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The Rich Young Ruler

             Just then 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, keep the commandments.”

“Which ones?” he inquired.

Jesus replied, “‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother,’ and ‘love your neighbor as yourself.’”

“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 treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth. (Matthew 19:16-22)

This passage is interesting. First off, when Jesus lists the commandments, He skips the ones that deal with God and the Sabbath. He lists four of the five negative commandments, omitting “You shall not covet.” And at the end, He puts the positive commandment of those dealing with other people: honoring one’s parents. Then, He adds a command that is in the Mosaic Law (Leviticus 19:18), but not in the Ten Commandments, but while He’d added loving one’s neighbors to loving God elsewhere, here He doesn’t. For some unknown reason, Jesus seems to leave God completely out of the equation and He chucks part of the greatest commandment in at the end, almost like an afterthought.

It is this last but greatest commandment that Jesus chooses to focus on and one reason for that could be that He wasn’t interested in the young man incriminating himself in a crime punishable by death. So, Jesus ends with the foundation on which all the others listed are built, but not that the Jews would get too bent out of shape about.

And the rich young man claims he has kept all the commandments Jesus mentioned.

In response, Jesus challenged the rich young man to sacrifice is “Isaac,” the thing that made him laugh, gave him joy, and probably that he saw as being nearly a covenantal promise with God. Hadn’t God promised Him the land, the seed, and the blessing by making him rich? Of course, God didn’t do so in so many words, but wealth is often associated with God’s blessing and approval.

Some people think that the point of the story is that money is that the rich are evil. But if you were in the rich young ruler’s sandals, Jesus might not ask you to give all your money to the poor. He might well ask you about whatever your beloved thing is – child, person, pet, job, money, position or even ministry, just to name a few possibilities.

 

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