Welcome to the In Touch podcast with Charles Stanley for Friday, April 10th. This world values wealth, position, and power, but they fall short of satisfying the heart. Today's podcast helps you discover what may be missing in your life. When you think about your life, what would you change if you had the privilege of changing anything? What would you change? Would you change your income, your health, your job, your profession? Would you change where you live, what you drive? Would you change some areas of your life that are personal and private? What would you change in your life? If you could just change something, or if you feel the need to change something because something is missing. Maybe you don't know what it is, but deep down inside something's missing because you have a good job, maybe. You have a good income, you like where you live, you got good health, happily married, maybe. And so, only on you go, but there's something hanging out there that you can't put your finger on. Something's missing. Well, that's what our passage of Scripture is all about. Somebody who had it all, and yet something was missing. So, I want to encourage you to listen carefully and to turn in your Bible to Mark chapter 10. And I want us to read these verses. So, let's begin in the seventeenth verse of the tenth chapter. As he was sitting out on a journey, Jesus, that is, a man ran up to him and knelt down before him and asked him, Good teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus said to him, Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments. Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud. Honor your father and mother. And he said to him, Teacher, I've kept all these things from my youth up. Looking at him, Jesus felt a love for him. And he said to him, One thing you lack, go and settle all you possess, give to the poor, and you'll have treasure in heaven, and come follow me. But at these words he was saddened, and he went away grieved, for he was one who owned much property. And Jesus, looking around, said to his disciples, How hard it will be for those who are wealthy to inherit the kingdom of God. The disciples were amazed at these words, but Jesus answered again and said to them, Children, How hard it is to enter the kingdom of God. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. They were even more astonished and said to him, Then who can be saved? Looking at them, Jesus said with people, It is impossible, but not with God, for all things are possible with God. Now, you look at that passage and you say, Well, you know, I'm not rich. I don't know what in the world that has to do with me. Well, let me just say right up front, you can have everything the world has to offer. You can have it all, and yet something missing in your life. And this is where many people are. They have it all, and yet there's something out there that sort of gnaws at them. It just sort of hangs in there. It won't go away, some need that they have. And so the Scripture says he was a rich young ruler, and he had all that you think he would possibly need, all he thought he needed, rich, young, and authority, position, and life. And so it sounds like he lived in the twenty-first century. So if I were to ask you, Would you like to be rich, young, and have position? If you were honest, most of you would raise your hand. Is there anything wrong with being rich, young, and having position? No, there's not. And so what's the issue here? So that's what I want us to look at. And you see, the problem is we live in a society that's where people stop. If I can make enough money, and if I can have a little authority in life, if I can stay healthy and stay young in my spirit, then what else could you want in life? You see, the truth is we are not thinking properly about life. And we are short-sighted. If we think gold, money, and so forth is going to satisfy us, position, and good health, and opportunities are going to satisfy us, there's still going to be something missing. It was true in this young man's life in the Scripture, and it's true in life. And this is why people go from one marriage to the next. It's why they drink and drink and drink, trying to satisfy something they can't fulfill. This is why they get on drugs. And we could just go right down the list of all the things that people do to do what? To get that missing thing, and to get that fulfilled somehow. And what they do is they get in deep trouble trying to fill up an area of their life that only Jesus can fill up. Only He can do it because God made us for Himself, and He made every single human being for Jesus to be in their life. And the fool thinks in his or her heart, I'm going to get it filled up without him. And they spend their life accumulating, spending their energy and their time and their efforts and their knowledge and understanding, doing their best to accumulate these things in order to have this feeling of being complete. And the rich young ruler is a perfect example of it. He was rich, young, and a ruler. And He had everything but something was missing in His life. The second lesson I want us to notice is this, that our love and desire for material things can cause us to miss the most important thing in life. People don't realize that money is dangerous. Money can do some things, it can do many good things in the right hands, but it can't satisfy the longing of your soul. It can't satisfy the longing of your heart. It can't satisfy that which God has placed in you that only He can fill, and that is a personal relationship with God through His Son, Jesus. And you may be one of those very, very wealthy persons. You have it all. You have the prestige and the prominence and the popularity and the position and the power. You have the money, you can buy anything you want. Go anywhere you want to go. But the truth is you've already discovered that there must be something else because as you look at your life, there's something missing. You can't quite tell what it is, and yet think about this. Think about the father and the foolishness of investing your life, giving your life, working, working day after week after month after year after year after year after year, accumulating something that will not satisfy you. Now watch this. Accumulating something that one day you're going to have to give up. One day you're going to have to lay it down. One day you're going to realize you can't keep you here a day longer. One day you're going to realize that all the hours and years of your life you've spent, and maybe you've wronged other people, or maybe you didn't, to get what you have. But you lay it along. In fact, you're pretty proud of the fact of how well you've done. And you have it all. But deep down inside, there's something missing. And that's something that's missing. It's a personal relationship with the Son of God. And this young man had all of it. You could say, well, what is it that you need? He didn't need anything. He had everything. But if you'll notice, he'd become so desperate when he heard about Jesus, the Bible says this young man ran to him and fell on his knees. Somebody told him, here's the man who can satisfy the longing of your heart. Here's the man who can give you eternal life. And he ran to Jesus. And in those days, running in public was sort of a, if you hadn't indignated at all and you didn't run in public. He's running to Jesus, falling down before him. And what's happening? He simply says to him, he asked him, good teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? So that in spite of all he had and all he was and all his relationships, he finally discovered that what he didn't have was the one thing his money couldn't buy, his popularity couldn't provide for him. And none of his efforts seemed to make any difference. He desired eternal life. He had plenty to live on, but he didn't have anything that satisfied him. And there are many people who are in that stage. And I would ask you, is there something missing in your life? I can tell you what it is. You say, oh, I don't believe in this God business. Well, let me tell you why one day you will. Because the Bible says it is important unto men once to die and after this, the judgment, you will, but it'll be too late. It's foolish to wait too late for something you don't have to wait for. And your money can't buy. Your prestige, popularity, position, power can't fulfill it. There's only one thing that'll fulfill that empty heart in your life and that is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That's the way God made it. So he comes running to Jesus and says to him, you know, what can I do to inherit eternal life? And I would say to you, the gift of eternal life is not the result of our good works. In other words, you don't get there by good conduct. And if you'll notice how Jesus approached this, so he didn't condemn him. When he said to him, he said, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? And look what Jesus does. He begins with the commandments. He skips the first four about loving God and so forth, and the Sabbath. And he skips those. And then he skips the last one. And then he says, you know the commandments. He starts out with, do not murder. See, he's just talked about how he'd live. He says, do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not commit adultery. Do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother. He said to him, what teacher? I've done all these things all of my life. Well, then if that's it, why don't I have any peace and joy? And why am I running to you and kneeling down before you and asking, what can I do to inherit eternal life? Because I've done all these things. Well, notice Jesus didn't say, thou shalt not covet at the end. He skipped the first four and the last one because Jesus knew what his problem was. He was very wealthy. In fact, in Luke he says he was extremely wealthy. A young man, extremely wealthy. In those days, he had to be doing something. And so he says, I've kept all these things from my youth up. Then what he was expecting Jesus to say, well, if you've done all those things, you can have the gift of eternal life. But Jesus didn't tell him that. And so the Scripture says that Jesus looked at him and felt a love for him and said to him, one thing you lack, there's something missing in your life. Go and sell all you possess and give to the poor and you'll have treasure in heaven and come follow me. Now, his whole idea was if he did enough good things, he would be saved. Listen to me. The majority of the world has the same idea. If I'm a good person and I don't steal, I don't lie, I don't cheat, I'm a good husband, I'm a good wife, I give a little bit to the church, I do all these things, then surely I'm going to be saved. When the Bible says so clearly, not by works of righteousness which we've done, but according to his mercy, he saved us. If a person could be saved by doing good, Jesus wouldn't have had to die on the cross. And so he is coming to Jesus on the basis that here's what I've done, so therefore I ought to have a gift of eternal life. And the Bible says that Jesus looked at him and loved him. Watch this, he didn't condemn him. He thought that all this heat accumulated and all the good reputation he had would get him into heaven. And when Jesus gave him the commandments and was bringing him to the point of his lives, they were sinning his life, he just, watch what happens. The Scripture says Jesus felt a love for him and said to him, one thing, you lacked. Go and sell all your possessions, give to the poor and you'll have treasure in heaven and come follow me. Now let's clarify one thing. That's not the way you get saved. In other words, he's not saying if you give all this, you'll get saved. What he was dealing with here is the fact, the sin in his life, this covetousness that he was depending on all of this to save him. And he's simply saying, here's what you do. Now does that mean in order to be saved? Or that Jesus meant in order to be saved, sell everything you got, give to the poor? No, because, watch this, this was an incident, this was one occasion in which what he needed to deal with his covetousness and his sin and his understanding was that the thing that stood between him and salvation was his greed, his covetous spirit, his dependence on material things rather than upon God. So in this given occasion, for him, salvation meant, look, you're not going to get there by earning it. You've got to get there by surrendering everything to me and trusting me as your Savior. So it isn't a matter of giving up things, it's a matter, listen, it's a matter of placing first things first, Jesus. When Jesus is in your life, all those things take their place. But for him, for him the issue was that he was covetous, that he owned much, but he was owned by much. And the Scripture says he was extremely wealthy and he was unwilling to lay all that down and follow Jesus. What a fool. And he went away grieving for he was one who owned much property. He won the answer, he found the answer. The answer was, is there anything wrong with being rich? No. Anything wrong with having much? No. Anything wrong with being wealthy and successful? No. As long as you rise at the most important thing in your life is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and that you follow Him. God takes people who are very wealthy and uses them to promote the kingdom of God. He takes people who are gifted in lots of ways to promote the kingdom of God. It's what owns us that gets us in trouble. And the fact that you think that if you get enough, accomplish enough, have enough authority and prestige and popularity in life, that's going to satisfy you. Listen to me carefully. That is the Devil's lie. You see, this is a folly of ignoring God and the Word of God. The Devil doesn't want you to believe in him. Certainly not, because you know what? He has you. And you say, well, the Devil doesn't have me. Well, then why don't you go to church? Well, I don't believe in church. Why don't you read the Bible? I don't believe the Bible. What do you believe? There's something big missing in your life. You see, the only thing you have then is yourself. So I want to say to you, whoever you are, the only thing that you're going to have to do is face yourself and ask yourself the question, am I trusting in something else other than Jesus? Somebody says, well, I don't believe in Him. You better start. Because Jesus Christ is the Son of God. And God the Father sent Him into this world. This is why you hear us say, quote this Scripture, For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him and to believe in Him and surrender your life to Him, shall not perish but have eternal life. That's the key to eternal life, nothing else. And the issue is this. What is it in your life that you're holding onto, that you're grasping, that either you own or it owns you? What is in your life that's more important than eternal life? The Bible says, who shall shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved? That means I acknowledge that He's the Son of God. I acknowledge my sinfulness, acknowledge my need of Him, and surrender my life to Him. So I would ask you one last question. Is there anything missing in your life? Well, the one ultimate question is, can you look back in your life and point at a time, and you said, I know that this time in my life, I trust in Jesus. I believed in Him. That is, I accepted Him as my personal Savior. I know that I've trusted Him as my Savior. You may not be able to know the time, but you know for sure that at some point in your life, you made the most important decision in your life. The decision that determined your eternal destiny. The decision that nobody can change. The decision that nobody can steal from you under any condition. You're saved with the grace of God. Amen. Thank you for listening to Is Something Missing in Your Life? For more inspirational messages like this one, visit our 24-7 online station. And if you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or Intouch Ministries, stop by intouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of Intouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia. Intouch Ministries
