Just before Jesus spoke these words to His followers, that with God everything is possible, He and His followers had watched a rich young man walk away after hearing that to have eternal life he must sell all his possessions. His face dropped, his haughtiness about having kept all the commandments fell. His pride was disrupted.
Mind you, selling all you have isn’t a prequisite to eternal life. Jesus knew the heart of that young man, that it belonged to those riches, that he was courting the idea of chalking up eternal life as one more possession. Jesus was requiring of the rich young man the same as He required of those who were following Him: complete surrender. The man wasn’t ready for that answer. He would check all the things off that list of things to do, but he wasn’t ready to surrender himself to God. Some of us are there, too.
Simon Peter asked in shock “Well then, if rich people have a hard time finding eternal life, how can anyone be saved?” (Faye’s drill-down version.) The culture he lived in proved daily that the rich got all they wanted and everyone else scraped by. If the rich couldn’t attain eternal life, what chance did the rest of them have?
Do you see that Jesus didn’t get angry at this questioning? He calmly explained that the way to eternal life was not going to be traversed by mankind. It was impossible ground to cover. It would require a God-thing that was eternal in its nature and could only be accomplished by God Himself. Peter and the others didn’t realize He was talking about His sacrifice for them (and us) on the Cross of Calvary. It was there that God did the impossible. He died on the Cross, was buried, and was raised back to life on the third day.
Still today, achieving eternal life requires our surrender. It requires us giving up what we think is control and ability to recognize that we aren’t able to save ourselves. It’s necessary that we accept God’s sacrifice on the tree for us as a gift, believe and proclaim it true, and follow Him in obedience.
If God can speak all of life into existence and secure our eternal life, how much more can He do everything else!
Are you ready? Let’s surrender our will to Him today … again.
Coffee, Bible, Journal.
