I Met Him At The Top Of My Game Series

If you had to had to have surgery, who would you want to perform the operation? Some surgeon that you randomly picked out of the phone book or looked up on the internet? An intern fresh out of medical school? Or an experienced surgeon whose done this particular procedure a thousand times?

When you have to fly, who do you want in the cockpit flying the plane? A novice making their first professional flight? Or a pilot whose logged over a thousand flight hours and has flown over a quarter of a million miles?

I think the answer is obvious in both cases, don’t you?

Let’s see … what’s that feeling that you get when you know that the surgeon’s done a thousand of these procedures? Or you know that the pilot has flown over a quarter of a million miles? Hum ….

What is that feeling? Trust? Yes. More like “confidence,” amen? But what is “confidence” really? It’s a compound word made up of the Latin words “con” and “fides” … which literally means “with faith.” You trust the surgeon whose done a thousand of these procedures because you have “confidence” … you have “faith” in him. And the same goes for the pilot … you have “confidence” … you have “faith” in him.

The rich young ruler went to see Jesus because he had heard of Jesus’ great knowledge and teaching but Jesus, as He is so good at doing, goes right to the heart of the matter and challenges the young man: “Do you have confidence in me? Do you trust me?” And that is the question that Jesus is asking us this morning. “Do you trust me? Do you have confidence in Me? Do you have faith in me?”

This is my “pay-attention-to-the words” moment of my sermon. Verse 17 says: “As [Jesus] was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before Him.” Hum … notice anything thing? Listen again. “As [Jesus] was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before Him.” Jesus was about to leave this particular area when this “man” literally knelt down before Him and blocked His way.

Mark starts out by telling us that this person, this “man,” was some kind of ruler or leader. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all tell us that he was wealthy and had many possessions. None of them mention this man’s age … so we have no idea why he’s called the “rich YOUNG ruler.” For whatever reason, that’s how this man has come to be known over the years.

Another thing that we don’t know is why he sought out Jesus that day but he was clearly desperate. In fact, you can almost feel the panic in verse 17. Jesus is about to leave town and this man runs up to Him and drops to his knees and blocks His way. Men of his standing and reputation never ran to anyone for help … people came to him. Men of his standing and reputation never knelt down and humbled themselves before other men except men of higher station than them. But here was a respected man of the community … a leader … kneeling in the dust in his fine robe asking … almost begging … this Galilean teacher for an answer to what was clearly the most important question of his life: “What must I do to inherent eternal life?”

What about you? Wouldn’t you like to know what you have to do to inherit eternal life? I sure do! If you do, join me and this rich young ruler at the feet of our good Teacher.

Now, I know that none of you know what this is like but there is a point where you can have so much money that you can buy whatever you want whenever you want … go anywhere you want whenever you want. When you have that much money you have come to a place that I like to call “the end of more.” “The end of more” is the place where you have anything and everything that you could possibly want and you don’t want any more. I know … I know … it’s hard … well, impossible … to believe that such a place exists but it does for a rare few. Billionaire Elon Musk lost 15 million dollars investing in GameStop stock … a mere bump in the road for him. I doubt it impacted his lifestyle much, do you? He still lives at “the end of more” along with the likes of Jeff Bezos, Bill and Melinda Gates, Warren Buffet, Mark Zuckerberg, and the Walton family.

There was one person in the Bible who managed to arrive at “the end of more.” That was King Solomon. “I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself,” he writes in Ecclesiastes (2:4-10). “I made myself gardens and parks and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. I bought male and female slaves and had slaves who were born in my house; I also had great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. I also gathered for myself silver and gold, and the treasure of kings and of the provinces; I got singers, both men and women, and delights of the flesh, and many concubines. So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem; also my wisdom remained with me. Whatever my eyes desired, I did not keep from them; I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my toil, and this was my reward for all my toil.” Wow … sounds like “the end of more” doesn’t it? Whatever he saw with his eyes, whatever his heart desired, all he had to do was reach out and take it. I can’t even begin to imagine what that would be like.