The scene changes quickly. Children were being brought to him, but now “someone” shows up with a burning question. Matthew gives us no introduction. Although the editors of the New Revised Standard Version assume that it is all right to drag in information from Mark and Luke, let's be a little more careful. Who knows? Perhaps Matthew as a writer and editor had his reasons for slowly revealing the man’s identity. Always stay with the story in front of you until you get everything you can out of it. Then look in other places in Scripture for help if there are unanswered questions.
19: 16-19. Then someone came to him and said, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?” And he said to him, “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is one who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.” He said to him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and mother. Also, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Most of those who have come to Jesus have been in need of physical or spiritual healing, as in demon possession. Instead of a healer, this man calls Jesus a teacher. Let’s look at his question: His ultimate concern is ‘eternal life’. However, the man has already made an assumption that reveals his error in thinking. He assumes that there is yet another “good deed (that) I must do.” Notice the double emphasis on an action that he must perform (deed, do). A more neutral question might have been: “What am I missing?”
Perhaps that is why Jesus focuses on the idea of the ‘good’ in his response. That is, “If you are trying to be good enough, that’s the wrong approach because only God is good.” Then, as if to show him that being good enough was impossible, Jesus says: “Try keeping the commandments.”
“Which ones?” the man asks. Interestingly, Jesus lists the relational ones, but does not mention the Sabbath or the Temple.
19: 20-22. The young man said to him, “I have kept all these, what do I still lack?” Jesus said to him, “If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When the young man heard this word, he went away grieving, for he had many possessions.
Matthew keeps adding character to this man. He is a devout Jew, he has been keeping the law, and he is in the prime of life. The term Matthew uses here could also refer to a soldier who is fit as a fiddle; not just to a man who is young in years.
At least, this man is perceptive, to a point. He thinks that he has kept the commandments, but he has a nagging suspicion that he is still lacking something. Jesus has been pushing toward this realization. It's decision time.
If he wants to be ‘perfect’, a word also meaning ‘complete’, then the man must consider whether or not he has unqualified devotion to God. What stands in his way is his divided devotion. Jesus makes him an offer to come and follow him. Disciples need to travel light, to be ready at an instant to move on when there is greater need. Possessions, particularly property, will drag him down. Ain’t that the truth?
So, Jesus tells him to sell his property, but he does not tell him to give all the money away and thus become destitute himself. He simply says, “Give to the poor,” not “Give it all to the poor.”
19: 23-26. Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it will be hard for a rich person 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 someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astounded and said, “Then who can be saved?” but Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but for God all things are possible.”
What Jesus says here balances on the fine line between ‘hard’ and ‘impossible’. Jesus uses what may have been a common saying at the time. But he does not pose a problem to be solved. Some interpreters have tried to sane-wash it. They note that the word could be ‘thick rope’, or that ‘the needle’ could be the name of a gate into the city of Jerusalem (no evidence). However, it is more likely that Jesus meant for it to sound crazy.
The point is not the needle, but rather the difficulty a rich man has in entering the kingdom of heaven. That is why the disciples are astounded, because common sense in First Century Palestine was that the rich person had been blessed by God or they wouldn’t be rich. Poor people were cursed by God and that’s why they have their station in life. What Jesus does is redirect their gaze away from what a person does or what a person possesses toward the only one who actually has the power to get someone into heaven: God.
This is the response that the rich man should have had. “That’s impossible! How can I get into heaven then?” Actually, the question is the same for all of us, rich or poor. The answer is that unless God decides to let you in, you will not be getting in. The path is wholly different than you think, and it takes the whole Gospel to simply say: Ask (for forgiveness), and you shall receive (eternal salvation). The gift comes from God but receiving it will change you drastically.
19: 27-30. Then Peter said in reply, “Look, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, at the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man is seated on the throne of his glory, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother (or wife) or children or fields for my name’s sake will receive a hundredfold (or manifold) and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.
Peter then asks a question that seems similar but Jesus’ answer shows that he saw it as a different kind of question. Peter rightly saw that Jesus was inviting the rich man into discipleship, but the cost seemed too great. Trying to redeem something for the disciples who did leave everything, Peter asks about what they have gained. Keep in mind, though, that we know that the base-house in Capernaum was Peter’s house where his wife and mother-in-law and family lived. One might think that the topic is still “entering the kingdom of heaven” or “being saved,” and it is, but there is more to it.
Jesus uses, for the first time, the phrase “the renewal of all things.” This has an ‘end of the world’ ring about it, but that theme is not as popular as the ‘fire and brimstone devastation' emphasis some people give the last days. Notice that even the Book of Revelation ends up in the city of God that sits on a renewed earth where God will live with mankind forever (Revelation 21-22). So much for the full destruction of the earth, or for going to heaven for eternal life.
Peter remembered this theme and brought it out during his second post-resurrection sermon. Listen to Peter’s altar call: “Repent therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah appointed for you, that is, Jesus, who must remain in heaven until the time of the universal restoration that God announced long ago through his holy prophets” (Acts 3: 19-21). “The time of universal restoration,” we don’t hear enough preaching about this hopeful future. The earth is not destroyed, but rather is redeemed and renewed; and our future is here.
Likewise, Paul assured the Christians in Rome that “the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed in us.” In fact, “creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God” (Romans 8: 18, 21). Thus, creation will be redeemed and renewed, just as we are. Who preaches about the redemption and renewal of nature and, thus, the need for Creation care? Too few. The rest take the easy way to please the audiences.
In Jesus’ view, it is God’s plan that whatever a devoted follower has lost will be regained and more. This implies, of course, that there will be loss first, and that brings us back to the issues of devotion and distraction. Jesus called the rich man to discipleship, but his distractions were too much for full devotion. It is not just the disciples or the rich man in this story that Jesus calls to follow him. That is the altar call that you heard when you accepted Jesus as your Savior. Did you leave it all on the altar to make this decision? When Jesus calls each of us to discipleship, what is the cost?
Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote the book The Cost of Discipleship (1937), in which he famously said, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” Where did he get such a crazy idea? Perhaps from Jesus who said, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me” (Matthew 16: 24). Why the cross? I thought Jesus already paid the bill and we get to live the life? Do not ask for whom the cross is meant; it is meant for you.
In the book, Bonhoeffer made the distinction between ‘cheap grace’ and ‘costly grace’. By cheap grace, he meant “the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ.” Bonhoeffer was the rich young man who did not walk away. He ran an underground seminary during the Nazi era, and actively resisted the dictator. On April 9, 1945, he was killed by servants of the fascist state while imprisoned in Flossenburg. That is the cost of discipleship.
One’s life must be opened up to receive the ‘free gift’ of salvation. FedEx does not deliver it as a package that can be left sitting on the shelf. Really receiving the gift necessarily changes one’s life, as when Jesus put his finger on the distraction in the rich man’s life.
The church has always struggled with ‘cheap grace’ and does so especially now with ‘God loves you just as you are (and you don’t have to change)” liberalism, on the one hand, and ‘America is a Christian Nation (so devotion to America is devotion to Christ)” fascism, on the other. Who warns us about the 'costly grace'?
Theologian Randy Maddox explains something about Charles Wesley’s theology of grace. “I discerned in Wesley’s work an abiding concern to preserve the vital tension between two truths that he viewed as co-definitive of Christianity: without God’s grace, we cannot be saved’; while without our (grace-empowered, but uncoerced) participation, God’s grace will not save. I have chosen to designate this as a concern about ‘responsible grace’” (Randy L. Maddox, Responsible Grace: John Wesley’s Practical Theology (1994), page 19).
The grace of the cross is a transforming grace, it will not leave you alone until every thought or deed that does not belong to Christ is identified and pushed out of your life. It is apparent, however, that most people do not want this costly version of grace. There is a cheap version playing at the church down the street or splashed across the internet or spewed daily at the political rally at the auditorium downtown. You’re all right just like you are. Go out and be yourself, and if you carry a cross; that’s to use on the other guy. He’s not like you; make him change.
That’s what Jesus told the rich man, didn’t he?