TEXT:
MATTHEW 19:16-17, 20-21, 23-26
“Now a man came up to Jesus and asked “Teacher, what good
thing must I do to get eternal life?” why do you ask me about what is good?
Jesus replied there is only one who is good. If you want to enter life, obey
the commandments.” (Matthew 19: 16-17).
All
these I have kept, the young man said, what do I still lack? Jesus answered, “If
you want to be perfect go sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you
will have treasures inn heaven.”
(Matthew
19: 20-21).
“Then
Jesus told the disciples, I tell you the truth it is hard for a rich man 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 a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. When
the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked “WHO THEN CAN
BE SAVED?” Jesus looked at them and said “WITH MAN THIS IS IMPOSSIBLE, BUT WITH
GOD ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE.” (V 23-26).
Our righteousness is like filthy rag in the
eyes of God, we cannot claim anything for ourselves, and our righteousness came
from God. He commanded us to live holy and be righteous without SPOT or WRINKLE. He wants absolute
holiness from His children, it is truly difficult to attain this like Jesus
mentioned in his conversation with his disciples in the above text (V 23-24).
Despite the difficulty in attaining this level of holiness, yet it is
attainable THROUGH GOD. When the
disciples were surprised to hear what Jesus said about making heaven, they
asked a question “WHO CAN BE SAVED?”
he answered them by saying “WITH MAN THIS IS NOT POSSIBLE, BUT WITH GOD ALL
THINGS ARE POSSIBLE.”
You cannot work out your own salvation with
your head knowledge and wisdom; you need the grace and mercy of God to be able
to walk in the will of God. We need God to give us the wisdom and enable us to
live above sin. At times you do some things that you don’t see or count as sin,
and that could be what would make you to be disqualified from the race marked
out for you. The rich man asked Jesus what else he needed to do to make heaven,
he was confident that he was in line with all that God commanded (He had obeyed
all commandments). I am sure that he would be expecting Jesus to say “well-done
you are on your way to heaven” but Jesus told him to go do more by selling all
his belongings. This illustrates that though we obey all commandments and we
are making all effort to avoid sin; there may be things that can hinder us that
we may not notice or pay attention to. This is where God’s grace and mercy
comes in, “NOT THAT WE ARE COMPETENT IN
OURSELVES TO CLAIM ANYTHING FOR OURSELVES, BUT OUR COMPETENCE COMES FROM GOD.”
(2 Corinthians 3:5). We need God to reveal ourselves to us, to know what we need to do
and what we ought not to do.
Don’t be boastful let your competence come
from God; it is by His grace that we can live to
please Him. Humanly speaking it is difficult; but with GOD ALL THINGS ARE
POSSIBLE.
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