen it, but I'll do my best.

Toward the end of the film, I rewatched it to get the details right, just the last bit.

Toward the end of the film, they find the Holy Grail, the cup of eternal life, and they're trying to take it out of the cave in Petra in Jordan, but there's some like curse and they can't leave the cave, and the rock falls apart, and Elsa, who's kind of Indiana jones' love interest, is dangling from the side of a cliff, held with one hand by Indiana jones.

And the cup, the Holy Grail is right there, just out of reach.

And so she's dangling by one hand, trying with all her might to grab the cup of eternal life.

She thinks, I can have both.

I can reach the cup and we can leave and have eternal life.

But Indy says, I need your other hand.

I can't hold you with one hand.

And she wouldn't forsake the cup and she falls to her death.

And then, like brilliant moment in the story, the rocks crack perfectly, so that Indiana jones then falls into the same position.

And he's hanging from one hand from his father.

And he, Indiana jones was just the one saying, you have to let it go.

But now, in put in that very same position, and he's held by one hand, and he thinks, I can have both.

I can get the cup of eternal life and live forever and save my own life.

It's this like immensely dramatic moment.

And Sean Connery, Indiana jones' dad says, let it go.

You have to let it go.

And he does.

He turns from the cup of eternal life, the holy grail right there.

He turns, gives you second hand and he's saved, and they ride off into the sunset.

I think that's what jesus is saying, that the answer to the question, what must you do to inherit eternal life, is let go of everything else in your hand in order to receive the one thing that God has.

You can't have both.

We all spend our lives like the rich men, accumulating everything around us and whatever the everything is, power, prestige, money, friendships, status, all of it.

We accumulate it and then we're trying to hold that in one hand and grasp onto the eternal life that God offers.

But he says, one thing you lack, to let it all go.

And with two hands, with everything that you are, pursue the one thing, eternal life.

What must you do to inherit eternal life?

I think the psalmist David had it right in Psalm 27 verse 4.

He writes, one thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in this temple.

David knew what to do.

He knew that there is no world where you can hold onto both things at once, anything in the world and eternal life.

But he was all in on the kingdom of God.

He said, one thing I seek, that I might know God, gaze upon his beauty and receive eternal life.

jesus is asking you the question, what one thing are you not going to let go of?

One thing you lack, and what is that one thing for you?

The one thing that you will not let go of.

God is calling you tonight, you must let go of that, and then come follow jesus with everything.

That's what you must do to inherit eternal life.

I think David also knew from what we see in other Psalms, hence why you should read the Psalms over the next 150 days, he knew that there are eternal pleasures at the right hand of God.

The best life a human being can live is in relationship with God, is to forsake everything else that doesn't satisfy and pursue with everything the one thing of knowing God.

It's the best life you could live.

So, picture Indiana jones, picture yourself as Indiana jones, dangling from the cliff.

Will you turn from everything else, from the alluring things of this world, will you with single minded focus, will we as a church pursue the one thing of God, His kingdom, His righteousness?

If we do that, we'll have eternal life.

We're going to come to communion in a second, but as I was getting to the end of writing this message, I thought of a song that would just be absolutely perfect to wrap this up.

And then I remembered that we've already done it multiple times, and we did it quite well back in COVID days.

So we're going to play an item that Steph and I recorded a couple of years ago, and after that have communion.

So please reflect on this item.