Matthew 19:16-30

Jesus talks with a rich young man in this section of Chapter 19 and He might as well be talking directly to someone like me.  This rich young man grew up in a good home and had a great foundation, but he was still missing something.

Jesus tells the rich young man how he can enter the Kingdom of Heaven.  Jesus tells the rich young man to keep all the commandments.  The rich young man replies: "All these I have kept."

Jesus responds, "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."

"Then Jesus said to His disciples, 'I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven."

It is hard for us to enter the Kingdom of Heaven when we are rich.  And we are filthy rich.  I discovered that I make 50x what the average person in the world makes.  I am filthy rich.  Because I am rich I often put my faith in my stuff instead of God.  I love and trust my ability to go to a doctor more than God.  I am too comfortable to place my trust in God and I have structured my life so I don't have to trust God.  I am just rich and comfortable without God.

I need to remember my friend from Cape Town, South Africa, Kia.  When I met Kia I felt sorry for him and his community because they had nothing.  I thought about how much people like me could help him.  But I quickly realized he had something worth the world.  The first words Kia said to me when I visited his barbed wire surrounded school was, "Do you know Jesus as your personal savior?"

Kia was sharing Jesus with me.  He didn't see me as someone who would give him something; rather, he saw Jesus in his life and immediately wanted to share Him with me.  Wow.  Kia was rich although he had very few possessions and 1 in 3 people in his community had AIDs.

The last will be first and the first will be last.

So we need to quit relying on our stuff because it's junk.  If we rely on it now we had better enjoy it because it is as good as it's going to get.  But for those of us that are serious, we need to put our trust in something of value rather than something that will fade away.  Put your faith in Jesus rather than your cashflow today.