Matthew 19:16-22 And, behold, one came and said to him, Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life?… To the question "What lack I yet?" Christ answers in substance, "This: the temper that counts property worthless beside true life. You come to me with your money, with)'our sense of complacency, of consequence, of power, and you want to bring these with you into the kingdom of God. You are not indeed satisfied with things as they are. How can you be, so long as you are vainly striving to feed your immortal nature upon husks and chaff? You want to be enlarged into a life nobler, fuller, worthier of your better self. But you would come as Dives, not as Lazarus. What you have, you think, ought to be reckoned in with what you are. You and your estate are in your own conception too entirely identified to be separated. Believe me, my young brother, the kingdom of Jesus can not know you upon any such terms. It is not necessary that you should be stripped bare of all your belongings in order to enter it. But you should be willing to be stripped bare. You must come to look upon what you call yours as though it mattered not, when you set your face toward the kingdom of God, whether it were yours or no. The spirit of renunciation must be so deep in you that you must be ready to give up all for Christ. And this not from any arbitrary reason, but simply because a human heart is not large enough to hold two thrones. If Christ is to be in it at all, He must be king of the whole domain; and if He is to be king, the money power, the sense power, the brain power must go to the rear. There will be a place for each of these in every sanctified life, but it must be a subordinate place. "Go," or at least, if it be a question between your securities and your Saviour, be ready to go, "and sell all that thou hast, and follow Me!" (Bishop H. C. Potter.) Parallel Verses KJV: And, behold, one came and said unto him, Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life? |
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