Love Jesus More
7 min read
19 “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.’”
20 “Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.”
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. Then come, follow me.”
22 At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.
—Mark 10:19-22
The ten commandments may be grouped into those commandments directed vertically toward God and those directed horizontally toward others. Reading this episode in the past, I imagined that Jesus had left out “You shall not covet” on purpose. By leaving out only this one horizontal commandment, I thought that Jesus was actually pointing out the rich man’s key issue.
But now, I imagined that as Jesus was listing out these horizontal commandments, the rich man interrupted Jesus before he could state that last one. In his heart, he may have thought that Jesus had finished that list.
How proud he must have felt, knowing that he was such a faithful child of God. And so his itching ears were eagerly waiting to hear what he was already hearing in his head: “Well done, good and faithful servant!”
What a great shock it must have been for this young man to hear what actually came out of Jesus’s mouth.
The greatest threats to evangelical faith and to the health of churches are the prosperity gospel and moralistic therapeutic deism (MTD), and we see both of these demonstrated in this young man.
He believed that his wealth was his reward from God for his moral behavior. And he was seeking an emotional boost through the affirmation of a well-respected rabbi of what a wonderful person he is.
The lesson to be learned here is not that we need to sell off all our possessions, donate the proceeds to the poor, and then enter a life of ministry. The lesson is that we need to be willing and ready to choose Christ over anything else in this world.
On the one hand, we may think, “Whew! I don’t have to renounce all my possessions!” On the other hand, are we really ready and willing to choose Christ over anything else in this world?
Another way to think of this young man’s problem is not that he loved his wealth too much, but that he didn’t love Jesus enough. And I think that’s the real issue for most, if not all, of us.
If we are not truly happy as a devoted follower of Jesus, it is probably because we do not love Him enough. And if we do not love Him enough, it is probably because we do not fully grasp the depth of His love for us.
And this is why I love Paul’s prayer to the Ephesians - “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ—and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:17b-19).
I desperately need that prayer, and I know that you do too.
Father, I lift up Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians for myself, for my family, and for my Canvas family. Help us to know the depth of Christ’s supreme love so that we will treasure Him in our hearts above all things. Bless us in that way, Father. Bless us!. In Jesus’s name. Amen.
